I looked at her in astonishment. This was the girl who was afraid of mice.
"But don't you mind—that?" I pointed over my shoulder at the heap under the archway. The moon was creeping upward towards the zenith, and the light had now illuminated the dark face and wet, snaky curls of that which had been Mad Jeremy. I went nearer to look at him. I wanted to make sure that he was indeed dead.
The bullet had entered a trifle behind one ear, traversed the base of the skull, and come out by the opposite temple. This time there was no mistake—the creature was dead.
Two little crosses of white caught my eye, one over each bullet hole. She saw me bend down to examine them.
"That's the Geneva pattern," she said calmly. "It's plaster from my 'First Aid to the Wounded' case. I always carry it—so convenient. Now let us go back and tell Mr. Yarrow!"
"Before we start," I said, "I think you had better give me that pistol, and after this you stick to your First Aids!"
"If I had stuck to my First Aids," she retorted, "you wouldn't have needed any aids—first, second, or third!"
However, she handed over the revolver, "not (as she said) because she was afraid of it, but because it weighed down her pocket so much it was making her walk lopsided!"
*****
There is ever so much to tell—about how Elsie and I quarrelled and made up—that of course. How Mr. Yarrow, senior, would and Mrs. Yarrow wouldn't. How my mother pestered me about Harriet Caw, and Mr. Mustard pestered Elsie on his own account. Then, there is all about how we were at last rid of the Caw girls, Harriet and Constantia both, and who rid us of them. That is a ripping part. There isn't so much battle, murder, and sudden death in all this, but it's even more interesting, especially the part where Elsie and I decided to take our fate into our own hands. It all came right enough in the end, of course, or I shouldn't be writing like this, looking out on the sheep pasturing on the Cheviot slopes, and listening to the whaups crying.