Only one thing baffled her in the understanding of the event. She saw clearly that, the position of the seats in the dining-room being familiar to the engineer, it had been simplicity itself for him so to dispose the rifle in the tree as to have it trained on the spot occupied by Temple’s breast as the unsuspecting victim sat at table. It was hardly likely, moreover, that any other would be exposed to peril, since the smallness of the room was such that there was not sufficient space between sideboard and chairs on that side of the table for Mrs. Dustin to pass in her service of the meals. The deliberate malignity of the plot was appalling to May, as she considered this naked revelation of it. She was pallid, shuddering, nauseated.
The one thing that puzzled her for a time was the means by which the criminal had been able to secure the discharge of the rifle in his absence. It was plain that he had devised some method, so that he himself should be above suspicion, in the possession of a perfect alibi. It would, of course, be absurd for anyone to bring an accusation against him, when it was the common knowledge of all that he had been seated at the very table with the one against whom the attempt had been made. Yet, she failed to penetrate the method employed by him in firing the piece, and for a long time she puzzled over this in vain.
Then, at last, her eyes were caught by a fragment of cord, which hung from the trigger of the rifle. A brief examination showed her that the loose end was charred by fire, and immediately she guessed the nature of the device that had been employed. She knew that Masters in his work had had much experience with explosives, and, in consequence, with fuses of various sorts. She understood on reflection that he had used in this instance a fuse of such length as to permit his lighting it a long time before the moment of firing. Afterward, he had been able to leave the rifle unattended, confident that at the instant designed by him it would be fired automatically by the burning of the fuse. But, a minute later, it occurred to her that the trigger required to be pulled backward in order to discharge the weapon. The parting of the string she had discovered could by no means effect this. She had let the obscuring branch swing back into place the while she meditated. Now, she again thrust it out of the way, so that the light shone in brightly, as she bent to another scrutiny of the rifle. Her investigation was instantly rewarded, for she perceived a coil of spring, which ran from the trigger to one of the branches. Its blackness had hidden it from her eyes hitherto. The discovery made all clear. The cord had held the trigger forward in its usual place, acting against the power of the spring. Then, the burning of the string by the fuse had left the trigger unprotected against the pull of the spring, which, suddenly effective, had fired the rifle. The ingenuity of the scheme confounded the girl, as she sat staring at the evidences of treachery. Yet, in that moment of anguish, she was moved to murmur a prayer of thankfulness that the knowledge of her lover’s character had come to her in time to save her life from misery and degradation as his wife.
After a long time crouched there in the tree, May bestirred herself slowly and clambered down, leaving the rifle as she had found it, with the bit of charred string hanging, and the spring holding the trigger pulled, as it had been at the moment of the shot. It did not occur to her that it might be wiser to carry away these proofs of attempted murder. Indeed, in that first understanding of the guilt of Masters, she was too distraught to think clearly. She could only feel the vicarious shame that was hers by reason of him to whom she had accorded her love. Nor did she just then speculate much as to the exact motive that had actuated the engineer. She took it for granted that he had been influenced to his course by motives of greed, as was the fact in the main. She supposed that he had thought the murder of Saxe Temple would cause a delay in the search, by which he might profit to the extent of finding the treasure himself. It did not occur to her that an older and more primitive passion than greed, even, one more savage, too, might have driven him on to the crime. In her horrified amazement over the deed itself, she quite forgot the jealousy that had sprung in her heart by reason of her lover’s devotion to Margaret West. Yet, at that very moment, the man who had just striven in vain to redden his hands with the blood of a fellow creature, was with Margaret West in a bowered nook of the shore, pouring forth the story of his love in passionate phrases.
CHAPTER XII
THE SECRET VAULT
MAY passed a sleepless night, wearying her brain in a futile endeavor to see her path clearly. She felt that, for the sake of what had been, she could not bring herself to accuse Masters before the others, or even privately to his face. Yet, her manifest duty lay in some step that should prevent another effort by him. She was convinced that he would dare no more, when aware of the fact that there was a witness to bear testimony as to his guilt, and in this she probably reasoned justly. In the end, she decided to write him a note, informing him as to her knowledge, and warning him against further pursuit of his evil plans, or of herself. She would have the missive in readiness to hand to him on the occasion of his first appearance at the cottage.
When she had thus determined, it was time to dress, for the day was two hours old. As soon as she was clad with her accustomed nicety, she wrote the letter to the engineer, and then descended to breakfast, pale and wan, with heavy shadows under her eyes, but vastly relieved that, at last, she had reached a decision as to her conduct of the affair.
The letter thus prepared was not destined for delivery that day. Masters did not appear at the cottage. As a matter of fact, even his egotism was convinced of the sincerity and unchangeableness of Margaret West’s rejection of his suit. He found to his despair and wrath that the girl was totally irresponsive to his most ardent pleadings. The disappointment to him was the keener because it was so wholly unexpected. The girl had shown pleasure in his society from the first, and he had anticipated an easy victory, despite his jealousy of Saxe. Nevertheless, she repulsed him with a finality not to be denied. His failure was the more exasperating to him by reason of the fact that the cause baffled his every effort of understanding.