Jimmy looked up sharply, but Deering said, "Stannard's plan was good, but your officers are not fools. Then another thing is obvious; if you had tried very hard, you might have hit Mr. Leyland's trail before."
"It's possible," the sergeant agreed with a touch of dryness. "Maybe the bosses were after Stannard. But I don't get it all yet. Stannard was not a fool. I guess he knew we couldn't put it on him that he meant to shoot Douglas. Since he was using the pit-light, he'd have gone to the pen, but I guess he could have stood for all he got. Yet when he saw he was corralled, he stepped back off the rocks!"
"Stannard was an English highbrow. A year or two in a penitentiary would have knocked him out. Perhaps this accounts for it."
"Oh, well," said the sergeant, "I guess we'll let it go. For three nights I've shivered on the rocks and I want to sleep."
He lay down on the branches and Jimmy waited. The smoke was gone, the fire was clear, and red reflections played about the quiet figures at the bottom of the rude wall. After a time Jimmy thought all slept and he turned to Deering.
"I don't know if the sergeant was satisfied, but I am not. You imply that when Stannard stepped back he knew where he went?"
Deering pondered. He saw Jimmy was disturbed and puzzled, but he doubted if there was much use in enlightening him. Stannard was gone. Jimmy had trusted the fellow and had already got a nasty knock. Yet if he had begun to see a light, Deering did not mean to cheat him. He was not Stannard's champion.
"Well," he said, "it certainly looks like that."
"But why? The sergeant thinks they would not have tried Stannard for shooting with intent to kill; he declares Stannard could have stood for all he got."
"I expect that is so. Sometimes, however, people are not logical. For example, when you thought you had shot Douglas, you pulled out."