blotch against the night, Black Jem sensed that he was wary and alert.
"Who are you?" a voice came crisply. "I am armed; I have a pistol. . . .
Black Jem grinned. The voice was the voice of the youth he had seen in the inn.
"I be Jem Willis," he said jovially. "Jem Willis, a poor tinker, ajourneying to Boston Town. Let me ride by you. This night is not one for honest men to be out alone."
There was a long silence, broken only by the clatter of the horses' hoofs, before the youth answered.
"I ride only to Hooker's crossing. An inn is there at which you may find lodging. You may ride by me if you will."
Black Jem's mare drew close beside the youth's horse. "Thankee, lad," the tinker said heartily. "'T'will spell the loneliness." He squinted upward toward where the moon rode the sky, hidden behind a long tattered cloud that blotted out the stars. He must wait until the moon shone forth. . . .
They rode in silence.
And then the moon gleamed fitfully through the fraying cloud—dimmed again. But not for long, Jem knew. His right hand fumbled within his homespun jacket.
Abruptly the moonlight gleamed, with a cold, revealing pallor. The fine cambric at the youth's breast was a white blotch against the darkness. Black Jem's left knee dug into his mare's shoulder. As the horses stumbled together he struck, with a wide, strong, backward sweep of his right hand.
The youth's horse reared as he felt his saddle suddenly lightened. Wheeling, scenting blood, a shrill whinny bursting from his dilated nostrils, he thundered down the black road toward home.
Black Jem dismounted and stood over the coughing, twisted figure in the road.
"Ho, now, my fine friend," he said commiseratingly, as he swiftly slipped the blood-drenched pouch from the lad's waist and transferred it to his own, "I hope that that prick I gave you pains not overmuch. 'T'will not pain for long; the blow was fatal." He chuckled callously. "'Tis well for you—else I would have had to strike again. I would not have you live to know my face."
The youth's eyes, pain-widened, stared upward into Black Jem's night-shrouded countenance.
"You have killed me, tinker," he coughed, then, through blood flecked lips, "yet I will venture a prophecy. You have killed me for my gold, and my gold shall betray you. More, you will not live, tinker, to spend one piece of gold from that pouch, and you will die for this crime, dancing at the end of a rope. Though I die now, Justice yet lives. . . ."
A fountain of blood gushed over his shirtfront, cutting short his words, and he shuddered, stiffened, and relaxed. He was dead.
Black Jem shrugged, for he feared neither God nor man nor devil. Casting a quick glance about, he saw a clump of elder bushes close beside the road. Hurriedly he dragged the corpse behind their concealing screen. Then, a song in his heart, he mounted into the saddle and continued on his way.
As he rode he pondered what he would do. It was bad that Bennett's horse had escaped to give the alarm; he had planned to kill both horse and rider. The best strategy now would
