VI
Hector's estimate of Randall proved absolutely correct. He told them all he knew.
"Ya've caught me with the goods, I guess," he said, nervously twisting his big hands and rolling his bloodshot eyes, "so I may's well 'fess up. But for God's sake, don't give me away to Welland. That feller, he's a hound o' hell, Mr. Denton. He beats that there squaw o' his——"
"Beats his squaw, Randall?" queried the Inspector, astonished.
"Yessir, beats the hide off'n her. There ain't many knows that but I know it—blast him! An' he's——"
"That'll do. Get on with your story," the Inspector said.
"Well, sir, he come to me an' he says, 'You got to start a story against Adair,' he says. 'He's been interferin' a sight too much in my business lately—' Hector flashed a triumphant look to the Inspector, a look that plainly said 'I told you so!'—'an' I want him broke. I want him ruined!' he says. 'That case o' whiskey,' he says, 'that gives us what we want.' Then he tells me I gotta tell everyone Sergeant Adair was as bad a whiskey-runner as any in the North-West, that he was gettin' whiskey up reg'lar from th' East—you know all about it, Sergeant! I wouldn't 'a' done it, I wouldn't, Sergeant, that's straight—but that human devil, he made me."
"He's got you, too, eh?" the Inspector interjected. "What had you done, Randall—theft or murder?"
"Eh? Eh?" Randall jerked, jaw dropping.
The shaft had struck him fair and square.