"Get it sent to Beachum," said the voice. "I joined Mike in the robbery, and wish him to get off."
The window fell from the powerless hold of the thunderstruck girl, and struck the speaker's hand which was on the end of the portmanteau. The blow was a severe one; he ran off, and the portmanteau fell down within the house, where it lay as if it had been placed there by the hands of a housewife. It was some time before the miserable girl came back to the consciousness of her true position. The last words of the voice—"I joined Mike in the robbery, and wish him to get off"—rung in her ears like a death-knell; and the next moment her eyes fell on the fatal portmanteau—the very article stolen by her lover—that which was to convict him, to hang him. She grew frantic, ran to the door, looked east and west through the shadows of the trees, flew first one way, then another, called aloud, screamed, and called again. No one answered. The man was gone. She returned into the house, where her eyes again met and recoiled from the damning memorial. Terror now took possession of her mind. The circumstance of the portmanteau being found there would form the only link wanting of the evidence that would hang her lover. Were she to state how it came there—concealing the last dreadful words which still haunted her ear—she would not be believed; and if she told the whole truth, including the fatal words, the same result—the condemnation of her lover—would follow. What therefore was she to do? She could not discover it; but could she conceal it without danger to herself as well as to him? It was clear she could not; and, besides, her soul abhorred secresy and deceit of all kinds.
As she sat in this state of doubt and despair, a noise of footsteps was heard at the door, with whisperings and broken ejaculations. A tremor passed over her. They might be officers of justice come to search the house. A rap sounded softly on the door, and the whisperings continued. The portmanteau must, in any view, be concealed in the meantime; and, until her mind was made up, she flew and seized the covering of the bed, and hurriedly threw it over the glaring evidence of her lover's guilt. She had scarcely accomplished this hasty, but fatal concealment, when the door opened, and three sheriff-officers entered the house, and asked her if Mike Maxwell had left anything to her charge? The necessity for acting prudently called up her energies. She stood erect before the men.
"No," she replied, "Mike Maxwell committed nothing to my charge."
"We have here a warrant for a search, young woman; and you will not be annoyed by our putting it to execution."
She was silent, and shook from head to heel. One of the men drew off the bed-cover, and discovered the object of their search. Captain Beachum's name was on the top of it.
"So Mike committed nothing to your charge?" said the man, addressing Alice again.
"No," she answered, firmly.
"You can tell that to the sheriff," said the man. "Meantime, we take this article along with us."
He threw the portmanteau on his shoulders, and departed along with the concurrents, leaving the girl fixed to the floor like a statue.