"No," said Davies, wondering.
"Then I want you to look at this, compare it with your recollections, and tell me how accurate it is, especially as to the tracing of the trails of the various parties."
The short winter day was already waning and the light in the dingy office growing dim. Leonard called for candles, then stretched a huge white blotter upon a wide-topped stand and spread open upon it the filmy sheet of tracing paper. An almost exact copy of Devers's map was thrown into bold, black relief, and for the first time Percy Davies saw the plan on which was based the report that, exonerating his captain, inferentially held him accountable for the massacre of his comrades at Antelope Springs.
"Why! when was this made?" he asked, in grave surprise. "Whose work is this?"
"It was made while you were lying ill at Cranston's up at the old post," said Leonard, calmly. "Had you never heard of the investigation?"
"Never."
"The general sent Mr. Archer of his staff up there to go over the ground with Devers and let him explain, if he could, why he got so far away from you and your people as to permit that tragedy to occur, especially after the orders he'd received from Major Warren. Devers cleared himself by proving to Archer's satisfaction that he obeyed his orders exactly and marched right along the ridge here. This trail, the one that runs due south, just west of the summit of the divide, was made by Devers's main command moving in support of you and your detachment. This one off here"—and Leonard's pencil rode lightly along another that skirted a ravine apparently two miles away from the ridge—"this one was made by his command the next day after you had been found by Warren's men," and Leonard was narrowly eying Davies as he spoke.
"Pardon me, Mr. Leonard, it was just the other way," said Davies, assuming that the adjutant in his personal ignorance of the facts was stating a theory. "Captain Devers never approached the ridge that evening. He was going farther away from it all the time. I had to gallop to catch him. This, out here to the southwest, is what might be called an approximation to his trail. I finally overtook him away out over here somewhere, across the ravine," and Davies indicated with the point of a pencil.
"Well, then who made this trail up here on the ridge? You must have crossed it twice before dark."
"There was no such trail there, sir, nor was there any party to make it. Everything in the battalion except my own little squad was away off to the southwest, anywhere from two to ten miles."