Part 4 (1/2)

”Ah!” cried Silk. ”That is significant. It means that it was with his own weapon that Henri Jolicoeur was killed.”

”Yes,” Dan agreed. ”His mother saw him handling the dagger, day before yesterday, but she didn't know he'd taken it out with him.”

”I see,” nodded the sergeant. ”It was probably s.n.a.t.c.hed from his belt--and used--while he stood up beside the maple tree. In that case it isn't of much further use as a clue. Did you discover the name of his enemy? He must, after all, have been afraid of being attacked.”

”It seems he had several enemies,” said Dan Medlicott. ”There was d.i.c.k Transom for one, who hated him like poison, and Emile Guyot for another, who owed him a grudge on account of some gambling affair.”

”It wasn't Transom,” promptly decided Sergeant Silk. ”d.i.c.k Transom has lost one of his front teeth. And it wasn't Emile Guyot, for he is in prison at Moose Jaw. Any others?”

”Henri's mother believes it was Flying Feather,” Dan went on. ”They had a bad quarrel just after the races in the spring. But I a.s.sured her that it wasn't an Indian who did it. The only other enemies of Henri's that she could think of were Pierre Roche and Adolf Simon, both of them half-breeds; but she didn't reckon it could be either of them who took her son's life.”

Silk repeated the two names thoughtfully as he turned to remount.

”Pierre Roche?--Adolf Simon? Let's see! Yes. Thank you, Dan; I was right about two heads being better than one. You have put me on a new scent. I hope you haven't mentioned either of these men to any one else?”

”Not I,” Dan a.s.sured him, adding, as the soldier policeman leapt into his saddle: ”Aren't you coming into the house to have some breakfast?”

Silk shook his head.

”I am on duty,” he answered. ”I am off to Pincher's Creek. That is where Adolf Simon and Pierre Roche usually hang out.”

”Then it's one of them that you suspect?” said Dan.

”I did not say so,” smiled Silk, touching his pony's side with his spurred heel.

He rode through the stifling heat of the summer noon across the parched prairie and among the winding valleys of the foothills, arriving at Pincher's Creek in the early evening, covered with dust, but with his well-cared-for broncho as free from fatigue as he was himself.

No one guessed what he had come for. The ranchers and cowboys supposed that his purpose was only to make one of his periodical patrol visits to inquire into any complaints that they might have to make, and to see that the settlers' homesteads were guarded against fire, as the law required them to be.

Silk made the tour of the far-stretching cornfields, where the men were at work harvesting the ripe grain, and when the labours in the fields were over and he had taken supper with the ranch-master's family, he strolled down to the bunkhouse, where most of the hands fed and slept.

He entered very casually, and was greeted as a friend.

At first he gave his attentions to the white men, but presently he approached a group of Indians and half-breeds. Amongst the latter he had seen Adolf Simon, one of the men against whom his suspicions were directed. Adolf was now seated at the end of a bench, rolling a cigarette, while he chattered volubly in Canadian French to his companions.

”Say, Adolf, are you making that f.a.g for me?” Silk inquired.

The half-breed looked up and smiled, showing his white and even teeth under a small, black moustache.

”Oh! but yes, if m'sieur will accept,” he answered gaily, as he delicately held forth the cigarette ready to be licked. ”_Voila!_”

Sergeant Silk took it and ran the tip of his tongue along the edge of the paper, smoothing it down neatly and nipping off the shreds of tobacco which protruded from the ends. He crumpled the fragments between a finger and thumb and sniffed at them critically.

”Ah! you no like such tabac,” said Adolf. ”It ees no good for mek de cigarette; only good for pipe, eh?”

”I dare say it smokes all right,” nodded Silk, striking a match.

He was not concerned whether the tobacco were good or bad. What he wished to discover was whether it was the same quality as the tobacco in the cigarettes smoked by Henri Jolicoeur and his enemy at the foot of the maple tree in Grey Wolf Forest. He quickly a.s.sured himself that it was different. It was darker and coa.r.s.er. He noticed also that the paper used by Adolf was yellow instead of white.