I had not one friend
in the city to whom I could appeal for sympathy, advice or money. Yet I
should need all of these to follow this business to the end--to learn
the fate of my cousin, to rescue him, if alive and to avenge him, if
dead.
Then, in the hope that I might find something among Henry's effects to
give me a clue to the men who had attacked him, I went carefully
through his clothes and his papers. But I found that he did not leave
memoranda of his business lying about. The only scrap that could have a
possible bearing on it was a sheet of paper in the coat he had changed
with me. It bore a rough map, showing a road branching thrice, with
crosses marked here and there upon it. Underneath was written:
"Third road--cockeyed barn--iron cow."
Then followed some numerals mixed in a drunken dance with half the
letters of the alphabet--the explanation of the map, I supposed, in
cipher, and as it might prove the clue to this dreadful business, I
folded the sheet carefully in an envelope and placed it in an inmost
pocket.
The search having failed of definite results, I sat with chair tilted
against the wall to consider the situation. Turn it as I would, I could
make nothing good of it. There were desperate enterprises afoot of
which I could see neither beginning nor end, purpose nor result. I
repented of my consent to mix in these dangerous doings and resolved
that when the morning came I would find other quarters, take up the
search for Henry, and look for such work as might be found.
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