“No? I have been in your camp more than once since you first put me out.”
“Not that I know of, you haven’t.”
“No? Jim, who killed that man near the women’s carts the night of the big run on the Colorado?”
“I don’t know who killed him; I only know he was dead.”
“Well, that man was after the trunk you thought that I had stolen. Rudabaugh wants that trunk. He sent his boldest man after it that night. I was a little ahead of him, that was all. You know what happened to him. Now you know who did it. Yes, you might say I stole Miss Lockhart’s trunk and put it in my wagon. But I stole it from Rudabaugh, not from her. What I said at the trial was true. Theft from her—why, good Heavens!”
He suddenly spread out his hands.
“I’m a killer now, Jim!” said he, his face strangely drawn by a smile that could not come to it. “I can’t turn back now. The man who says I ever was a friend of Rudabaugh is a liar, and a fool besides. I call that to you here. I will call it to your whole campful just the same.”
“Them’s right strong words,” said Jim Nabours quietly. “I only listen because I more’n half believe you’re right. I can’t answer what you say. But why in hell didn’t you say all this at the trial?”
“Trial! Who gave you any right to try a McMasters of Gonzales? I took what you-all gave me because I thought it might make it easier for me to stay away.”
“Well, I don’t know what you mean by that.”