“Well,” said Gwinne gently, “what’s the matter with me?”
“So that’s all?” said Gwinne, after Dines had told his story. “Sure of it?”
“Absolutely. He rode up while I was branding my long-ear. He gave me a letter to mail and gassed while he smoked a cig, and wandered back the way he came, while I oozed away down the cañon. No more, no less. Said he was prospecting, he did—or did he?” Johnny reflected; remembering then that Forbes in giving him a letter to mail had mentioned location notices. “Yes, he did.”
With the words another memory came into his mind, of the trouble with Jody Weir on day herd—about another letter, that was. This memory—so Johnny assured himself—flashed up now because Weir was one of his five accusers. No—there were only three accusers, as he understood it from the talk of the night before; three accusers, five to arrest him. Yet only one had come actually to make the arrest. Queer!
“Now,” said Johnny, “it’s your turn.”
He curled a cigarette and listened. Early in the recital he rubbed his nose to stimulate thought; but later developments caused him to transfer that attention to his neck, which he stroked with caressing solicitude. Once he interrupted.
“I never stole a calf in a bare open hillside, right beside a wagon road, never in my whole life,” he protested indignantly. “As an experienced man, does that look reasonable to you?”
“No, it don’t,” said Gwinne. “But that’s the story. Adam was found close by your fire—shot in the back and dragged from the stirrup; shot as he rode, so close up that his shirt took fire. And no one rode in Redgate yesterday, but you, and those three, and Adam Forbes.”
“Yes. That might very well be true,” said Johnny.