And this is what I discovered to be written: 

    “Honored Madam: 

“The one at the head of all has sent me to this place to inspect grazing lands and make report.  I send in a report of what is not here and the signing of the papers by your Gouverneur Faulkner must be done quickly in blindness before a discovery of what is not—­”

“It is written to a woman,” I said very quietly as I made a finish of reading.

“Yes, boy, to a woman.  I have made my last fight to—­to hold an old belief, which in some way seemed to be—­be one of my foundation stones.  The General is right:  they are all alike, the soft, beautiful, lying things.  The truth is not in them, and their own or a man’s honor is a plaything.  That piece of paper was sent me by a man up in the mountains of Old Harpeth, who loves me with the same blood bond that I love you, boy, all on account of a gun struck up in the hands of his enemy.  Here’s the note he sent with it.

    “Bill, we cotched a furren man fer a revenue up by the still
    at Turkey Gulch and this was in his pocket.  I made out to read
    yo name.  I send it.  The man is kept tied.  What is mules worth? 
    Send price and what to do with this man critter by son Jim. 
    Hell, Bill, they ain’t no grazing fer five thousand mules on
    Paradise Ridge, but I know a place. 
                Jim Todd.”

“What is the significance of this paper, my Gouverneur Faulkner?” I asked after I had made the attempt to translate to myself the very peculiar writing he had given to me.

“I do not know just exactly myself, Robert,” answered my Gouverneur Faulkner as he dropped his head upon his hands while he rested his elbows on the polished table among its scattered papers.  “I am convinced now that this mule contract business is the plot against my honor that the General believes it to be and has been trying to get to a legal surface.  In some way Jim Todd has got hold of one end of the conspiracy.  It has been hard for me to believe that a woman would sell me out.  If I take it to her in the morning I’ll perhaps get an explanation that will satisfy me.  The men who are in with Jeff Whitworth are the best financiers in the State and it is impossible to believe that—­”

Very suddenly it happened in my heart to know what to compel that very large man beside me to do for the rescue of his honor.  He must see the matter, not through the lies of that beautiful Madam Whitworth, the instrument of that very ugly husband, but he must look into the matter with his blood friend, that Mr. Jim Todd.

“You must go immediately to that Mr. Jim Todd and his prisoner to discover truth, Your Excellency,” I said with a very firm determination as I looked straight into his sad eyes that had in them almost the look of shame for dishonor.

“It’s twenty-four hours on horseback across Old Harpeth from Springtown, boy.  The trip would take three days.  I can’t do it with these guests here, even if they are robbers.  I’ll have to stay and dig down to the root of the matter here.  I may find it in the hearts of my friends,” he answered me with a look of great despair.