"The three letters still left, which apparently came months ago, at intervals, in response to those just burned, are addressed to Miss Claxton at my office. I judge from this that Beardsley never knew of the alias 'Smith' or of this retreat. Indeed, Adolphus told me he does not know." Alden paused absently.
"These letters are no doubt from that beast. They are in feigned hand and anonymous; and the subject is money--no religion, no duty, no affection, is to be believed as long as money is withheld. Thousands of dollars are demanded. I've no means of knowing whether this money was given or not."
Durgan went over the notes, which Alden had described accurately.
"The negro is really dying, I suppose?" he asked. "He can help us no further?"
"Yes; he may be dead by this time; but, curiously enough, to the end of my interview he was chuckling, and saying that he would pay the villain and right the lady yet. But he would not give me, or the doctor, any indication of what he meant. He adjured me to----"
"Listen." Durgan went to the window as he spoke, and the dogs pricked their ears.
"I ought to be going home," said Durgan. "What were you saying?"
"Only that the fellow told me to keep my wits about me, and tell you to do the same. There is something to be subtracted from all the evidence he gave, for he was certainly, if rational at all, in a very fantastic humor."
The lawyer's tones were low and weary. Durgan was not even listening. He had opened the window a little.
"I think there is a horse, or horses, on the road from the Cove," he said. His thought glanced back to the last time he heard horsemen approach in the night, to arrest Adam. No errand of less baneful import seemed to fit the circumstances now.
The French clock on the mantel-shelf rang out twelve musical strokes.
There is, perhaps, no more enthralling sound than the far but sure approach of someone who comes unlooked-for to a lonely place. The two men who were keeping vigil became certain that travelers were ascending the steep zig-zags of Deer. They looked at one another in apprehensive silence, and went softly out to that side of the house nearest the road. The young moon had set, and there was cloud overhead. Almost an hour's journey below them the creak of wheel, the sound of hoof, came faint but nearer. The two house dogs stood by the men, a growl in their throats.