“Meanin’—well—boys, I seen a girl in the graveyard that night. Splashed my flashlight full in her face oncet. I think he seen her too—”
A low mutter from Bill as he took another drink in big gulps.
“Know who she was?” asked Cottar, the man who had not spoken yet.
“Nope. I don’t live around these diggin’s you know, but I’d know her again ef I seen her, I swear I would. She had eyes you don’t forget.”
The man drank in silence and watched him.
“Get it all off’n yer chest Tyke—” said Bill at last. “There’s more comin’.”
Tyke edged in his chair uneasily. He dropped his voice to a whisper:
“She slep’ in a hammock that night. I seen her. I follered after he went back to the village. I made an excuse an’ cut across to the station. Remember? But I come back after you all left an’ went down the road a piece. I think I could find the house again. I seen her in a hammock underneath the trees.”
The men bit hard on their pipes and watched him in silence piercing him through with little narrowed eyes in the smoke haze of the room, grilling his soul to see if it were true.
“Well, whaddaya figger?” Taney asked at last.