Time passed on. Donald was still at large. The reward had failed.
Private detectives from Montreal, who had remained in the district for
weeks, returned in disgust, confessing that Morrison's capture was
impossible so long as he had friends to inform him of every movement,
and the woods to retreat to.
At the police headquarters in Montreal various schemes were discussed.
Chief Hughes was of opinion that thirty resolute men, skilfully
directed, could accomplish the capture.
It was now the fall, and if action were not speedily taken, the winter
woods, filled with snow, would soon mock all effort of authority.
The press kept up the public interest in the case. Morrison had been
seen drinking at the hotel in Lake Megantic. He had attended a dance in
Marsden. He had driven publicly with the Mayor of Gould, with his rifle
slung from his shoulder. He went to church every Sunday, and he had
taken the sacrament. All this according to the press. Did the Mercier
Government, then, confess that it had abdicated its functions? Was this
Scotland in the Seventeenth Century, and this Morrison a romantic Rob
Roy, with a poetic halo round his picturesque head, or was it America
in the Nineteenth, with the lightning express, the phonograph, and
Pinkerton's bureau, and this criminal one of a vulgar type in whose
crime sentiment had no place?
Did the Government intend to allow this man to defy the law? If it did,
was this not putting a premium upon crime? If it did not, what steps did
it intend to take to secure his arrest? Thus far the newspapers.