"Well, you can't hang him for that."
"He will have to prove where he was, then."
"I am afraid it will be for you to prove a little more first."
Langholm sat very dogged with his notes. There had been a pause on Steel's part; there was a thin new note in his voice. Langholm was too grimly engrossed to take immediate heed of either detail, or to watch the swift changes in the face which was watching him. And there he lost most of all.
"The next point is that he undoubtedly knew Minchin in Australia—"
"Aha!"
"That he was and is a rich man, whereas Minchin was then on the verge of bankruptcy, and that Minchin only found out that he was in England thirty-six hours before his own death, when he wrote to his old friend for funds."
"And you have really established all that!"
Steel had abandoned all pretence of rowing; his tone was one of admiration, in both senses of the word, and his dark eyes seemed to penetrate to the back of Langholm's brain.
"I can establish it," was the reply.