A half mile from the commissary she paused indecisively at a crossroads. The right-hand road, leading to Shoalwater River, meant the lengthening of her journey a full mile; but the river, with its promise of a cooling plunge, enticed her. As she stood hesitant, trying to decide, she observed a stranger approaching on horseback. She drew aside to let him pass, but he reined in his horse and hailed her.
“Evenin’, little sister! Live hereabouts?”
“Down the left-hand fork a piece.” Selina Jo bent her steady glance upon the stranger. “Who air you?”
“I’m Holmes—sheriff of the county.”
Instinctively the girl drew back. “What air you wantin’ o’ me? I ain’t done nothin’.”
“Lord bless you, little sister,” the sheriff laughed, “I’m not after you. Thought maybe as you live round here you might tell me something I want to know.”
It seemed that a murder had recently been committed in the bay-shore country ten miles distant. Circumstances pointed to the guilt of two men who had been arrested. Assuming that the murderers had passed through the Hudsill section en route to or from the scene of the crime, the sheriff was seeking evidence to prove this.
Strangers were enough of a rarity in the neighbourhood to be remembered easily. Selina Jo recalled two men who had passed that way whose description fitted those charged with the murder.
Sheriff Holmes was elated. “Would you like a trip to Eastview?” he asked.
“Eastview?” Selina Jo’s heart skipped a beat. “That’s town, ain’t it—whare the railroad trains is at?”