Burton excused himself to Miss McKay as soon as he could. He walked to the stables, and, finding himself unobserved, plunged down into the deep gulley. Here he strode on and on, his mind at first in a turmoil of confusion. Gradually the exercise calmed his brain and he was able to think more clearly. And the clearer he saw his position the less he liked it. Two courses were possible; to disappear and try again to lose himself, probably by taking up a homestead far back from the centres of civilization; or to make a clean breast of the whole thing to Kate. But what would she think of him when she knew the truth? Suppose she believed in his innocence, of which he had every confidence, would her attitude change when she knew him to be a fugitive from the law—an innocent man who lacked the moral courage to prove his innocence or accept the inevitable? That afternoon he had felt that he could tell her all; that night he knew that he could tell her nothing.
And yet the idea of unexplained disappearance was unbearable to him. He felt that he owed it to his friends here, whose home had been such an oasis to him in his desert of bad fortune, to relieve their minds of any doubt as to his personal safety. He now remembered that this thought had not occurred to him when he fled from Plainville, and the blood slowly mounted to his forehead. But he would not repeat that cruelty; whatever came he would have an interview with Mr. McKay.
He returned to the house. The cowboys were still absent, and Kate, after searching for him in vain, had gone riding alone. He found Mr. McKay still on the kitchen porch, and floundered into his task.
“I have come, Mr. McKay, to tell you that I must leave here, at once. I have just heard—that is, I have just had information which makes it imperative that I leave without an hour’s delay. The heavy end of the harvest is over. I hope you will get along without trouble. Good-bye.”
“But, boy, hang it, there’s somethin’ wrong about this. Bad news?”
“Yes, news that takes me away, and any news that forces me to leave your home is bad news.”
“But you will come back, Ray? You’ll be back when your troubles—when things is straightened up with you?”
The farmer sat back in his chair and drew deeply at his pipe for a full minute, his eyes slightly elevated and his brow knit in thought. When he spoke the words came slowly, as though each had been chosen after deliberation.
