“Come across with the rest!” said Barjan abruptly. “How did Dave Henderson come here to you? And what about that bomb? Did you give it to him?” Nicolo Capriano's convenient irascibility was instantly at his command again. He scowled at Barjan, and his scranny fist was flourished under Barjan's nose.
“No, I didn't!” he snarled. “And you know well enough that I didn't. You will try to make me out the guilty man now—eh—just because I was fool enough to help you out of your muddle!”
Barjan became diplomatic again.
“Nothing of the kind!” he said appeasingly. “You're too touchy, Nicolo! I know that you're on the square all right, and that you have been ever since your gang was broken up and Tony Lomazzi was caught. That's good enough, isn't it? Now, come on! Give me the dope about Dave Henderson.”
Nicolo Capriano's fingers plucked sullenly at the coverlet. A minute passed.
“Bah!” he grunted finally. “A little honey—eh—when you want something from old Nicolo! Well, then, listen! Dave Henderson came here last night in those torn clothes, and with his face badly cut from a fight that he said he had been in. I don't know whether his story is true or not—you can find that out for yourself. I don't know anything about him, but this is what he told me. He said that his cell in the prison was next to Tony Lomazzi's; that he and Tony were friends; that Tony died a little while ago; and that on the night Tony died he told this fellow Henderson to come to me if he needed any help.”
“Yes!” Barjan's voice was eager. He dropped into the chair again, and leaned attentively over the bed toward Nicolo Capriano. “So he came to you through Tony Lomazzi, eh? Well, so far, I guess the story's straight. I happen to know that Henderson's cell was next to Lomazzi's. But where did he get the bomb? He certainly didn't have it when he left the prison, and he was shadowed——”
“So you said before!” interrupted Nicolo Capriano caustically. “Well, in that case, you ought to know whether the rest of the story is true, too, or not. He said he met a stranger in a saloon last night, and that they chummed up together, and started in to make a night of it. They went from one saloon to another. Their spree ended in a fight at Vinetto's place up the block here, where Henderson and his friend were attacked by some of Baldy Vickers' gang. Henderson said his friend was knocked out, and that he himself had a narrow squeak of it, and just managed to escape through the back door, and ran down the lane, and got in here. I asked him how he knew where I lived, and he said that during the afternoon he had located the house because he meant to come here last night anyway, only he was afraid the police might be watching him, and he had intended to wait until after dark.” Nicolo Capriano's eyelids drooped to hide a sudden cunning and mocking gleam that was creeping into them. “You ought to be able to trace this friend of Henderson's if the man was knocked out and unconscious at Vinetto's, as Henderson claimed—and if Henderson was telling the truth, the other would corroborate it.”
“We've already got him,” said Barjan, with a hint of savagery in his voice. The “friend,” alias a plain-clothesman, had proved anything but an inspiration from the standpoint of the police! “Go on! The story is still straight. You say that Dave Henderson said he intended to come here anyway, quite apart from making his escape from Vinetto's. What for?”
Nicolo Capriano shrugged his shoulders.