They found on the square porch at the back of the house, Colonel Churchill, the negro Eli, and a white man, roughly dressed.  The first, seated on the steps, his elbows on his knees and his face in his hands, looked up with a gasp.  “Fair, Fair—­”

Cary spoke with steadiness “What has brought you here, Eli?  Mr. Ludwell came home last night?”

Eli, trembling violently, and of the ashen hue that a negro takes in terror, tried to answer, but at first there came only jabbered and meaningless words.  He fell on his knees, and finally became coherent.  “Marse Fair—­Marse Fair—­ain’ I done lif’ you bofe in dese ahms w’en you wuz jes’ little fellers—­he er lot de oldes’ an’ you nuttin’ but er baby, toddlin’ after him eberywhar he went!  Ain’ I done ride behin’ you bofe dese yeahs an’ yeahs?  Oh, Gawd-a-moughty!  O Lawd, hab mercy—­”

Cary took him by the shoulder.  “Eli, stop that crying out and tell me at once what is the matter!  What has happened to Mr. Ludwell?”

“I’ll tell you, Fair,” answered the Major, in a shaking voice.  “The negro can’t do it.  Ludwell did not come home last night, and this morning James Wilson, here, found Saladin—­”

“Far up the river road, near my house,” said the man upon the steps.  “’Twas just about daybreak.  I didn’t know, sir, whose horse he was, so I put him in my stable.  Then my son and me and Joe White, a neighbour of mine, we set out down the river road.”

“Oh, my young marster!  Oh, my young marster!” wailed Eli.  “De kindes’ an’ de bes’!  Oh, Lawd hab mercy!”

“It was just dawn, sir, and we went down the road—­we were on horseback—­quite a good bit of miles.  There wasn’t any sign until we came to where Indian Run crosses the road; but on the further side, where there’s a strip of rocks, you know, sir—­”

The speaker stopped short.  “They found him there, Fair,” finished Major Edward.

The young man turned squarely to the old.  “Thank you, sir.  You are the man for me.  Was he—­is he badly hurt?”

“There’s nothing can ever hurt him more, my dear.  It is you, and we with you, who must suffer now.  They found him—­they found him dead, Fair.”

There was a silence; then, “Ludwell—­Ludwell dead?” said Cary.  “I don’t believe you, Major Churchill.”

He turned, walked to a bench that ran along the wall, and sat down.  “Eli, get up from there and stop that camp-meeting wailing!  Mr. Wilson, you perhaps do not yet know my brother’s horse—­black with a white star.  Colonel Dick, they’ve got hold of the wrong end of some damned rigmarole or other—­”

“I didn’t know the horse, sir,” replied Wilson, not without gentleness, “for I’ve been out of the county for a long time, and your brother used to ride a bay.  But I knew your brother, sir.”

“That’s what I said, too, Fair,” groaned Colonel Churchill from the steps.  “I said it was all a damned mistake.  But I was wrong.  You listen to Edward.  Edward, tell him all!”