About twelve o'clock that night a Negro woman came rushing along at full speed. Ramon seized her and she uttered a loud scream, falling in a helpless heap at his feet. With a tight grip on her arm he said,
"Have you, too, blighted somebody's happiness? Have you murdered some one?"
With terror stricken eyes the woman looked up into his face and said, "Mistah, please lemme go, please sah!"
"What have you done?" sternly asked Ramon.
"Nothin' sah," said she. "I'se been roun' ter Dilsy Harper's, settin' up ovah Bud Harper's daid body, whut wuz sent home frum de bridge. Wal, sah, ez shuah ez dis here chile is bawn ter die, while we wuz settin' up ovah Bud's body, Bud hisself walked in. We looked at Bud, den at de body, en we wuz skeert ter death. Den de livin' Bud, went up an looked down on de daid Bud, and de daid Bud skeert de livin' Bud, and de livin' Bud fairly flew outen dat house. Den, bless yer soul, honey, dat ole house wuz soon empty."
This weird tale furnished the needed diversion to Ramon's overburdened mind. His thoughts began to run in another direction.
"Was the mob mistaken? Is the man thought to have been killed yet alive? If one mistake has been made, who can say that two haven't been made? Is her real murderer yet alive?"
Such were the thoughts that went crashing through Ramon's mind and his grip on the woman's arm slackened. The woman wrenched herself loose and continued her journey with increased speed.
As late as it was Ramon hurried to the Harpers' home and found the Negroes standing about at a distance from the house, discussing the sudden reappearance and disappearance of Bud Harper, when there, all agreed, lay Bud before their very eyes.
Ramon returned to his home strangely becalmed, and though late in the night he sat down and wrote the following letter to his home in the North.