As they neared
Cottonville, and teams were numerous on the road, Johnnie, jealously
unwilling to slacken speed, kept the horn going almost continuously.
People in wagons and buggies, or on foot, drawn out along the roadside,
cupped hands to lips and yelled startled inquiries. Johnnie bent above
the steering-wheel and paid no attention. Uncle Pros tried to answer
with gesticulation or a shouted word, and sometimes those he replied to
turned and ran, calling to others. But it was black Jim, riding on Roan
Sultan, out with the searchers, who saw and understood. He looked down
across the great two-mile turn beyond the Gap, and sighted the climbing
car. Where he stood it was less than an eighth of a mile below him; he
could almost have thrown a stone into it. He bent in his saddle, shaded
his eyes, and gazed intently.
"Fo' God!" he muttered under his breath. "That's Mr. Gray hisself!
Them's the clothes he was wearin'!"
Whirling his horse and digging in the spurs, he rattled pell-mell down
the opposite steep toward Cottonville, shouting as he went.
"They've done got him--they've found him! Miss Johnnie Consadine's
a-bringin' him down in his own cyar!"
At the Hardwick place, where the front lawn sloped down with its
close-trimmed, green-velvet sward, stood two horses. Charlie Conroy had
come out as soon as the alarm was raised to help with the search.
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