When Brewster obeyed, perforce, the sergeant directed Moira to tie the wrists. After he had inspected the knots and recovered the fallen gun, he suggested that Brewster sit down on one of the cots until they were ready to start back to Gold. The freighter, in doing so, swung his right leg over his left knee. From his seat on the opposite cot, Seymour saw on the exposed sole one of the peculiar leather-saving metal plates in which he was so interested—the one that had made its impression in the soil near the scene of the murder. Reaching under the table, he retrieved the spare boot he had thrown there and saw that they matched in every particular.
"Just to make everything according to Hoyle, Brewster," the sergeant said, "I now place you under arrest for the murder of Bart Caswell, alias Sergeant Seymour."
Brewster seemed stunned at the charge. His eyes, as if by instinct, avoided Seymour's steady gaze. He looked at the scowling Karmack, starting slightly at his first glimpse of the nickeled wristlets the man wore.
"Who's the boob now?" snarled Karmack. "Leaving tracks with your bad foot for any fool Mountie to read!"
"Shut up, you fool!" A look of fright crossed Brewster's handsome face. For a second he seemed about to spring upon Karmack. Then, as quickly as it had come, the spasm passed. He turned his eyes on Seymour. "If you ever press this ridiculous charge," he said, "I'll prove it false to the jury. I've done some freighting for the B. & K. outfit, nothing more. Rode in here to-day to collect a bill. Down at the cañon, Kluger passed me on to Bonnemort. I ran into you—and trouble."
After a moment's pause, Brewster continued: "Say, if you really are Sergeant Seymour, who was the uniformed bird that came to Gold as Bart Caswell?"
"Bart Caswell's widow is ready to tell the court why he killed Ben Tabor in robbing the B.C.X. stage of my uniform and papers," the sergeant answered somewhat cryptically.
"Poor Ruth," murmured Moira. "She really believed."
"Well, I'll be——" Brewster began.
"Told you Caswell was a crook," whined Karmack. "No yellow legs would have let himself be caught the way I got him that day up here on the creek."