Very soon a boy led up Mrs. Martas’s pony, and she went out to the steps and mounted, followed by Celia on foot. The girl held the stirrup for her mistress, and as she did so looked back at Captain Martas with eyes in which shone strange love, pity, and tenderness; but the voice of her mistress called her away, and, even in turning her black and lustrous eyes toward Captain Martas, their expression totally changed, and showed for a fleeting instant the murderous glitter that gleamed from the eyes of a panther when ready for a fatal spring.
I was startled and troubled, and half moved forward to tell the lady not to go; but a moment’s reflection showed me how foolish such an unnecessary and silly interference would seem. A strange mistrust flitted across my mind, but there was nothing on which to base it. I could not give a reason for it, except to say that I had seen the light of a gladiator’s eye, the twitch and spasm of an assassin’s lip, in the eye and mouth of that now smiling and dutiful young slave girl. The thing was too foolish to think of, and I held my peace.
The women passed out of the gate, and went on quietly in the direction of the Black Swamp. Martas and I resumed our conversation. Hour after hour passed away, and the sun grew large and low in the West; still Mrs. Martas did not return. The sun was setting—set; but she had not come. Then Captain Martas called Toby and had him ride to the edge of the wood and see if he could learn anything of his mistress; but Toby soon came back, saying that he saw nothing except the pony’s tracks leading into the swamp, and the pony himself leisurely coming home without a rider. Then Captain Martas mounted, and I followed him. He took the plantation conch-shell, and we rode on into the dark forest as long as we could trace any footsteps of the pony, or find any open way, and again and again Captain Martas blew resonant blasts upon his shell that rolled far away over the swamp, seeking to apprise his wife that we were there, and waiting for her; but nothing came of it.
“They could hear the shell,” he said, “upon a still night like this three or four miles,” and it seemed to him impossible that they could have gone beyond the reach of the sound. But no answer came, and the moonless night came down over the great Black Swamp, and the darkness grew almost visible, so thoroughly did it shut off all vision like a vast black wall.
Then Martas sent Toby back to the plantation for fire and blankets, and more men, and soon a roaring blaze mounted skyward, and every few minutes the conch-shell was blown. Nothing more could be done. I remained with the now sorely troubled husband through the night. At the first peep of dawn he had breakfast brought from the plantation, and as soon as it became light enough to see in the great forest, we searched for and found the pony’s track, and we carefully followed the traces left in the soft soil. The chase led, with marvelous turns and twists, right along the little ridge of firmer land which led irregularly on between the boundless morasses stretched on either side, trending now this way, now that, but always penetrating deeper and deeper into the almost unknown bosom of the swamp. The pony had followed his own trail in coming out of the swamp, and this made it easier for us to trace his way. At last we came to the dark, sluggish, sullen water. It was a point of solid ground, of less than an acre in extent, a foot or two above the water, almost circular in outline, and nearly surrounded by the lagoon. It was comparatively clear of timber, and near the centre rose a grand magnolia tree, such as Celia had described to Mrs. Martas on the evening before. At the root of this tree, bathed with the rich, overpowering perfume of the wonderful bloom above her, lay the dead body of the beautiful woman, her clothes disordered, her hair disheveled, a coarse, dirty handkerchief stuffed into her mouth, and all the surroundings giving evidence of a despairing struggle and a desperate crime. Captain Martas was overcome with anguish, and after one agonized look around, as if to assure himself that Celia was not also somewhere in sight, he sat down beside the body and gazed upon his murdered wife in silent, helpless agony of spirit.
I desired all the men to remain where they were, except Toby, whom I ordered to follow me; and then, beginning at the little ridge of land between the waters by which we had reached the circular space before described, we followed the edge of the ground completely round to the starting point, seeking in the soft mud along the shore for a footprint, or the mark made by a canoe or skiff, for some evidence of the route by which the murderer had reached the little peninsula, or by which Celia had left it.
We found perfect tracks of all animal life existing in the swamps, even to the minute lines left by the feet of the smallest birds, but no trace of a human foot, although a snail could not have passed into or out of the water without leaving his mark upon the yielding mud, much less a footstep or a canoe.
The thing was inexplicable. Where was Celia? How had she gone without leaving a trace of her departure? Had she been there at all? Who had murdered Mrs. Martas? Surely some man or devil had perpetrated that crime. How had the villain escaped from the scene of his crime, leaving not the slightest clew by which it was possible to tell which way he had gone?
I reported to Captain Martas the exact condition of the affair, and told him I knew not what to do, unless we could get bloodhounds and put them on the trail. He said there were no hounds within sixty miles; that all of the planters he knew preferred to lose a runaway rather than to follow them with the dogs. Rumors of the loss of Mrs. Martas had spread from plantation to camp, and two or three soldiers had immediately ridden out to the plantation, and then had followed us to the scene of the crime. One of them said: “If there are no hounds, send to camp for old Du Chien. He is better than any dog.”
The remark was so singular that I asked: “What do you mean by saying ‘He is better than any dog’?”