Willard brooded long over this straightforward message. He was blind and deaf to its gentle reproach, finding in it only a confirmation of his worst fears. There was no need now to map out a course of action; he had limned that in the main before leaving Newport. Vengeance on Power, vengeance ample and complete, was what he craved for. He understood, in some furtive and perverted way, that he could not strike a mortal blow at a man of Power's temperament by using the bludgeons of the law to expiate an offense against society. Both Nancy and her lover must have discounted the effect of the social pillory before they transgressed its code beyond redemption. Indeed, they would hail with joy the edict which banned them--be it proclaimed from the housetops and carried round the earth by the myriad-tongued press! Nancy's letter, too, showed that she would not scruple to make known her defense, and Willard was well aware that it would serve to rehabilitate her in the eyes of her friends. So he had devised a ghoulish and crafty punishment, which, the more he pondered it, the more subtle and effective did it appear. As the scheme grew in his imagination, he almost hugged himself in rapturous approval of it. So warped was his mind that he might have discovered, were he capable of making an honest analysis of motives, that he was actually gloating over the position in which his daughter was placed if only because of the weapon it placed in his hands against Power. To succeed, two conditions were necessary--Power must not have written to his mother, nor Nancy to her husband. To his thinking, neither of these eventualities was likely. The very environment of the woods and lakes of the Adirondacks forbade the notion. If he was right, he would turn Power's dream of happiness into bitterest gall; if wrong, there was still another alternative, deadlier, more lurid, but far from being so attractive to a mean and rather cowardly nature. Time alone would show which project promised success--to fail in both was nearly, if not quite, impossible. Meanwhile, no painted Indian ever camped on the trail of unsuspecting pioneer with more malign intent and rancorous tenacity than Willard displayed in his pursuit and tracking of the erring pair. He was not a righteously incensed father, but a disappointed man who saw within his grasp the means of glutting the stored malice of years. To appreciate to the full Willard's mental processes at this period of his life, not only his double-dealing in the matter of Nancy's marriage, but his vain longings for the lost wealth of the Dolores Ranch, must be taken into account. Even then, his apologist might plead an obsession mounting almost to insanity. Nothing else would explain his actions; but no words could palliate them, for the ruthless Pawnee he resembled would assuredly have chosen a less ignoble revenge. CHAPTER X NANCY DECIDES