Pagina 114 van 439

A new suspicion edged itself into his mind. "What did you talk

about? Did he say anything about--Did he--He always was a

terrible liar. Nobody ever believed Wolf Struve."

Without understanding the reason for it, she could see that he

was uneasy, that he was trying to discount the value of anything

the convict might have told her. Yet what could Struve the

convict, No. 9,432, have to do with the millionaire mine-owner,

Thomas J. Dunke? What could there be in common between them? Why

should the latter fear what the other had to tell? The thing was

preposterous on the face of it, but the girl knew by some woman's

instinct that she was on the edge of a secret Dunke held hidden

deep in his heart from all the world. Only this much she guessed;

that Struve was a sharer of his secret, and therefore he was set

on lynching the man before he had time to tell it.

"They got away, didn't they?" she asked.

"They got away--for the present," he answered grimly. "But we're

still hunting them."