The King of Arcadia put a hand on Ballard's shoulder and pointed an appreciative finger at Blacklock.
"That young cub, suh, hasn't any mo' horse sense than one of youh Dago mortah-mixers; but the way he drives a motor-car is simply scandalous! Why, suh, if my hair hadn't been white when we started, it would have tu'ned on me long befo' we made the loop around Dump Mountain."
Ballard went to the door with the two Good Samaritans, saw the colonel safely settled in the runabout, and let his gaze follow the winding course of the little car until the dodging tail-light had crossed the temporary bridge below the camp, to be lost among the shoulders of the opposite hills. The elder Fitzpatrick was at his elbow when he turned to go in.
"There's hope f'r the little man, Misther Ballard?" he inquired anxiously.
"That's the brave wor-rd. The min do be sittin' up in th' bunk-shanties to hear ut. 'Twas all through the camp the minut' they brought him in. There isn't a man av thim that wouldn't go t'rough fire and wather f'r Misther Bromley--and that's no joke. Is there annything I can do?"
"Nothing, thank you. Tell the yard watchman to stay within call, and I'll send for you if you're needed."
With this provision for the possible need, the young chief kept the vigil alone, sitting where he could see the face of the still unconscious victim of fate, or tramping three steps and a turn in the adjoining office room when sleep threatened to overpower him.
It was a time for calm second thought; for a reflective weighing of the singular and ominous conditions partly revealed in the week agone talk with Elsa Craigmiles. That she knew more than she was willing to tell had been plainly evident in that first evening on the tree-pillared portico at Castle 'Cadia; but beyond this assumption the unanswerable questions clustered quickly, opening door after door of speculative conjecture in the background.
What was the motive behind the hurled stone which had so nearly bred a tragedy on his first evening at Elbow Canyon? He reflected that he had always been too busy to make personal enemies; therefore, the attempt upon his life must have been impersonal--must have been directed at the chief engineer of the Arcadia Company. Assuming this, the chain of inference linked itself rapidly. Was Macpherson's death purely accidental?--or Braithwaite's? If not, who was the murderer?--and why was the colonel's daughter so evidently determined to shield him?