He stared at
it dismayed, crumpled the cloth into a compact bundle, tucked it
under his arm, and ran on, his ears strained to catch some sound
to guide him.
"Well, anyhow, I didn't kill him," he muttered uneasily as he
crawled through a fence into the orchard. "He's making a pretty
swift get-away for a fellow that's been shot."
In the orchard the patches of moonlight were larger, and across
one of them he glimpsed a dark object, running wearily. Grant
repressed an impulse to shout, and used the breath for an extra
burst of speed. The ghost was making for the fence again, as if
it would double upon its trail and reach some previously chosen
refuge. Grant turned and ran also toward the fence, guessing
shrewdly that the fugitive would head for the place where the
wire could be spread about, and a beaten trail led from there
straight out to the road which passed the house. It was the
short cut from the peach orchard; and it occurred to him that
this particular spook seemed perfectly familiar with the byways
of the ranch.
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