“Nothing more than we did. We heard that you’d got back from Cromarty and thought maybe you could tell us something.”
“Not anything definite,” was the superintendent’s brief rejoinder. “You know the facts; Murtrie’s body was taken out of its coffin and carried off. There were auto tracks on the mesa at the head of Cromarty Gulch, and Harding and his posse are following them. That’s all.”
“Wh-where is that coffin, now?” It was the younger of the two who wanted to know.
Without looking around, Maxwell felt that Sprague’s eyes were signalling him, but he could hardly determine why he was moved to tell only part of the truth.
“It was taken off at Corona.”
The one who answered to the name of Calthrop swore morosely. “It’s the Scott Weber gang, ain’t it, Mr. Maxwell?” he asked.
“I think so; and Harding thinks so. But why they should steal only a dead body is beyond me—or any of us.”
The two young men exchanged a whispered word or two and went out, with the anxiety in their faces thickly shot with fresh perplexity. At the door Higgins turned for another asking.
“If we pay the freight on it, can we have that coffin back, Mr. Maxwell? We bought it and paid for it.”
This time Maxwell caught Sprague’s eye and read the warning in it. “We’ll see about that later,” he said.