Maxwell waited for Gabriel to speak, wiping away as he waited the usual smile that lingered around his lips. But Gabriel said nothing.
"Gabriel Conroy," said Lawyer Maxwell, suddenly dropping into the vernacular of One Horse Gulch, "are you a fool?"
"Thet's so," said Gabriel, with the simplicity of a man admitting a self-evident proposition, "Thet's so; I reckon I are."
"I shouldn't wonder," said Maxwell, again swiftly turning upon him, "if you were!" He stopped, as if ashamed of his abruptness, and said more quietly and persuasively, "Come, Gabriel, if you won't confess to me, I suppose that I must to you. Six months ago I thought you an impostor. Six months ago the woman who is now your wife charged you with being an impostor; with assuming a name and right that did not belong to you; in plain English, said that you had set yourself up as Gabriel Conroy, and that she, who was Grace Conroy, the sister of the real Gabriel, knew that you lied. She substantiated all this by proofs; hang it," continued Maxwell, appealing in dumb show to the walls, "there isn't a lawyer living as wouldn't have said it was a good case, and been ready to push it in any court. Under these circumstances I sought you, and you remember how. You know the result of that interview. I can tell you now that if there ever was a man who palpably confessed to guilt when he was innocent, you were that man. Well, after your conduct there was explained by Olly, without, however, damaging the original evidence against you, or prejudicing her rights, this woman came to me and said that she had discovered that you were the man who had saved her life at the risk of your own, and that for the present she could not, in delicacy, push her claim. When afterwards she told me that this gratitude had—well, ripened into something more serious, and that she had engaged herself to marry you, and so condone your offence, why, it was woman-like and natural, and I suspected nothing. I believed her story—believed she had a case. Yes, sir; the last six months I have looked upon you as the creature of that woman's foolish magnanimity. I could see that she was soft on you, and believed that you had fooled her. I did, hang me! There, if you confess to being a fool, I do to having been an infernal sight bigger one."
He stopped, erased the mirthful past with his hand, and went on—
"I began to suspect something when you came to me yesterday with this story of your going away, and this disposal of your property. When I heard of the murder of this stranger—one of your wife's witnesses to her claim—near your house, your own flight, and the sudden disappearance of your wife, my suspicions were strengthened. And when I read this note from your wife, delivered to you last night by one of her servants, and picked up early this morning near the body, my suspicions were confirmed."
As he finished he took from his pocket a folded paper and handed it to Gabriel. He received it mechanically, and opened it. It was his wife's note of the preceding night. He took out his knife, still holding the letter, and with its blade began stirring the bowl of his pipe. Then after a pause, he asked cautiously—
"And how did ye come by this yer?"
"It was found by Sal Clark, brought to Mrs. Markle, and given to me. Its existence is known only to three people, and they are your friends."
There was another pause, in which Gabriel deliberately stirred the contents of his pipe. Mr. Maxwell examined him curiously.