“Ah! my dear Wilfrid,” he sighed. “It is really terrible—too terrible.”
“This is not the moment to discuss the affair. We must act,” I urged, and together we got over a gate and turned into a grass field which was a shorter cut to the wood.
“This way,” my friend directed. “The spot is up at that corner,” pointing away up the hill, where the wood loomed darkly against the sky.
Truth to tell, I shared Eric’s fear that Harris or one of his sons might be lurking in the neighbourhood, yet I said nothing. My only thought was for the woman who had been my friend, my playmate, the dainty love of my early youth. She might be all that her enemies said of her, yet for her mother’s sake, for Jack’s sake, I meant—if possible—to save her.
Keeping in the shadow of the hedgerows and walls, I allowed my companion to direct my footsteps. With his long practice in those boundless forests of eternal night in Equatorial Africa, he had learnt how to creep along with scarce a sound. He motioned to me to be silent, and presently we crossed the big turnip field and entered the thicket at the point where he had entered it that afternoon.
“This will destroy my track,” he whispered. “Tread always on your toes.”
His example I followed, malting my way through the brambles and undergrowth until, of a sudden, we came out into a small open space beneath some big trees on the edge of the wood itself, and there upon the ground I saw something lying. In the darkness I could not distinguish what it was, but Eric advanced slowly, and bending, turned to me, saying in a low whisper,—
“Here it is. But how can we search him without a light? If we strike a match it can be seen by anyone coming up the hill.”
I knelt at his side and ran my hands over the cold corpse. Ah! it was a gruesome moment. My eager fingers unbuttoned his jacket that was wet and clammy with blood, and quickly I put my fingers in his inner pocket. Yes! there were papers there. Quick as thought I thrust them into my own pocket, and then in the darkness searched his clothes thoroughly. In his hip-pocket I felt a small leather wallet or card-case, and in his left-hand trousers pocket was a pen-knife, both of which I secured; while Eric, making another search of his waistcoat, discovered an inner pocket which contained some paper or other, which he handed to me.
To search a dead man in the darkness is not the easiest thing, and even though we had gone through his pockets, yet I was not satisfied.