CHAPTER XII
"THAT'S THE MAN"
"Your name?"
"Cass Hull."
"Business?"
"Real estate, mostly farm lands."
"Did you know James Cunningham, the deceased?" asked Johns.
"Yes. Worked with him on the Dry Valley proposition, an irrigationproject."
"Ever have any trouble with him?"
"No, sir--not to say trouble." Hull was already perspiring profusely.He dragged a red bandanna from his pocket and mopped the roll of fatthat swelled over his collar. "I--we had a--an argument about asettlement--nothin' serious."
"Did he throw you out of his room and down the stairs?"
"No, sir, nothin' like that a-tall. We might 'a' scuffled some, kindain fun like. Prob'ly it looked like we was fightin', but we wasn't.My heel caught on a tread o' the stairs an' I fell down." Hull madehis explanation eagerly and anxiously, dabbing at his beefy face withthe handkerchief.
"When did you last see Mr. Cunningham alive?"
"Well, sir, that was the last time, though I reckon we heard him passour door."
In answer to questions the witness explained that Cunningham had owedhim, in his opinion, four thousand dollars more than he had paid. Itwas about this sum they had differed.
"Were you at home on the evening of the twenty-third--that is, lastnight?"
The witness flung out more signals of distress. "Yes, sir," he said atlast in a voice dry as a whisper.
"Will you tell what, if anything, occurred?"
"Well, sir, a man knocked at our door. The woman she opened it, an' heasked which flat was Cunningham's. She told him, an' the man hestarted up the stairs."
"Have you seen the man since?"
"No, sir."
"Didn't hear him come downstairs later?"
"No, sir."
"At what time did this man knock?" asked the lawyer from the districtattorney's office.
Kirby Lane did not move a muscle of his body, but excitement grew inhim, as he waited, eyes narrowed, for the answer.
"At 9.20."
"How do you know the time so exactly?"
"Well, sir, I was windin' the clock for the night."
"Sure your clock was right?"
"Yes, sir. I happened to check up on it when the court-house clockstruck nine. Mebbe it was half a minute off, as you might say."
"Describe the man."
Hull did, with more or less accuracy.
"Would you know him if you saw him again?"
"Yes, sir, I sure would."
The coroner flung a question at the witness as though it were a weapon,"Ever carry a gun, Mr. Hull?"
The big man on the stand dabbed at his veined face with the bandanna.He answered, with an ingratiating whine. "I ain't no gunman, sir.Never was."
"Ever ride the range?"
"Well, yes, as you might say," the witness answered uneasily.
"Carried a six-shooter for rattlesnakes, didn't you?"
"I reckon, but I never went hellin' around with it."
"Wore it to town with you when you went, I expect, as the other boysdid."
"Mebbeso."
"What caliber was it?"
"A .38, sawed-off."
"Own it now?"
The witness mopped his fat face. "No, sir."
"Don't carry a gun in town?"
"No, sir."
"Ever own an automatic?"
"No, sir. Wouldn't know how to fire one."
"How long since you sold your .38?"
"Five years or so."
"Where did you carry it?"
"In my hip pocket."
"Which hip pocket?"
Hull was puzzled at the question. "Why, this one--the right one, o'course. There wouldn't be any sense in carryin' it where I couldn'treach it."
"That's so. Mr. Johns, you may take the witness again."
The young lawyer asked questions about the Dry Valley irrigationproject. He wanted to know why there was dissatisfaction among thefarmers, and from a reluctant witness drew the information that thewater supply was entirely inadequate for the needs of the land undercultivation.
Mrs. Hull, called to the stand, testified that on the evening of thetwenty-third a man had knocked at their door to ask in which apartmentMr. Cunningham lived. She had gone to the door, answered his question,and watched him pass upstairs.
"What time was this?"
"9.20."
Again Kirby felt a tide of excitement running in his arteries. Whywere this woman and her husband setting back the clock thirty-fiveminutes? Was it to divert suspicion from themselves? Was it to showthat this stranger must have been in Cunningham's rooms for almost anhour, during which time the millionaire promoter had been murdered?
"Describe the man."
This tall, angular woman, whose sex the years had seemed to have driedout of her personality, made a much better witness than her husband.She was acid and incisive, but her very forbidding aspect hinted of the"good woman" who never made mistakes. She described the stranger whohad knocked at her door with a good deal of circumstantial detail.
"He was an outdoor man, a rancher, perhaps, or more likely acattleman," she concluded.
"You have not seen him since that time?"
She opened her lips to say "No," but she did not say it. Her eyes hadtraveled past the lawyer and fixed themselves on Kirby Lane. He sawthe recognition grow in them, the leap of triumph in her as the long,thin arm shot straight toward him.
"That's the man!"
A tremendous excitement buzzed in the courtroom. It was as though someone had exploded a mental bomb. Men and women craned forward to seethe man who had been identified, the man who no doubt had murderedJames Cunningham. The murmur of voices, the rustle of skirts, theshuffling of moving bodies filled the air.
The coroner rapped for order. "Silence in the court-room," he saidsharply.
"Which man do you mean, Mrs. Hull?" asked the lawyer.
"The big brown man sittin' at the end of the front bench, the one rightbehind you."
Kirby rose. "Think prob'ly she means me," he suggested.
An officer in uniform passed down the aisle and laid a hand on thecattleman's shoulder. "You're under arrest," he said.
"For what, officer?" asked James Cunningham.
"For the murder of your uncle, sir."
In the tense silence that followed rose a little throat sound that wasnot quite a sob and not quite a wail. Kirby turned his head toward theback of the room.
Wild Rose was standing in her place looking at him with dilated eyesfilled with incredulity and horror.