“I know what I’m doing,” Sprague said.
Mason turned to Sheriff Barnes and said, “I think you and I can get along, Sheriff.”
“I’m not so certain,” Barnes said, pulling a sack of tobacco from his pocket, and spilling rattling grains to the surface of a brown cigarette paper. “You have quite a bit to explain before I’ll give you my confidence again.”
“What, for instance?” Mason asked.
“I thought you were going to co-operate with me.”
“I am,” Mason told him, “to the extent that I intend to find out who murdered Fremont C. Sabin.”
“We want to find out, too.”
“I know you do. You use your methods. I’ll use mine.”
“We don’t like having those methods interfered with.”
“I can understand that,” Mason told him.