Part 27 (1/2)

”I imagine Bob doesn't know,” said Stannard. ”Before you arrived he implied that I was accountable and demanded a hundred dollars. In fact, when he didn't get the sum he was much annoyed.”

”I was mad all right,” Bob agreed. ”My flour and tea's gone, and I can't hire up about the settlements, but if I'd a hundred dollars, I'd try to make the coast.” He looked hard at Stannard and resumed: ”Are you going to help me get off?”

”Certainly not,” said Stannard in a careless voice. ”I am not as rich as you think, and to give you money would be rash, particularly when Miss Jardine is about.”

Margaret pulled out her wallet. ”I can give you ten dollars, Bob; but I can shout to the people at the hotel. You know Mr. Leyland did not shoot Douglas.”

”I sure don't know,” said Bob and gave Margaret a haughty glance. ”Put up your wad; I've no use for your money. If you like, shout for them to 'phone the police.”

For a moment or two Margaret hesitated. She was persuaded Bob himself was not accountable, but she thought this was all she would know. She was hurt and humiliated, for now she had found Bob she had not helped Jimmy much.

”Shall I shout?” she asked Stannard.

”To choose is your part. I rather think Dillon is on the terrace and two or three athletic young sportsmen are at the hotel, but unless you are willing to use your gun, I doubt if Bob would wait until the others arrive. Then, although I don't know where Jimmy is, perhaps for the police to search the neighborhood would have some drawbacks.”

Margaret turned to Bob. ”Get off! If you come back, I'll send the troopers after you.”

Bob went, and when he vanished in the gloom Stannard laughed. ”I expect your arrival disturbed the fellow. At the beginning, he tried to force me to give him my wallet; then he took another line and hinted that Leyland was the guilty man. Well, he has gone. Will you come back with me and talk to Laura?”

Margaret noted that he was not curious about her object for stopping at the hotel, but she said, ”I wanted to see you. What do you know about the accident?”

”I really don't know much, although I am persuaded accident is the proper word. Jimmy thought the unlucky shot was his and when he resolved to go off I agreed.”

”But you knew what the police would think about his running away!”

”That is so,” said Stannard coolly. ”All the same, Jimmy was with me when I killed the big-horn, and when Douglas found us at the old ranch we were using pit-lights. One of our party shot him, and since we were again poaching, it hardly looked as if the shot were accidental. Jimmy is young and when he saw the risk he ran he was afraid. I thought he did run some risk, but, if he could cheat the police for a time, we might find a clue to the puzzle.”

Margaret remarked his frankness. Although she thought he did not know Jimmy had stopped at the ranch, his arguments were the arguments Jimmy stated he had used. Moreover, she admitted the arguments carried some weight.

”We have not yet found a clue,” she said drearily. ”Still, if the warden gets better---- Do you know where he is?”

For a moment or two Stannard was quiet. Then he said, ”We can get no news about Douglas, and perhaps we ought not to expect much from his narrative. When you use a pit-lamp your hat-brim shades your face, and I imagine all Douglas saw was the light. Yet the police's reserve is strange.”

”Perhaps they know something we do not,” said Margaret. ”Well, my father is waiting and I must not stop.”

She went off and Stannard went up the steps to the hotel. In a corner of the veranda Dillon talked to Laura, and Stannard remarked the smile she gave the young man. Stannard knitted his brows and did not stop. In some respects, the marriage would be good, but it was not the marriage he had wanted Laura to make. All the same, Jimmy was obviously satisfied with the bush girl and Stannard thought she loved him. Well, he had done with Jimmy.

When Margaret got down at the ranch she went to the kitchen and sat by the fire. For a time she said nothing and Jardine quietly smoked his pipe. Then she looked up with a frown.

”I found Bob,” she said. ”He was talking to Mr. Stannard outside the hotel.”

”In the trees, I'm thinking! Did he tell ye much?”

”He declared when they used the pit-lights he had not a gun and somehow I think he hadn't.”

”Maybe!” said Jardine, with some dryness. ”Was it all ye got?”

”That was all. I'm not as clever as I thought. Bob wanted Mr. Stannard to give him a hundred dollars.”