"Well, I learned that you were about to organize a vigilance committee, and thought I would present my name for a membership. So I rode over from my house, and as I passed the ford at the creek, I was knocked from the saddle, and when I recovered, I was robbed of my horse as well as watch and a large sum of money."
"Ho, ho! the robber robbed!" croaked the mysterious voice, and the cry appeared to float around the room above the company's heads, most of whom were deathly pale, while anxious, apprehensive glances ran from one to another. "Ho, ho! the robber robbed!"
"Our worthy friend is quite a ventriloquist," slowly uttered Poynter, as his fiery eyes roved around the room, dwelling slightly upon each face; but upon one in particular he cast a glance of mingled hatred and triumph, then passed to another. "I would willingly give half I am worth, just to take one lesson from him," dwelling with bitter emphasis upon each word.
"Well, friends, we may as well break off now before harm is done," said Neil McGuire, in a vexed tone. "There's something wrong here, and the less we say, perhaps the better it will be, for who can have any object in breaking up this meeting, unless he or they are connected with this accursed gang of scoundrels?"
"But what! must we give up the plan after all this to-do?" exclaimed Demetrius Bacon, again leaping upon his stool in order to gain the desired auditory, forgetful of his late downfall.
"Give up the devil!" retorted McGuire, who was not always precise in his language. "When I put my hand to a thing in dead up-and-down earnest, it's bound to go through. And now listen, all of you. Until you hear from me, attend to your business as usual, and do not make what has happened to-night the subject of conversation. We must use a little more circumspection, for if a spy can enter among us here we will need all our wits."
"I show you the spy—why don't you take him?" again squeaked the strange voice, and then as each man glanced at his neighbor, it added: "His name, now, is Clay Poynter!"
"My dear sir, whoever you may chance to be," cried the man thus strangely denounced, in an assumed tone of nonchalant politeness, as he glanced around the room, "I made an error a few moments since. I said that I would give half I am worth; so I will add the other moiety, if you grant me an interview."
There was no reply to this speech, and the party filed through the doorway into the bar-room of the "Twin Sycamores," the majority of them pausing to take a parting drink before leaving for home. Beside Neil McGuire stood a medium-sized man, of a sandy complexion, and who appeared to belong to a different class from the rough, homespun-clad farmers that surrounded him, if one might judge from his apparel and general demeanor.
A heavy gold watch-guard, from which depended a bunch of seals, crossed his waistcoat, and while with one hand holding a riding-whip he daintily flecked a speck of dust from the tip of his well-polished boot, the other raised a glass of liquor from the bar. As he did so, a solitaire diamond ring flashed back the candle-light with a thousand scintillations. Among the frills of his linen shirt-front a magnificent cluster pin of the same jewels gleamed forth, exciting the wonder and admiration of a number of the men present.