“That’s a curious thing. I’d have almost sworn it was a man’s voice that yelled. It went through me like a sharpened icicle.”
“All this was night before last. What have you been doing meantime?”
“Drove over to Marcus Corners to trade yesterday. There I heard about the murder and came back here to make a little business out of it. I’ve done fine.”
“You made no attempt to trace the woman?”
“Look here!” said Simon P. Groot after a spell of thoughtfulness. “Your ten dollars is good, and you’re a gent, all right; but I think I’ve talked a little too much with my mouth around here, and I’m afraid they might dig up this lady and start something new and want me for a witness. Witnessing is bad for business.”
“I’m safe,” said Kent.
“So far so good. Now, would it be worth five dollars to you, likely, a relic of the murderer?” suggested the old man.
“Quite likely.”
“Mum’s the word, then, for my part in it. That next morning I followed her trail a ways. You see, the yell in the night had got me interested. It was an easy trail to follow for a man that’s acquainted in the woods, and I used to be a yarb-grubber. Do a little of it now, sometimes. She’d met somebody in a thicket. I found the string and the paper of the bundle she was carrying, there. Then there was a fight of some sort; for the twigs were broken right to the edge of the thicket, and the ground stamped down. One or both of ’em must have broken out into the open, and I lost the trail. But this is what I found on a hazel bush. Do I win the five on it?”
Kent’s eyes drooped, fixing themselves on a small object which the other had laid on his knee. His lips pursed. Nothing that could be interpreted as an answer came from them. Simon P. Groot waited with patience. Finally he said: