“No!” Garner cried, firmly, even fiercely, as he turned and struck the counter near him with his open hand. “There you go with your eternal sentiment! I tell you this is a grave happening tonight—grave for us and still graver for Pete. Once let that mob find out that they were tricked and they will hang our man or burn this town in the effort.”
“I understand that well enough,” admitted Dwight, “but the Lord knows we could trust his own flesh and blood when they have so much at stake.”
“I am not willing to risk it, if you are,” said Garner, crisply, glancing round at the others for their sanction. “It will be an awful thing for them to hear the current report in the morning, but they'd better stand it for a few days than to spoil the whole thing. A negro is a negro, and if Lewis and Linda knew the truth they would be Shouting instead of weeping and the rest of the darkies would suspect the truth.”
“That's a fact,” Blackburn put in, reluctantly. “Negroes are quick to get at the bottom of things, and with no dead body in sight to substantiate a lynching story they would smell a mouse and hunt for it till they found it. No, Carson, real weeping right now from the mammy and daddy will help us out more than anything else. Yes, they will have to bear it; they will be all the happier in the end.”
“I suppose you are right,” Dwight gave in. “But it's certainly tough.”
CHAPTER XXVII.
