Crimi built himself a small cabin about a mile from the Jimersons, in the direction of the rattlesnake ridge. He adorned the shack tastefully, and Marjorie’s deft hand gave a distinctly feminine neatness and charm to its appearance.
He became a frequent visitor at the Jimerson cabin, and evening after evening he read to them in his melodious, well modulated voice. Sometimes the draughtsman or transitman would come in, and Crimi would join in playing cards until late at night.
He seemed to take keen pleasure in the company of Marjorie and her husband, and his face always lit up at sight of them, especially when they were together. But it was the joy of a boy who sees the apples ripening for him on his neighbor’s tree, and knows that they will soon be ready for him to pluck. He was most happy when he was meditating his frightful revenge. As his preparations drew near their end, he often spent whole hours gloating over the fate in store for the couple. For Marjorie, in loving Jimerson, had aroused him to insane jealousy, and Jimerson, having robbed him of his heart’s desire, was included in Crimi’s fierce hate for the girl who had crossed him.
When, one evening, Marjorie and her husband happened in at Crimi’s cabin, Marjorie expressed her horror at the thought of Crimi wandering among the snake-infested rocks of the rattlesnake ridge. The snake-hunter seated her on a box that contained a twisting knot of the venomous reptiles.
Marjorie, serenely unaware, talked on blithely, and Crimi’s merry laugh pealed out at regular intervals. He was in right jovial mood that evening, for he was ready to spring the death-trap prepared for his two friends. He only awaited a favorable opportunity to strike.
The opportunity came when the surveyors’ cook, crazed by bad whisky, smashed up the kitchen. Jimerson discharged him, and the cook muttered threats of a horrible vengeance.
“Shut up,” Jimerson ordered. “This is the third time you’ve been seeing snakes, and now you’ve wrecked the cook shack. You ought to be sent to jail—or a lunatic asylum.”
“It’s you that will be seeing snakes,” the cook spluttered. “You an’ that Italian wife of yours’ll see plenty of ’em—red, an’ green, an’——”