“No, that couldn't have been, Miss Arlie, because——”
“Because——” she prompted, smiling at him in a peculiar manner.
He flushed, and could only say that the newspapers were always getting things wrong.
“But this is the evidence at the coroner's inquest,” she said, falling grave again on the instant. “I understand one thing now, very clearly, and that is that Faulkner was killed early in the fight, and the other man was wounded in the ankle near the finish.”
He shook his head obstinately. “No, I reckon not.”
“Yet it is true. What's more, you knew it all the time.”
“You ce'tainly jump to conclusions, Miss Arlie.”
“And you let them arrest you, without telling them the truth! And they came near lynching you! And there's a warrant out now for your arrest for the murder of Faulkner, while all the time I killed him, and you knew it!”
He gathered together his lame defense. “You run ahaid too fast for me, ma'am. Supposing he was hit while we were all there together, how was I to know who did it?”
“You knew it couldn't have been you, for he wasn't struck with a revolver. It couldn't have been dad, since he had his shotgun loaded with buckshot.”