MURDER.
It was a summer morning, between six and seven. The last thread of
mist has melted in the warming air, air suffused with sunshine and
crisp with a lingering freshness from the night; the banks all dewy,
and the river asparkle in the slanting light.
Considine stepped into a skiff in the boat-house beneath his chamber,
and shot out into the stream to take his morning plunge. Then
lingeringly snuffing the sweet cool air and surveying the upward
moving banks as he drifted down, with fingers idling among the
intricacies of buttons, and talking aloud, he leisurely undressed
himself for his swim:
"Can that be the glitter of a gunbarrel in the sun? It is--reminds one
of the sharpshooters on the Rappahannock river during the war. What
can the fellow be skulking for, like that, among the bushes? He
remembers it's the close season for duck perhaps; but he might take
courage, and stand boldly forth this morning; there is not one on the
river to pop at, as far as I can see. I must give the Game Preserving
Association a hint when I go to town, though. Well! here goes.
One--two--three!" He dived into the river, and the bracing coolness
licked his languid limbs into a new feeling of firmness and strength.
Regaining the surface, and shaking his eyes clear of the dripping
hair, he turned to survey his sportsman, now standing full in view.
"Ralph Herkimer!--and taking aim!--last night--I understand. My
God!--if he aims straight--I'm done for."
The skiff had drifted on in front during his gambols, and he now
struck out with all his might to gain its side and interpose it
between himself and danger; but he never reached it. A flash and a
puff of smoke upon the shore, a crack, and a stinging sensation in the
shoulder, paralyzing the arm, and he went under water. Rising
presently, he struck out anew, straining every sinew to overtake the
boat, and almost reaching it, when he lifted the sound arm to lay
hold--lifted it too soon. It fell short, fell back on the water, and
he plunged headforemost to the bottom. His head may have struck upon a
sunken rock, or--or anything. He struggled, feeling himself drowning,
and then he grew drowsy, his consciousness grew vague and dreamlike,
and then there was an end. The current swept onward undisturbed, and
the empty boat drifted down stream towards the sedgy islands, where
the river took a turn, and was lost from view.
Ralph Herkimer stood upon the shore watching with an intentness which
left him deaf and impervious to every other impression. The rifle had
slipped from his shoulder, the butt rested on the ground, and a thread
of smoke still crept out from the barrel. His hand supported it
mechanically. His perceptions were out upon the river. The victim was
hit, he saw so much, and when he sank, Ralph drew a breath of infinite
relief between his tight-set teeth; but still he could not turn away
his eyes.
The head emerged above the tide again. What?--and he was wounded?--and
yet about to escape!--and it would be known that it was he--Ralph--who
had fired. He must not let him escape--and yet, to fire again? The
first shot, being unlooked for, would pass unnoticed; the next, all
ears along the river being now aroused, would surely be observed. He
clutched the rifle, with one barrel still to fire, and watched the
swimmer. How heavily he floundered through the water, yet with what
desperate force; and, really, he was gaining on the boat. If he
should reach it the deed would be out--everything known--and it would
then be too late to shoot. A boat with a corpse--an empty boat, with
blood-stains, would be enough to set the law and the detectives to
work. He lifted the gun, but his heart beat far too wildly to take
aim. His eyes were clouded, his hands shook; while out in the stream
the swimmer could be seen in frantic effort struggling along and
gaining on the boat.
And now it seems to Ralph there is no choice. He _must_ fire again, or
the swimmer will gain the boat, and everything be known. Why should
his hand tremble now? When did he ever fail to knock a squirrel from
the tree? Has he not shot a bear in his time? Is not the danger of
letting this man escape worse than any mischief the bear could have
done him? and yet----
Ha! The swimmer rises in the water, throwing out his arm as though to
grasp the boat. It is beyond his reach. He falls forward in the tide
and disappears. A foot is seen above the water for an instant, and is
gone. The boat drifts onward all alone. The gun has not gone off, and
Ralph sinks on the bank, panting and weak in the revulsion of
excitement. His eyes follow the drifting boat and watch the even
glassy flowing in its wake, but the waters part not asunder any more.
No head emerges panting and struggling to disturb the mirrored lustre
reflected from the morning clouds. The thing is done.