Whitney Fair met him on the new house's veranda. They were about to pass, when Fair said gruffly, "I'll take the key to the office door, if you please."
Wolfe frowned. He knew why Fair was going to the office. The wonder of it was that Fair had not demanded the key sooner. He meant, of course, to telephone Sheriff Starnes at Johnsville, and notify him of the outrageous doings of the escaped prisoners.
"The key, if you please!" Fair growled.
In no heart are the ties of blood stronger than in the mountain heart. Wolfe drew back. His kinsmen had wronged him deeply, it was true, but they were still his kinsmen. They hadn't had the advantage that had been his.
He took the key from his pocket, and gave it over. There was, plainly, nothing else to do. Anyway, he told himself, the chances were that the jail delivery had already become known, and Sheriff Starnes and his posse were perhaps even then on their way out to the basin. Whitney Fair turned the collar of his greatcoat up close around his neck, and hastened toward the crude little office.
Wolfe entered the new house without rapping. There was a cheery log fire in the living-room. Old Buck Wolfe, his blistered back bandaged, sat very straight on a couch.
"Where are the others?" his son asked.
"I run 'em out," sourly.
"Why?"