The sun was an hour above Two-Gwo-Tee pass when Otis dismounted in
front of the Red Rock ranger station. He looped Pie-face’s bridle over
a post of the barbed-wire fence and made for the cabin. The door was
unlocked. He remembered that Sheriff Ogden, as they had departed from
the cabin the morning before, had remarked that the coroner would
fasten the door after removing the body.
He stepped inside, and swept the interior of the principal room with a
quick glance. Nothing had been disturbed. The body had been removed.
Nothing else, apparently, had been touched.
He stepped across to the combined office and sleeping-room. It too
appeared to be exactly as he had last seen it. He returned to the other
room, seated himself upon one of the log stools, and rolled a
cigarette.
He had been moved by no definite plan of action when he had determined
to return to the cabin. He hoped only that, undisturbed, he might
discover some clue which would lead to the solution of the murder. Now
he felt that he might conduct his investigation in a leisurely manner.
The Sheriff, if he were at liberty by this time, without doubt would
start his pursuit--if, indeed, he made any pursuit at all--in the
direction of the Tetons. He would never dream that his prisoner had
returned to the scene of the murder.
He wondered if the Sheriff had been liberated from his own handcuffs.
Certainly, he thought with a smile, he could not have been freed by the
jailer, for that valiant person undoubtedly was still running. Probably
some of the residents of the town, aroused by the shooting but loath to
leave their homes at the time of the one-man jail-delivery, had
discovered the Sheriff shortly after the departure of the cowpuncher
rescuers, and had found another key to the handcuffs or had filed them
from his wrists.
For a time he had feared that a coroner’s jury might be impaneled and
might visit the cabin during the morning. This fear he dismissed,
however, upon reflection that the plank bearing Fyffe’s message, and
his revolver, the two most damaging bits of evidence, were in the hands
of the Sheriff and could be exhibited to the coroner’s jury where they
were impaneled, thus obviating the necessity of their visiting the
scene of the murder.
Could it be possible that Fyffe might have written something else on
the floor--some message that later had been obliterated by the pool of
blood, and thus remained undiscovered during the investigation by the
Sheriff and his deputy?
He doubted it. Yet, determined to investigate everything that promised
a shadow of a clue, he knelt on the floor, near the spot where the
plank had been ripped from its fastenings.
What remained of the blood-pool on the adjoining planking was now a
brown stain. He scrutinized it minutely. For some unaccountable reason
the interior of the room grew darker. He wondered absently if the sun
had been obscured by the clouds. He raised his head and turned toward
the door. There he saw--Mariel Lancaster.
* * * * *
He uttered an exclamation of astonishment and dismay. She too cried out
in alarm, shrank back a step, and reached out a supporting hand which
she placed upon the door frame.
“Mariel!” he burst out, struggling awkwardly to his feet. “What are you
doing here?”
“What--what are _you_ doing here?” she demanded in return. “I thought
you were in--in jail.”
“I was,” he grinned, “until a few hours ago, when some of my very good
friends induced the Sheriff to release me. I thought perhaps you’d
heard about it.”
She smiled and advanced a step. “I left the ranch very early--before
daybreak,” she explained. “I talked to no one before I left. In fact, I
wasn’t at all eager for them to know what I planned to do.”
“And that was--”
Mariel colored slightly. “We’d been hearing so many stories about this
terrible affair. I couldn’t believe them all. So I--I just came to see
for myself.”
“You didn’t believe I murdered Joe Fyffe?” Otis inquired eagerly.
Mariel dropped her eyes. “No,” she said, “I didn’t.”
“Why?” Otis persisted, thrilling oddly at her words. “Haven’t you heard
about what Fyffe wrote? And haven’t you heard about my revolver, with
the two empty shells? And haven’t you heard how I was chosen to--to run
him out of the country? Have you heard a single thing that would
indicate that I didn’t do it?”
“I’ve heard all those things,” she admitted. “And I must confess I
haven’t heard a thing that indicated your innocence.”
“Then why,” interrogated Otis, “why do you believe in me?”
Mariel shrugged. “Woman’s intuition, I suppose. And in this case that
means something that the law doesn’t consider. That’s character.
Somehow, Otis, I can’t conceive of a man of your character doing such a
thing, and doing it in such a way.”
“Mariel, you’re the first, and the only one of my friends who has shown
that much faith in me. Hasn’t it occurred to you that you might be
mistaken in your estimate of me?”
Mariel stamped her foot. “I haven’t even asked you if you did it,” she
announced, eyes flashing. “And what’s more, I don’t intend to. I know
you didn’t. That’s why I left the ranch before dawn to come out here to
the ranger station. I’m going to prove that you didn’t. I don’t know
how I’ll do it, but I will.”
* * * * *
Otis longed to pour out the flood of heartfelt appreciation that
swelled up within him. But, untrained in the use of such phrases, his
lips failed him. He could only stammer, “Th-thanks, Mariel,” as he
reddened beneath her direct gaze. But his eyes told her more of the
feelings that surged within him than his words could express.
“As a matter of fact,” he went on awkwardly, “that’s just why I came
back here. That is, I mean that I came to search for some clue that
might lead me to the discovery of the real murderer. And, like you, I
don’t know just what it is, but if it’s here I mean to find it.”
He went on, sketching briefly for her the incidents of the discovery of
the murdered ranger and his arrest, touching lightly upon his escape
from the flood, and ending with a condensed version of his rescue from
the jail.
“Now, let’s reason this thing calmly,” Mariel began in a businesslike
tone when he had finished. “First, what could have been the motive for
the murder?”
“I don’t know,” Otis admitted frankly, “unless it could be the same
motive they’ve charged to me--that is, the natural enmity of the cattle
man toward the Government ranger. No one, so far as I know, had any
personal grudge against Joe Fyffe. He kept pretty much to himself, and
never quarreled with anyone here, except possibly when some of the
ranchers protested at the necessity of applying to the Government for a
grazing-permit. His spare time was spent mostly in the pursuit of his
hobby, which was wild-animal photography.”
“Could it be that some enemy of yours, Otis, knowing that you had been
chosen to--to invite him to leave the country, had killed him with the
object of throwing the blame on you?”
“I’ve thought of that,” Otis replied. “For a time I believed that might
be the real solution of the case. But the one thing that disproves it
is Fyffe’s own writing on the floor. I can swear that’s his writing.
Then why, if the chief or even the incidental motive was to cast
suspicion on me, should Joe Fyffe himself name me as his murderer?”
Mariel, puzzled, shook her head. “Let’s go over this thing bit by bit.
Let’s recreate the scene of the crime, just as it was at the time you
entered the cabin. Please show me just where and how the--the body lay,
and what details of the room, if any, differ from the way you found it
when you entered.”
Otis flung himself face down upon the floor over the hole in the
planking.
“This is where we found him,” he explained. “You can see part of the
outline of the pool of blood, under my arms here. The message, which
was covered with blood at first, was, of course, written here upon the
plank which the deputy tore up.”
* * * * *
He rose to his knees and went on: “Right about here, say eighteen
inches from his hand, we found the stub of the pencil he had used.
“It seems he had rushed into the cabin, clutched at the phone, knocking
his camera off the table, and then had sunk to the floor, probably with
the telephone instrument still in his hands.
“We found the telephone hanging from the cord. The camera was on the
floor under the table--at least Deputy Markey told us he had found it
there, and had replaced it on the table.”
“Then the actual shooting happened outside the cabin?” Mariel asked.
Otis nodded. Then he led her outside, showing her where they had traced
the trail of blood and had found the ashes, and telling her how the
Sheriff had deduced that the fire had not burnt itself out, but had
been quenched with water.
“And you found no tracks--no other signs of any nature?”
“Tracks a-plenty, but they were meaningless. You see, this is part of
the forest grazing land. Cattle have milled over this land outside the
fence both before and after the shooting, I suppose.”
“Why couldn’t some of you have thought to preserve some of the
footprints you found about the fire? You could have placed a box or
something over them to protect them from the weather. That might have
solved the whole mystery. Here’s where the shooting took place, and
here’s where you should have looked for your clues.”
“But Mariel, you couldn’t keep a footprint--granting we had found
any--under a box and then present it in court months later.”
“No, but you could have photographed it. You could have used the
ranger’s own camera, if necessary. And photographs sometimes reveal
things the human eye can’t see. You know, Otis, I think it might be
worth while even now to photograph the ground here, so we can study it
at leisure, through a magnifying glass, perhaps. And the interior of
the cabin, too. It’s only a bare chance, but it might aid us. Run back
to the cabin and get the camera, will you, please?”
* * * * *
As Otis turned his back and made for the cabin, Mariel knelt and made a
hasty but careful examination of the earth about the remains of the
fire.
Otis appeared presently, fumbling the camera. He walked toward her
slowly, lowering the extension frame and extending the bellows.
“Right over here,” Mariel directed. “I think we’ll take this ground
surrounding the fire, first.”
“Just a minute,” Otis returned, looking up. “The plate-slide’s missing.
We’ll have to find it before we can use this.”
Mariel glanced up at him quickly, her lips parted, as if a significant
idea had flashed upon her.
“Let me see it,” she commanded, holding out her hand for the camera.
“Um-m. Just as I thought. Look at that plateholder. One plate has been
exposed. The slide hasn’t been inserted, and the holder hasn’t been
reversed. It looks as if--”
“I’ve got it!” Otis exclaimed eagerly. “It was the last picture Fyffe
ever took! And he must have taken it hurriedly, or he’d have replaced
the slide and reversed the plate-holder. Maybe--maybe that last plate
holds our clue! Maybe it will reveal something about the murder!”