“As the accuser, you'll have to support your statement with the testimony of witnesses. You'll have to bring people who knew Murray Davenport. What do you suppose they'll swear? His landlady, for instance? Do you think, Larcher, that Murray Davenport's landlady would swear that I'm he?”
“I don't think so,” said Larcher, smiling.
“Here's Larcher himself as a witness,” said Bagley.
“I can swear I don't see the slightest resemblance between Mr. Turl and Murray Davenport,” said Larcher.
“You can swear you know he is Murray Davenport, all the same.”
“And when my lawyer asks him how he knows,” said Turl, “he can only say, from the story I told to-night. Can he swear that story is true, of his own separate knowledge? No. Can he swear I wasn't spinning a yarn for amusement? No.”
“I think you'll find me a difficult witness to drag anything out of,” put in Larcher, “if you can manage to get me on the stand at all. I can take a holiday at a minute's notice; I can even work for awhile in some other city, if necessary.”
“There are others,—the ladies in there, who heard the story,” said Bagley, lightly.
“One of them didn't know Murray Davenport,” said Turl, “and the other—I should be very sorry to see her subjected to the ordeal of the witness-stand on my account. I hardly think you would subject her to it, Mr. Bagley,—I do you that credit.”
“I don't know about that,” said Bagley. “I'll take my chances of showing you up one way or another, just the same. You are Murray Davenport, and I know it; that's pretty good material to start with. Your story has managed to convince me, little as I could hear of it; and I'm not exactly a 'come-on' as to fairy tales, at that—”