The narrative was interrupted by bursts of grief, changing to indignation, when she came to tell Zeb of the suspicion entertained by the people—that Maurice was the murderer.
“It air a lie!” cried the hunter, partaking of the same sentiment: “a false, parjured lie! an he air a stinkin’ skunk that invented it. The thing’s impossible. The mowstanger ain’t the man to a dud sech a deed as that. An’ why shed he have dud it? If thur hed been an ill-feelin’ atween them. But thur wa’n’t. I kin answer for the mowstanger—for more’n oncest I’ve heern him talk o’ your brother in the tallest kind o’ tarms. In coorse he hated yur cousin Cash—an who doesn’t, I shed like to know? Excuse me for sayin’ it. As for the other, it air different. Ef thar hed been a quarrel an hot blood atween them—”
“No—no!” cried the young Creole, forgetting herself in the agony of her grief. “It was all over. Henry was reconciled. He said so; and Maurice—”
The astounded look of the listener brought a period to her speech. Covering her face with her hands, she buried her confusion in a flood of tears.
“Hoh—oh!” muttered Zeb; “thur hev been somethin’? D’ye say, Miss Lewaze, thur war a—a—quarrel atween yur brother—”
“Dear, dear Zeb!” cried she, removing her hands, and confronting the stalwart hunter with an air of earnest entreaty, “promise me, you will keep my secret? Promise it, as a friend—as a brave true-hearted man! You will—you will?”
The pledge was given by the hunter raising his broad palm, and extending it with a sonorous slap over the region of his heart.
In five minutes more he was in possession of a secret which woman rarely confides to man—except to him who can profoundly appreciate the confidence.
The hunter showed less surprise than might have been expected; merely muttering to himself:—
“I thort it wild come to somethin’ o’ the sort—specially arter thet ere chase acrost the purayra.”