Assured that no one was near, he leaned over
and felt with his hand under the bench. His fingers closed upon an
object wedged between the seat and one of the slanting supports.
Quickly withdrawing it, he dropped it into his overcoat pocket,
and, after a moment, resumed his progress, making for the carriage
gate in the left lower corner of the grounds.
He had a sharp eye out for Rosabel Vick. He heard Annie Jordan's
high-pitched voice in the road ahead of him and slackened his pace.
In due time he limped up the steps of Dowd's Tavern.
Several women were in the "lounge," chattering like magpies in
front of the fire. There were no men about. He went in and for ten
minutes listened to the singing of his praises. Then, requesting a
pitcher of hot water, he hobbled upstairs, politely declining not
only the Misses Dowd's offer to bathe and bandage his heroic knee,
but Miss Grady's bottle of witchhazel, Miss Miller's tube of Baume
Analgesique and old Mrs. Nichols' infallible remedy for every
ailment under the sun,--a flaxseed poultice.
The first thing he did on entering his room was to open his trunk
and deposit therein the shiny object he had recovered from its
hiding-place under the tree-seat. Before hanging his hat on the
clothes-tree in the corner of the room, he thoughtfully examined
the bullet hole in the crown.
"Thirty-eight calibre, all right," he reflected.
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