"River's falling at last," he said, "and I'm glad of it."
"The humming has stopped too," I said.
He looked up at me quietly with his normal expression. Evidently he
remembered everything except his own attempt at suicide.
"Everything has stopped," he said, "because--"
He hesitated. But I knew some reference to that remark he had made just
before he fainted was in his mind, and I was determined to know it.
"Because 'They've found another victim'?" I said, forcing a little laugh.
"Exactly," he answered, "exactly! I feel as positive of it as though--as
though--I feel quite safe again, I mean," he finished.
He began to look curiously about him. The sunlight lay in hot patches on
the sand. There was no wind. The willows were motionless. He slowly rose to
feet.
"Come," he said; "I think if we look, we shall find it."
He started off on a run, and I followed him. He kept to the banks, poking
with a stick among the sandy bays and caves and little back-waters, myself
always close on his heels.
"Ah!" he exclaimed presently, "ah!"
The tone of his voice somehow brought back to me a vivid sense of the
horror of the last twenty-four hours, and I hurried up to join him. He was
pointing with his stick at a large black object that lay half in the water
and half on the sand. It appeared to be caught by some twisted willow roots
so that the river could not sweep it away. A few hours before the spot must
have been under water.
"See," he said quietly, "the victim that made our escape possible!"
And when I peered across his shoulder I saw that his stick rested on the
body of a man.
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