“Some believe he warh't robbed at all,” Kinnicutt said slowly. He had turned listlessly away, evidently meditating departure, his hand on his horse's mane, one foot in the stirrup.
“Ye know that gal named Loralindy Byars?” Crann said craftily.
Kinnicutt paused abruptly. Then as the schemer remained silent he demanded, frowning darkly, “What's Loralindy Byars got ter do with it?”
“Mighty nigh all!” Crann exclaimed, triumphantly.
It was a moment of tense suspense. But it was not Crann's policy to tantalize him further, however much the process might address itself to his peculiar interpretation of pleasure. “That thar pay agent o' the mining company,” he explained, “he hed some sort'n comical name—oh, I remember now, Renfrow—Paul Renfrow—waal—ye know he war shot in the knee when the miners way-laid him.”
“I disremember now ef it war in the knee or the thigh,” Swofford interposed, heavily pondering.
Kinnicutt's brow contracted angrily, and Crann broke into open wrath: “an' I ain't carin', ye fool—what d' ye interrupt fur like that?”
“Wall,” protested Swofford, indignantly, “ye said 'ye know' an' I didn't know.”
“An' I ain't carin'—the main p'int war that he could neither ride nor walk. So the critter crawled! Nobody knows how he gin the strikers the slip, but he got through ter old man Byars's house. An' thar he staid till Loralindy an' the old 'oman Byars nussed him up so ez he could bear the pain o' bein' moved. An' he got old man Byars ter wagin him down ter Colb'ry, a-layin' on two feather beds 'count o' the rocky roads, an' thar he got on the steam kyars an' he rid on them back ter whar he kem from.”
Kinnicutt seemed unable to longer restrain his impatience. He advanced a pace. “Ye appear ter 'low ez ye air tellin' news—I knowed all that whenst it happened a full year ago!”