"Yes."
"Then why didn't you interfere before the matter had gone so far?"
"Because I only just got here."
"Where have you been since you pointed my tent out to your friend?"
This question was uttered in a voice inaudible to any save the banker's son and the man-hunter. But it told them that their connection had been known from the first and that the by-play had been indulged in merely for the purpose of compelling them to acknowledge it publicly.
Ere either could recover from the shock of the discovery, Jessie was saying to the crowd:
"Mr. Rosier says that a cruel mistake has been made and that the man I thought was a thief is in reality a special friend of his father—a capitalist, who is his house guest."
And then to their amazement, instead of apologizing to the stranger, he continued:
"I beg your pardon for having sent any of you after the constable. But there is so little difference between some men of wealth and thieves that my mistake is not unnatural."
With this parting shot, whose meaning there was no mistaking, the world-famous desperado turned his back on the banker's son and the detective who posed as a capitalist, motioned to Clell and Cole to enter the tent and followed, taking the wine from the latter, while the crowd gasped at the public affront and the startling innuendo.