“It shore does. Did somebody tell him you shot Prentice?”
Len stepped away from the wall and walked to the stable door, where he looked out into the night. Hashknife puffed away on his cigarette and waited for Len to answer. Finally he came back and sat down again.
“Hartley,” he said softly, “yo’re a queer sort of a detective. You came here to spy on me, and yet you tell me who yuh are. I’ll shoot square with yuh. I’m as big a fool as you are; so I’m goin’ the limit with you. The night Charley Prentice was shot, my boy heard that knock on the door. When Prentice went to answer the knock, and threw the door open, my boy heard a voice say: ‘This is Ayres, you dirty dog!’ and then the shots were fired.”
“Yea-a-ah?” Hashknife leaned forward. “He told you he heard that?”
“Yeah, and that was why he didn’t want to come out here. To him, I’m a murderer. The squaw heard it too. They agreed to never tell anybody; but the boy told me. I reckon he wanted me to know why he didn’t want to come out here.”
“I’m sorry I didn’t bet with the sheriff,” said Hashknife.
“Bet what?”
“He wanted to bet that I wouldn’t find out any more from you than I already knew.”
Len laughed shortly.
“I don’t see what good it will ever do yuh.”