CHAPTER XXXVI
A RIDE IN A TAXI
Kirby was quite right when he said that Hull would go with them. Hewas on his way downtown when the taxi caught him at Fourteenth andWelton. The cattleman jumped out from the machine and touched the fatman on the arm as he was waddling past.
"We want you, Hull," he said.
A shadow of fear flitted over the shallow eyes of the land agent, buthe attempted at once to bluster. "Who wants me? Whadjawant me for?"
"I want you--in that cab. The man who saw you in my uncle's room thenight he was killed is with me. You can either come with us now an'talk this thing over quietly or I'll hang on to you an' call for apoliceman. It's up to you. Either way is agreeable to me."
Beads of perspiration broke out on the fat man's forehead. He draggedfrom his left hip pocket the familiar bandanna handkerchief. With ithe dabbed softly at his mottled face. There was a faint, a very faint,note of defiance in his voice as he answered.
"I dunno as I've got any call to go with you. I wasn't in Cunningham'srooms. You can't touch me--can't prove a thing on me."
"It won't cost you anything to make sure of that," Kirby suggested inhis low, even tones. "I'm payin' for the ride."
"If you got anything to say to me, right here's a good place to onloadit."
The man's will was wobbling. The cattleman could see that.
"Can't talk here, with a hundred people passin'. What's the matter,man? What are you afraid of? _We're not goin' to hit you over thehead with the butt of a six-shooter_."
Hull flung at him a look of startled terror. What did he mean? Or wasthere anything significant in the last sentence? Was it just a shot inthe dark?
"I'll go on back to the Paradox. If you want to see me, why, there'sas good a place as any."
"We're choosin' the place, Hull, not you. You'll either step into thatcab or into a patrol wagon."
Their eyes met and fought. The shallow, protuberant ones wavered."Oh, well, it ain't worth chewin' the rag over. I reckon I'll go withyou."
He stepped into the cab. At sight of Olson he showed both dismay andsurprise. He had heard of the threats the Dry Valley man had beenmaking. Was he starting on a journey the end of which would be summaryvengeance? A glance at Lane's face reassured him. This young fellowwould be no accomplice at murder. Yet the chill at his heart told himhe was in for serious trouble.
He tried to placate Olson with a smile and made a motion to offer hishand. The Scandinavian glared at him.
The taxicab swung down Fourteenth, across the viaduct to Lake Place,and from it to Federal Boulevard.
Hull moistened his lips with his tongue and broke the silence. "Wherewe goin'?" he asked at last.
"Where we can talk without bein' overheard," Kirby answered.
The cab ran up the steep slope to Inspiration Point and stopped there.The men got out.
"Come back for us in half an hour," the cattleman told the driver.
In front and below them lay the beautiful valley of Clear Creek.Beyond it were the foothills, and back of them the line of the FrontRange stretching from Pike's Peak at the south up to the Wyoming line.Grey's and Long's and Mount Evans stood out like giant sentinels in theclear sunshine.
Hull looked across the valley nervously and brought his eyes back witha jerk. "Well, what's it all about? Whadjawant?"
"I know now why you lied at the inquest about the time you saw me onthe night my uncle was killed," Kirby told him.
"I didn't lie. Maybe I was mistaken. Any man's liable to make amistake."
"You didn't make a mistake. You deliberately twisted your story so asto get me into my uncle's apartment forty minutes or so earlier than Iwas. Your reason was a good one. If I was in his rooms at the time hewas shot, that let you out completely. So you tried to lie me into thedeath cell at Canon City."
Hull's bandanna was busy. "Nothin' like that. I wouldn't play no sucha trick on any man. No, sir."
"You wouldn't, but you did. Don't stall, Hull. We've got you right."
The rancher from Dry Valley broke in venomously. "You bet we have, yourotten crook. I'll pay you back proper for that deal you an'Cunningham slipped over on me. I'm gonna put a rope round yore neckfor it. I sure am. Why, you big fat stiff, I was standin' watchin'you when you knocked out Cunningham with the butt of yore gun."
From Hull's red face the color fled. He teetered for a moment on theballs of his feet, then sank limply to the cement bench in front ofhim. He tried to gasp out a denial, but the words would not come. Inhis throat there was only a dry rattle.
He heard, as from a long distance, Lane's voice addressing him.
"We've got it on you, Hull. Come through an' come clean."
"I--I--I swear to God I didn't do it--didn't kill him," he gasped atlast.
"Then who did--yore wife?" demanded Olson.
"Neither of us. I--I'll tell you-all the whole story."
"Do you know who did kill him?" Kirby persisted.
"I come pretty near knowing but I didn't see it done."
"Who, then?"
"Yore cousin--James Cunningham."