“Glenn, what’s the meanin’ o’ this?”
“Simple, ain’t it? Your girl knew the kid had somethin’ in that first pasteboard that would go agin’ her feller, and——”
“Don’t call ’im that!”
“Well, that’s what she calls ’im, seems. Anyway, she didn’t want it to get into my hands, so she puts up a job on the kid. I see all that clear enough. But that ain’t the funny part now. The funny part is how she come to write ‘Blacky Silk.’ What did she know ’bout Blacky Silk?”
“He’d just been pesterin’ her, accordin’ to Mart,” replied Canby. “Wait’ll I set eyes on this Jasper, Fred. I’ll horsewhip ’im outa the country. But that’s neither here ner there. Maybe she couldn’t think o’ nothin’ else to write. Or maybe, bein’ sore on this hombre, she was tryin’ to make you think he was one o’ the fellas that pulled off the holdup. ’Tain’t like her, though, to try to hand a man the worst of it just ’cause she’s sore on ’im fer sumpin else.”
“The devil of it is,” remarked the sheriff thoughtfully, “that she’s right. But how in thunder did she know! That’s ’at gets me!”
“What? He’s the man ye got yer eye on?”
“Him and his pardner, Kid Strickland—a couple o’ bad ones all around. Here was me tryin’ my best to hang it on Blacky Silk and t’other un, when here comes your boy and give me that cover with Blacky’s name on it. Then, o’ course, I had more dope—or judged I had. And that helped send me inside; I wanted to find out if the Frisco police knew anything about his handwritin’. If they did, I was gonta mail the cover to ’em. Course I thought Blacky’d wrote his name in it, like a fella might do, ye know, just loafin’ about some time. But the police up there hadn’t any record, so I didn’t send ’er.
“Now, looky here: How’d your girl know Blacky Silk helped stick up the stage, Canby?”
Canby shook his head in mystification.