'I went back to Pete, having nowhere else to go.'
'And when you got there was Jarman still there?'
I stopped for a second. This was the question I had all along been dreading. But I had no option. If I was going to keep my plighted word, and Pete was to be saved, I could not tell the truth. So I said,—
'He had gone.'
'Did you see him go—or meet him on the road?'
'No. I am quite sure I did not.'
'And when you were alone with Pete and the other man, Finnan, what did you do?'
'I told Pete what a nasty fix I was in, and let him see that my father had turned me out of doors for riding The Unknown.'
'You still consider, then, that the horse was The Unknown—and not the Gaybird, as people assert?'
'I cannot say. I never saw Gaybird. I only know that Pete told me his horse's name was The Unknown, and having no reason to doubt his veracity, that satisfied me, and I asked no further questions.'