“That’s the only part of the whole thing that I can’t understand,” assented Hammerton. “He treated his livestock as other people treat their pets. It wasn’t like him to leave them to starve. Out there they might have gone hungry till they died before any neighbour would have been likely to happen in and find them. Even if he hadn’t been so fond of them, it doesn’t make sense for a man to leave such valuable property to die of neglect. To say nothing of the ruin of his year’s crops through his absence. Why, if you hadn’t wheedled me into having his crops looked after, the year would have been a total loss to his farm. As it is——”
“Then,” she declared triumphantly, “since you admit he wouldn’t have done such a thing of his own accord——”
“I don’t admit it. I only say I can’t understand it. But it happened. We have proof of that. He went away in his car. And he took Buff along with him. If he had left Buff there I could have seen, perhaps, where the mystery came in. For he and that collie were chums. But he took Buff with him. And he took along everything of portable value in his house, too. No, that doesn’t look like foul play. He did it deliberately, whatever his motive may have been. Took along his dog and his valuables and drove away in his own car. The car couldn’t have been stolen, either. For he told Greer over the phone——”
“If it was Michael who told——”
“We don’t know his motive,” summed up Hammerton. “But we do know he went of his own accord. There is ample proof of that. As for connecting Gates and Hegan with——”
“He did not go of his own accord!” announced the girl, deathly white, her eyes ablaze, as she towered over her wondering father. “And I have every reason to know he didn’t. I don’t want to tell why I know it. But I must, if I want you to get the truth out of those two assassins. I know Michael Trent did not leave here of his own accord. I know it because he loved me. A man doesn’t run away like that from——”
“What?” shouted Hammerton in astonishment. “He—you say he——”
“I say he loved me,” reiterated the girl, her sweet voice held steady by a great effort. “And no man will go away willingly from a woman he loves as Michael loved me. Most of all, he won’t go away and fail to send any kind of word.”
“You never told me!” accused her father indignantly. “You never——”
“Michael never told me,” she retorted.