What, Carson asked himself, would his father say to this deeper step—this headlong plunge into misfortune as the outcome of the cause he had espoused?
Carson could not sleep, and fancying that if his light were out he might do so, he rose and extinguished it and went back to bed. But he was still restless. The hours dragged by. It was after twelve o'clock, when on the still night air came the steady beat of a horse's hoofs in the distance, growing louder and louder, till with a cry of “Woah!” the animal was reined in at the hotel door, and the stentorian voice of the rider called out: “Hello! hello in thar!”
There was a pause, but no response. The landlord was evidently a sound sleeper.
“Hello! hello!” Again the call rang jarringly through the empty hall below and up the stairway.
Carson sat erect, put his feet on the floor, and stood out in the centre of the room. He told himself that it was an officer of the law in pursuit of him. How silly to have imagined that such a thing could remain hidden! And his mother! Yes, it would kill her! Poor, poor, gentle, frail woman! He had tried to obviate the blow, resorting to deception, to actual flight; he had submerged himself in the mire of criminal secrecy, according to the letter of the law, that he might shield her, and for what purpose? Yes, the blow would kill her. Dr. Stone had plainly said so.
He went to the window and looked out. At the gate below he saw a man on a horse, and heard him muttering impatiently.
“Hello in Thar!” The cry was accompanied by an oath. “Are you-uns plumb deaf? What do you keep a tavern fur, anyhow?”
There was a sound in the room below of some one getting out of bed, and then a drowsy voice cried: “Who's there?” It was the landlord.
“Me, Jim Purvines. Let me in, Tom. I've got to have a bed an' a stall fer my nag. I'm completely fagged out.”
“All right, all right. I'll join you in a minute. Where in the thunder have you been, Jim?”