Holliday bent over and pawed among the blankets. He brought out a curious little contrivance, very much like a trap. It was a board with a revolver tied to it and a thong so arranged that pressure on the thong would discharge the revolver into the source of the pressure.
Cheechako sniffed at it. It was the source of the peculiar odor he had noted in his master’s bunk. He wagged his tail placatingly and looked up at Holliday.
“Right where my head would have gone,” said Holliday, shuddering a little in spite of himself, “when I lay down to sleep. And he was going to stay here overnight. I see how he killed Carson now. Pfaugh!”
Sick with disgust, and a little shaken, he flung down the board.
Holliday did not go down-river at daybreak. It was nearer noon when he started. And instead of one deeply-carved cross in the ground about the cabin there were two. One read:
SAM CARSON
MURDERED
JUNE 2, 19—
And the other: