his retreat and his supine position no longer, and rolled himself out of
the bed of leaves that Teresa had so carefully prepared for him. He rose
to his feet stiff and sore, and, supporting himself by the nearest tree,
moved a few steps from the dead ashes of the camp-fire. The movement
frightened the lizard, who abandoned the paper and fled. With a
satirical recollection of Brace and his "ridiculous" discovery through
the medium of this animal, he stooped and picked up the paper. "Like as
not," he said to himself, with grim irony, "these yer lizards are in the
discovery business. P'r'aps this may lead to another mystery," and he
began to unfold the paper with a smile. But the smile ceased as his eye
suddenly caught his own name.
A dozen lines were written in pencil on what seemed to be a blank leaf
originally torn from some book. He trembled so that he was obliged to
sit down to read these words:--
"When you get this keep away from the woods. Dunn and another man are
in deadly pursuit of you and your companion. I overheard their plan to
surprise you in our cabin. DON'T GO THERE, and I will delay them and put
them off the scent. Don't mind me. God bless you, and if you never see
me again think sometimes of
"TERESA."
His trembling ceased; he did not start, but rose in an abstracted way,
and made a few deliberate steps in the direction Teresa had gone. Even
then he was so confused that he was obliged to refer to the paper again,
but with so little effect that he could only repeat the last words,
"think sometimes of Teresa." He was conscious that this was not all; he
had a full conviction of being deceived, and knew that he held the
proof in his hand, but he could not formulate it beyond that sentence.
"Teresa"--yes, he would think of her. She would explain it. And here she
was returning.
In that brief interval her face and manner had again changed. Her face
was pale and quite breathless. She cast a swift glance at Dunn and the
paper he mechanically held out, walked up to him, and tore it from his
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