Grief and distress unspeakable reigned in the houses of Gen. Evan and Col. Montjoy, and in his bachelor quarters that night one man sat with his face upon his hands and thought out all of the details of the sad catastrophe. An unspeakable sorrow shone in his big eyes. Barksdale had been touched in the tenderest part of his life. Morgan he admired and respected, but the name of the woman he loved had been bespattered with mud. With him there rested no duty. Had the circumstances been different, there would have been a tragedy at the expense of his last dollar--and he was rich. At the expense even of his enterprise and his business reputation, he would have found the author of those letters and have shot him to death at the door of a church, if necessary. There is one point on which the south has suffered no change. Morgan, he felt, would do the same, but now, alas, Morgan was indicted for another murder, and afterward it would be too late. Too late! He sprang to his feet and gave vent to a frightful malediction; then he grew calm through sheer astonishment. Without knock or inquiry his door was thrown open and Gerald Morgan rushed into the room. When Barksdale had last seen this man he doubted his ability to stand the nervous strain put upon him, but here was evidence of an excitement tenfold greater. Gerald quivered like an overtaxed engine, and deep in the pale face the blazing eyes shone with a horrible fierceness. The cry he uttered as he paused before Barksdale was so unearthly that he unconsciously drew back. The young man was unrolling some papers. Upon them were the scenes of the grave as he drew them--the open coffin, the shrunken face of the woman--and then, in all its repulsive exactness, the face of the man who had turned upon the artist under the electric light! "What does it mean, my friend?" said Barksdale, seeking by a forced calmness to reduce the almost irrational visitor to reason again. "What?" exclaimed Gerald; "don't you understand? The man uncovered that coffin; he struck that blow upon poor dead Rita's head! I saw him face to face and drew those pictures that night. There is the date." "You saw him?" Barksdale could not grasp the truth for an instant. "I saw him!" "Where is he now?" "I do not know; I do not know!" A thrill ran through the now eager man, and he felt that instead of calming the excitement of his visitor he was getting infected by it. He sat down deliberately. "Take a seat, Mr. Morgan, and tell me about it." But Gerald dropped the pictures and stood over them.