Now it was a tragic wreck of a woman whose garments hung in fantastic shreds upon her body, whose white skin shone through in many places and whose great eyes gleamed from her ghastly face with awful light. One long gold braid of hair hung from her head in a dangling loop. The other was loose to its roots and swept in a ragged flag to her hip. Long wisps of it shone here and there upon the trampled grass around.
And over her from head to foot was blood—blood in clots and streaks and splotches, while from a small gash on her temple a red stream slowly dripped.
The man was awed for once in his relentless life.
“Heaven!” he said, “what have you done? Where’s Provine?”
“Dead, I hope,” said Nance Allison dully.
Arnold struck his horse and dashed away, riding here and there as if he must know the ghastly finish quickly.
For a while it seemed that the man was gone entirely.
Then suddenly his horse shied from something moving in the deep grass by a spring and Arnold dismounted.
He had found Provine—Sud Provine rolling in agony, his face in the mud. With no gentle hand he grasped his shoulder and pulled him up.
“What’s all this?” he rasped. “What’s the matter with you?”