Evidence | Page 2

ought t' have."
He fell silent for a while, doing marvels of steering in the avoidance of obstacles and depressions in the really horrible road.
"An' thinkin'," he said suddenly, presently. "Folks don't like thinkin'. Anybody with any sense ud know Harry Temple wouldn't've shot ol' Abe Martin. Harry Temple has got a bank-account in th' Farmers and Ranchers Bank, an' it ain't in reason that he'd go an' shoot anybody t' steal their roll.
"Ol' Abe sold off six hundred steers, an' got th' money fo' them. He was ol'-fashioned an' didn't believe in banks, so he took th' money home with 'im. An' somebody went an' shot him an' took th' roll. But Harry Temple, with a bank-account in th' Farmers and Ranchers Bank--it ain't reasonable that he'd go an' shoot anybody fo' to steal their money. Ef he's any like I am, he's too busy wonderin' ef somebody is goin' t' steal his money to go stealin' somebody else's."
Jimmy said this last with an air of virtue that made me smile. Jimmy is much too good a poker-player to be worried about his money. I know he owns one small ranch he never goes near, bought out of the proceeds of a colossal game still remembered along the border.
"But they think he did it?" I asked.
"Sho they do," said Jimmy scornfully. "They's goin' aroun' sayin' they know he did. That's toro, o' course."
One of Jimmy's individualities is his habit of translating American slang into 'dobe Spanish and using it in his conversation.
"What are you going to see the coroner for?"
"They's holdin' a inquest," said Jimmy. "I'm sort o' goin' t' horn in a little, I reck'n. These folks are too lazy t' do any thinkin'. Ef I see a chance, I'm goin' to do some head-work fo' them. Theah's Abe Martin's place right ahead."
We turned in the gate and swung up to the house. Half a dozen cars, most of them of the same make as Jimmy's, clustered about the front, and there were a dozen or more ponies tethered close by the porch, dozing in the baking heat. It was quite a pretentious place, built in the old-fashioned style of the days when a rancher was almost a baron in his own right. Two big barns and a huge stable behind the house almost dwarfed the dwelling proper, and quite hid it from the rear.
Jimmy eased his car in among the others, snapped the switch, and alighted. Three or four of the men about the door nodded to him and told him the inquest had not started, but that it would begin shortly. Once he found that out, Jimmy plunged into an intricate and technical discussion of patented attachments for his machine, and I drifted off into the house.
It was a very old house, and built with old-fashioned disregard for space. I gathered, however, that the housekeeping done in it was but sketchy. Half a dozen of his riders made it their headquarters, with old Abe Martin. They bunked there, and a cook prepared the meals for all of them. There was a long table with a checked, red tablecloth on it--the room was empty now except for buzzing flies--where they had their meals. On the day of the shooting, I learned, the men had all been away on their duties, and the cook had gone into town for supplies, so Abe Martin had been alone.
Presently I went out to look at the stables. They were huge, but not much used. Three or four ponies were in their stalls, and several more stalls seemed to be used from time to time, but most of them were without signs of recent use.
There had been a time when the place was the headquarters of a busy ranch, but since the time of fences the activity had lessened until only Abe Martin, his half-dozen riders, and the cook lived there. It was curious to see the dwelling-place, large in itself, dwarfed by its outbuildings.
A stir in the house called me inside. The inquest was evidently to be more or less of an informal affair, but there was none the less a determined and businesslike air behind it all. Those men meant to get at the bottom of the matter. The coroner seemed to be a conscientious individual, who took the evidence of the first witness with great exactitude, though he knew perfectly well beforehand just what the testimony would be. The whole inquiry, as a matter of fact, promised to be cut and dried in spite of Jimmy's announced intention of "horning in."
The first witness was the cook, who had discovered the body. He had come back from town, entered the house and discovered his employer dead on the floor of the hall.
He had been shot through the heart. A rider, whom