The last was more of an order than a question, and the fellow stepped back slightly in a manner almost a threat.  Understanding the significance of the gesture I gave it no apparent heed, but turned in the direction of the cabins.  I had no reason to avoid Coombs; indeed, I desired to see him, and I had no intention of permitting this lad to suppose that I feared his veiled threats.  Without so much as glancing back at him I advanced along the footpath, my hands in my pockets.  Yet my mind leaped from point to point in eager speculation.  The whole thing was puzzling.  I had come expecting a mere bit of play-acting, with all details left in the control of others.  I anticipated no more than a few weeks of idleness, with, perhaps, the overseeing of a plantation, to partially keep my time occupied.  Instead I found myself instantly involved in a network of mystery where even murder was part of the play.  Little as I liked Coombs, this Creole was even more dangerous.  The one was a rough, the other a venomous snake.  So far as the original purpose of my adventure was concerned it had already largely faded from recollection.  The swift recurrence of more startling events dominated.  The spirit of adventure, with which I was liberally endowed, was fast taking possession of all my faculties.  Whatever mystery surrounded this house, whatever of crime lurked in the neighborhood, I became determined to solve.  For the moment I forgot even Mrs. Bernard, and my own assumed character, in the excitement of this new chase.

“Ze right; turn to ze right, M’sieur,” said a voice behind me, and then I saw Coombs standing before the door of the second cabin.  Half dressed as he was, his ever-present “gun” hung low at his hip, and his face scowled in surprised recognition.

“What does this mean, Broussard?” he growled savagely.  “Where did you pick up that fellow?”

CHAPTER XIV

THE CONFESSION

I caught the wicked, snaky gleam of the Creole’s eyes.  All his early suspicion of me had revived instantly.

“At the landing,” he hastened to explain.  “How could I tell?  He said he knew you, M’sieur.”

“Oh, he did, hey!  Well, all I know about him is that he blew in here last night with a woman; claimed to be young Henley, and took possession of the place.  I reckon it ’s about time I saw some papers to prove what yer are, young feller, ‘for yer go snoopin’ round at daylight.  What’s yer game enyhow?”

The man’s bluster gave me my clew.  The thought suddenly occurred to me that, for some reason, he was more afraid of me than I of him.  And if I met him on the same ground he was of the disposition to give way first.

“You can see my authority, Coombs, any time you are ready to exhibit your own,” I returned coolly, leaning back against the side of the cabin, and staring him straight in the eyes.  “I ’ve got more occasion to question you, you big brute, than you have me.  Who is going to prevent my walking about these grounds?  You?  Just try the experiment, and see how it comes out.  If you are the overseer here, then it is my money that is paying your wages, and from the look of things,” and I swept my hand toward the surrounding weeds, “you ’ll not hold the job long at that.”