"Mr.Ramsay's letter will keep till after that." They went out to the well together.
"So you heard the story, that I had killed Ben Soloman, before you left ?" "Yes; before your letter arrived, Mr.Ramsay sent for me, and told me a Jewish trader had just informed him that news had come that Ben Soloman had been murdered, and the deed had been done by the young Scotchman who had been with him.

Mr.Ramsay did not believe the story in the slightest.

He admitted that Ben Soloman might have been murdered, and even said frankly that, hated as he was, it was the most natural end for him to come to; but that you should have done so was, he said, absurd.

In the first place, he did not think that you were alive; and in the second, it was far more probable that you had been murdered by Ben Soloman, than that he should have been murdered by you.
"However, even before your letter came, three or four hours later, there seemed no longer any doubt that you had killed the Jew.

By that time, there was quite an uproar among his people.