Wheeling Sunday register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1882-1934, 1900-01-21

sound Of heavy breathing came from
the dark mass The moor treacher-
ously hid her face at this, the critical
moment Of the night. Tremblingly
the m in the saddle leaned for
ward. If that dark something should
prove to BE-. The moo lent her
full light to the solution of the mys-
terry! A horse. either lying or dead.
blocked the road at a narrow turn
where the gray powders encroached
most sharply. 1t was impossible to
manage Madge in her frantic terror
of the dark obstruction. With a cour-
age born of her fears for the man
she loved. Harriet slipped nimbly 70
the ground, and, securing the mare
by fastening her hitching rein to a
chance limb, she walked resolutely
toward the object.
1t was Maltby. The horse that Ledyard
Fielding had ridden to Tenbridge that
afternoon! The noble brute was breathing
his last. From a ragged hole in his fore
head a dark stream of blood was oozing.
lie had been shot right in the temple.
Where, then, was his rider?
Harriet cast terrified glances up and
down the road, across it, to the right and
to the left! There was not a moving
thing In sight, save her own frightened
self and no less frightened beast.
She lifted up her voice to shout Led
yards name. Then clasped her throat
with a new terror. What if another than
Fielding should hear and answer She ran
a.mIessly hither and thither under the
pitiless moonlight, crying silently to
heaven t. guide her, to tell her what to do,
where to go.
Another object in the road caught her
eve, small and black. She stopped to ex-
anime it. 1t was the little oil-skin bag
that was used for the mail matter for the
gulch. Fielding always swung it over his
shoulders when going for letters. She
swung 1t over hers now, scarcely knowing
what disposition she made of it. She had
found it on the side of the road nearest to
the ledge Of rock.
"Perhaps," Her teeth chartered in her
head. That old story came back to her.
Rogers had been driving the wagon the
DAY Mr.. Farindale had told that CHASTITY
story. He told how this would-be MUIR
derer had tried to fling his victim over the
ledge of rock into the narrow river which
coursed noisly past its base. Once, since
the property had been her own, she had
stood upon the dizzy margin of the ledge
and looked down into the babbling waters,
going over the whole scene somewhat
Electrically. 1t all came back to her now
She ran toward the spot, stumbling, fall
ing, recovering ~herself-stopping. Surely
she heard other sounds than the noisy
rush of the waters and the sad signing of
the night air among the aspen leaves. She
moved forward more cautiously. There
was a muffled sound of excited breathing,
the shuffling of tangled footsteps, a sound
as of men struggling mutely in a life and
death grip. Again she lifted up her voice
to call aloud. No sound came from her
parched throat. She leaned forward in an
attitude of strained attention. She could
see nothing.
Overhead the moon was sailing in a sea
of cloudless blue. In front of her rose in
exorably a huge gray bowlder. She toiled
up It's side with shaking limbs.
The shuffling of feet ceased. Then fol-
lowed a dull thud, an execration, a groan-
silerce.
She rushed recklessly forward on the
downward slope of the bowlder. Had
certain death awaited her at its feet she
must still have gone forward. From the
last low ledge to the sparse short grass
she took a spring. then recoiled with a cry
of pain.
A mans body lay in a huddle at her fee,
She stopped with chattering teeth TO get a
closer view OF 1t. That uncouth shape.
shaggy shocko Of unkempt hair, rude growth
OF red whiskers cid not belong TO Ledyarl
Fielding. She cast about her wildly for the
victor Of this fierce struggle. How fared
he?
His name rang out clearly with q
NKnn