"Would that save her name, Mr. Belford?"
"Look here, you don't mean that the people believe that newspaper's insinuation."
"They don't. Representatives of the best families have called to show their faith, but what would they think if Estell should shoot you?"
"And what would they think if I should run away? No, I will stay."
"Then I have nothing more to say, Mr. Belford."
He strode out, catching up his hat at the door, and I counted the steps as he trod down the stairs.
Early the next morning I walked out from the town, but at no time did I turn toward the Senator's house. I went down the road that led through the cypress land, into the deep silence of the swamp. I passed the house of the Notorious Bugg, and I saw it trembling (a mere fancy, of course) with the shake of the aguish sons-in-law. A road, impassable except in the driest of seasons, wound about among deep pools of yellow slime. The ground shook under my careful tread, and the slightest jar was sufficient to disturb an acre of spongy desolation. I sat on a log with the feeling that no eye could see me. Sometimes the silence was so strained that it sang in my ear; sometimes I was startled by the flapping and the shriek of a gaunt bird, skimming the surface of the ooze. In this creepy solitude I took myself to task. Behind an error of the heart there stands a sophist, a Libanius, to offer a specious consolation—a voice ever ready to say, "It was not your fault; you do not create your own desires and neither can you control them." This is true enough, but a man can control his actions. I should have gone away, for the commonest of sense had pointed out the weakness, the crime, of remaining. And what had I hoped for? To tell her that I would wait, with a hope ever warm in my heart. I could not see a crime in that. But I could not tell her—she would not permit me to lead up to so embarrassing a subject. Washington was right. It was my duty to go away, not to save myself, but to keep Estell's hands free of blood.
Strong in my resolve, I walked briskly toward the town, and, coming out of the swamp, I was still strong, but my heart fluttered when from a rise of ground I saw the Senator's house, far away. To the left of the road lay a piece of land, wild with briers and a growth of new timber, a thicket checkered with cattle paths. Up the road I saw a man coming, and, as he drew nearer, I recognized the slouching figure of Bugg Peters. I did not care to meet him, to be compelled to answer or evade his questions, so I turned aside into the thicket and brushed my way along a narrow path. On a sudden I leaped aside into a tangle of bushes. A pistol or gun had fired it seemed almost at my elbow. I listened, but heard not a sound. I thought I saw smoke arising off to my left, but it might have been mist, for the day was dark with vapors and low-hanging clouds. I was uneasy, and not knowing whither my path might lead, I turned back; and just as I reached the road a man and a boy, struggling through the undergrowth, ran past me. They said nothing, but, looking back with fright in their faces, ran off toward town. I looked about for Peters, but did not see him. I wondered what it all could mean.
Upon entering the town I avoided the busier streets, and passed through quiet by-ways. At the foot of the rear stairway leading to my room stood a man.
"Hold on," he said, and then shouted to someone above. A man came running down the steps.