"No; nearly half an hour."
"Where was he then?"
"He was going up-stairs."
"Very well, we want him. See him, and tell him so."
Frank went into the house, but came back into the bar-room after an absence of nearly five minutes, and said that he could not find his father anywhere.
"Where is he then?" was angrily demanded.
"Indeed, gentlemen, I don't know." Frank's anxious look and frightened manner showed that he spoke truly.
"There's something wrong about this—something wrong—wrong," said one of the men. "Why should he be absent now? Why has he taken no steps to secure the man who committed a murder in his own house, and before his own eyes?
"I shouldn't wonder if he aided him to escape," said another, making this serious charge with a restlessness and want of evidence that illustrated the reckless and unjust spirit by which the mob is ever governed.
"No doubt of it in the least!" was the quick and positive response. And at once this erroneous conviction seized upon every one. Not a single fact was presented. The simple, bold assertion, that no doubt existed in the mind of one man as to Slade's having aided Green to escape, was sufficient for the unreflecting mob.