“Hang it all,” thought Sandy, “the real work is over anyway. I’ve done my part. They can’t say I haven’t. This case is run to earth. What little excitement remains, Dick is welcome to. Toma and I both need a rest.”
Thus philosophically dismissing the matter, he and Toma went fishing; and Corporal Rand and Dick made their way on horseback to the foothills, arriving at the Carson cabin one evening before dusk.
Mrs. Carson met them at the door. She smiled her greeting and led the way into the house. A sort of motherly person, Dick thought.
“I hadn’t expected anyone at this time of the year,” she told them laughing, at the same time brushing back a dark wisp of hair that had fallen over her kindly forehead. “I’m afraid you’ll find everything in disorder. We’ve been drying saskatoons for the winter. Mr. Carson is in the kitchen helping now. He’ll come right in.”
True to his wife’s prediction, Mr. Carson came right in and, looking at him, Dick became heartily sick of the whole business. Carson was the sort of man one couldn’t help but like instantly. A much older man than Dick had expected, yet agile enough in spite of the white crown of hair, and handsome in a dignified way. He shook hands and took a seat opposite.
“Everyone is welcome here. You’re tired, I expect.”
“And hungry,” Corporal Rand amended.
“Mrs. Carson will soon attend to that,” her husband smiled. “She’ll have something ready in a few minutes. Have you come far?”
“From Fort Good Faith.”
A girl appeared in the open doorway, having come noiselessly, and stood, staring at them. The young lady mentioned in Dewberry’s diary, Dick surmised. She continued to stare as the now somewhat bashful young man stole a glance in her direction, then quickly dropped his gaze.
“Gertrude,” expostulated her father, “that isn’t nice. Either come forward and be introduced or return to the kitchen. My daughter,” he explained, turning his head and speaking to Rand. Gertrude made a wry face, shrugged her pretty shoulders and returned to the room, where her mother was preparing the evening meal. Her place was immediately usurped by a tall youth, older than Dick, who took up the business of staring with considerably more energy and effect, adding a dark scowl or two for good measure. As this was the young man he and Corporal Rand had come all that way to interview, Dick lost no time in giving him a careful appraisal.
Reynold Carson’s appearance was not prepossessing. He resembled neither of his parents. Unlike his sister, he was not good-looking. His mouth turned down at the corners. An unpleasant habit of scowling had etched two deep lines across his narrow forehead.
“A young cutthroat and no mistake,” mused Dick, remembering Dewberry’s verbal picture of him.
It was not until after supper that Rand stated his errand. All except Mrs. Carson were in the room. The boy and girl sat in one corner and conversed in low tones. Rand and Carson had pushed back their chairs from the supper table and had lit their pipes.
“Came over from Fort Good Faith,” said Rand, endeavoring to keep his voice steady, “to see your son. There’s a certain matter Mr. Carson, that I’d like to discuss with him. It’s important.”
“Yes, yes—” Carson removed his pipe and seemed to exhale the words with the smoke. “Reynold—” he trembled. “What—what has he done?”
The policeman placed one hand on the old man’s shoulder.
“I—I hate to do this. I wish it wasn’t necessary to tell you. You—you understand my position. It’s hard for me—hard for all of us.”
Dick choked and turned away his head. His heart had gone out to this poor old man, and he justcouldn’tlook at him now. And then, too, there was the boy’s mother. Thinking about her— It was terrible! She mustn’t come into the room. She mustn’t hear what Rand was saying.
“It’s in connection with Dewberry’s murder. Indirectly your son is implicated. I—I—”
Carson shrank back in his chair, threw up his hands in front of his face and moaned in misery—in terror. Reynold, who had heard his name mentioned, and perceived his father thus afflicted, got unsteadily to his feet and came stumbling across the floor, glaring at Rand.
“What you doing to dad?” he demanded.
Carson sat up, endeavoring to get a better grip of himself. Almost fiercely he turned upon his son.
“Reynold, you’re in trouble. The police have come for you. What have you done? Speak up, boy; speak up! My God!—this will kill your mother.”
“He lies! He lies!” stormed the boy. “I’ve done nothing. He lies!”
The corporal held up his hand, commanding silence.
“Sit down, Reynold—and keep quiet. You probably don’t know what it’s all about—yet. Listen to me. Answer my questions. No! Don’t try that,” he warned, as Carson’s son reached for his knife. “Sit down!”
“You’re lying,” whimpered the boy, taking a chair next to his father.
“Reynold, I wish you wouldn’t say that,” pleaded the old man. “He may be mistaken, but—but he isn’t lying.”
“I haven’t done a thing,” protested the boy.
“Perhaps you’ve almost forgotten the incident,” Rand cleared his throat, “but there was a note-book. You found a note-book belonging to Dewberry. Isn’t that right?”
“Yes,” Reynold acknowledged. “I did.”
“I remember that too,” said Carson brightening a little. “Reynold said he found it in Mr. Dewberry’s room. The prospector had—had mislaid it, I believe.”
“I gave it back to Dewberry,” stated the young man defiantly. “You don’t think I stole it, do you? I gave it back to him.”
“Quite right,” said Rand. “But is that all?”
“All! O’ course, it is. What you tryin’ to insinuate?”
“I’m trying to insinuate,” the policeman was very deliberate in his choice of words now, “that you read the book, copied something out of it and afterward sold that copy to two men—Emery and MacGregor. You did that, didn’t you?”
Reynold seemed to sink into his chair. His lips were white. Either he could not or would not answer. Feeling faint, Dick looked out of a window. Shadows were falling everywhere outside. The trees were black silhouettes. Night was shaking out its mantle from a metal-colored sky. There was no brightness or radiance anywhere except a single orange streak in the west, a sinister orange streak that marked the place where the sun had gone down.
“If he doesn’t confess,” thought Dick, “and have this over with, I’ll go crazy.”
A voice, trembling but defiant, broke across the silence.
“Yes, I did do that. What was wrong about it? Tell me—what was wrong about it? I didn’t commit no crime— It wasn’t a very bad thing to do—you can’t make me believe that. Just sold a copy of something that was written in that old book.”
“Reynold!” cried the old man. “Reynold!”
“Listen, dad, it wasn’t so terrible wrong. I didn’t touch anybody an’ I didn’t steal nothing. All I did was to sell what was in that book to a few men for just a few dollars.”
“To a few men!” gasped the corporal. “Who—beside Emery and MacGregor?”
“I sold one copy one day when Dewberry was here—before I gave him back the book. I made a second copy, but I didn’t sell it for months afterwards. Dad and I had a quarrel and I ran away. I played cards and I lost money—all I had. I tried to sell the copy. I showed it to a few men, but they laughed at me. Then one night, when I was at a road-house a queer looking chap, named Crane, gave me ten dollars for it.”
“Are you sure his name wasn’t Creel? Stop and think a moment.”
“Creel! Creel! That’s it.” Reynold looked at the policeman in surprise. “How did you know?”
“I found out,” answered Rand.
“So you see, dad, it wasn’t anything so very terrible,” Reynold ran on. “I—”
“Can you repeat what you copied from the book?” Rand interrupted.
“No, not word for word. It was something about an old chest that Dewberry had at his home at Peace River Crossing—full of money; about a key that he carried around his neck.”
“Would you remember if I read it to you?”
“Yes, I would,” answered the boy.
Corporal Rand crossed the room, knelt down, and opened his saddle-pack. A moment later he returned, carrying Dewberry’s diary, resumed his seat, and began thumbing the pages. It was several minutes before he found the right place. Then he read:
“May 13th, 1915. That chest is an obsession. Even out here in the wilderness away from it, it seems to haunt me night and day. Sometimes I call myself a doddering old fool. To buy it was a waste of money, an act of folly. That were bad enough, but this thing I have been doing lately is madness itself. In a thousand years, if God gave me that long to live, I could never restore that chest to its original glory and splendor. I’m sure that I haven’t put into it one infinitesimal part of the wealth and treasure that he did. If he were living now, Ming would laugh my diamonds and rubies and emeralds to scorn. I’m afraid he’d spurn my gold too. Cheap stuff! Trash! Where I have thousands he had millions. Folly to pit the Crystal Lode against the resources of an empire. Yet here I am, walking about with the key around my neck, trying to emulate an emperor.”
Corporal Rand closed the book.
“Is that what you copied?” he asked.
“Yes, that’s it,” answered Reynold.
“I wonder if you realize what you’ve done,” Rand spoke softly. “When you sold those copies you signed Dewberry’s death warrant. You must have known that one of those men, to whom you sold that information, would try to obtain Dewberry’s treasure.”
“I didn’t think much about it,” the boy declared doggedly.
“Dewberry is dead. MacGregor murdered him. It’s your fault. MacGregor never would have murdered him, if—if it hadn’t been for you. I want that fact to sink in. You know now why I’ve come to get you.”
“I’ll be hanged,” blubbered the boy.
Rand walked over and put his hand on the young man’s shoulder.
“No—not that. We’ll do what we can for you. You have a wonderful father and mother. For their sake—and for your own—we’ll be as lenient as possible.”
The young man’s body shook with sobs.
“Hush! Hush!” whispered Carson, wiping away his own tears. “I think I hear your mother coming.”
Creel was the first to confess. Sitting in the office of the commandant, in the presence of Inspector Cameron, Corporal Rand, Reynold Carson and Dick, he poured out his story. Confronted by Carson, who identified him as being one of the men to whom he had sold Dewberry’s secret, Creel saw that only the truth could help him. His deep-set eyes glowed dully. He moistened his lips.
“It’s true,” he began. “Frischette and me robbed Dewberry. Took his money and his poke. For months, we’d been waiting our chance. Dewberry stopped at the road-house several times, but nearly always it was during the middle of the day. Usually he’d hit our place about noon and stay not more than an hour. He preferred to go on and spend the night with Meade, who was his friend.”
The sun, shining in through the window, bothered the old recluse and he hitched back his chair. Not until he became comfortable again did he resume:
“Our chance come finally. Dewberry, delayed in a storm, drifted in one afternoon late—about four o’clock. He hadn’t time to make Meade’s that night. It was a cold day and miserable. A blizzard out. You could scarcely see ahead o’ you. I was surprised when Frischette come over and notified me that Dewberry was there. I hadn’t expected to stir out of my cabin. I didn’t want to walk back through the storm with him, but Frischette said it was the best time for our plan, that we’d have to strike that night if we ever intended to. After while I agreed and we walked over and I hid in Frischette’s room.
“Neither one of us had any idea that that man MacGregor was playing the same sort o’ game as us. He was stopping at Frenchie’s that night, along with a lot of others, and, of course, we thought nothing of it. You see, we was sure that we was the only ones ‘in’ on the secret. We had got the dope from the kid and had made our plans.”
“Was a part of your plan to kill Dewberry?” Inspector Cameron interrupted.
Creel nodded.
“Wasn’t any other way our plan would work out. We simply had to do it. We was compelled to put Dewberry out of the way, else he’d sound the alarm and prevent us from getting into his cabin at Peace River Crossing.
“About nine o’clock Frischette come into the room where I was, bringing my supper. Then the two of us sat there talking. We had decided that it wasn’t much use to try to do anything until along about midnight. So we waited there in the dark. When the bunk-hall began to get a little quiet we stopped talking ourselves for fear we might keep someone awake. It was exactly twelve by my watch, when we stole out of that room.”
Creel paused reflectively, his eyes half closed. He remained motionless and silent so long that Dick began to wonder if the man had lost his power of speech. Suddenly he sat up straight in his chair and continued:
“We was both in our stocking-feet and we moved as quiet as ghosts between the rows of sleepers. Nobody could have heard us. Men was snoring all around us. It was dark in the room, almost black, but we knew exactly where to go. All the details had been planned out in advance. Yet, as I said before, we hadn’t figured on MacGregor, and on that account we nearly got tripped up. We didn’t know nothing about him until we was directly over him.”
Again Cameron interrupted: “Directly over him? What do you mean? Had you made a mistake and gone to MacGregor’s bunk instead?”
“No! No!” the old recluse spoke impatiently. “He was on his knees, stooping over Dewberry, with the poke and money in his hands. Dewberry was dead!
“MacGregor hadn’t even heard us come up. I was carrying a knife in my right hand and I pushed it against his throat. I whispered that if he made a sound I’d kill him. In fact, I thought I would anyway. I was so frightened I could hardly stand on my feet. But if I was frightened, MacGregor was worse than that. He was frozen like a block of ice. I don’t think he had more than strength enough to hand over the poke and the roll of bills. After that we took him back into the kitchen and told him we would give him his life if he’d promise to leave the place at once and make no effort to get back the poke.”
“He was glad of the chance, I guess,” a smile twisted Creel’s lips. “We were pretty sure that we’d never see him again. We weren’t afraid that he’d squeal, because he was the one that had committed the murder. Our hands was clean. Things had worked out better than we could have planned ourselves.”
“You didn’t worry?” asked Cameron.
“Yes, we did worry—some. We knew that MacGregor wouldn’t say a word about us unless he was placed under arrest for the murder. We didn’t think you was going to get him, and you wouldn’t either if it hadn’t been for Fontaine. We had no idea that Fontaine knew anything about MacGregor until he blabbed out that he had seen MacGregor dope a drink he was mixing for the prospector. We could have killed the kid for that, but if we had, you’d have known right away that we was the ones that had done it and was implicated in some way in the other murder. There wasn’t a thing for us to do but just sit and wait.
“We didn’t have to wait very long either. MacGregor gets himself killed in a scrap with the police. And lo and behold!—the ‘Rat’s’ wife won’t talk. She wouldn’t tell you a thing and she kneweverything. You can bet MacGregor told his wife all about us. But why didn’t she squeal? She could have got revenge on us good and proper. She had us right where she wanted us. When she wouldn’t give evidence, we knew what was in that lady’s mind then and there:She was planning to get back that poke!”
“Have you any more to say for yourself?” asked the inspector, following a long interval of silence.
“No, sir, not a thing.”
“If you don’t mind,” said Rand, addressing his superior, “I’d like to ask him a question.”
“Very well, corporal.”
“What was in the poke the evening Emery and Burnnel came to your cabin?”
Creel’s laugh sounded like the cackle of a madman.
“A rusty nail and a piece of broken string, taken from an old alarm clock. That’s what I call a clever piece of work. It was my idea. Frischette didn’t know a thing about it. It fooled everybody. I buried Dewberry’s keys in a hole I dug in the cellar. When I got the chance, I came back and dug them up. It was the same day that you went over to investigate about Frischette. You thought he had committed suicide.”
“Well, wasn’t I right?”
“No.”
“If he didn’t commit suicide, what happened to him?”
“The squaw shot him—MacGregor’s wife.”
One might have thought that Rand had been shot himself. He jumped. It was several moments before he fully recovered from his surprise.
“How do you know that MacGregor’s wife shot him?”
“She told me so herself.”
“When?”
“The night her and Emery and Burnnel took the keys away from me, that night across the Hay River. Flew into a rage and spilled everything. I guess she’d have shot me too, but Burnnel wouldn’t let her.”
“If what you say is true, how can you account for the note I found in Frischette’s pocket?”
“She made Frischette write it before she shot him. Then she came back to my cabin and searched everywhere for the keys. They were there, but she couldn’t find them. My place looked like a wreck. After that she met Burnnel and Emery who had come back to try to get the poke again. The next morning she stayed out there in the woods while them two prospectors went over to see you.”
“And did she stay in the woods until the afternoon of the next day?”
“That’s exactly what she did.”
Corporal Rand turned to Inspector Cameron.
“I guess that’s all, sir. I’d suggest that you verify the prisoner’s last few statements by questioning Mrs. MacGregor herself and Burnnel and Emery. However, I believe that they are true. Shall I take Carson and Creel to their cells, sir?”
The commandant nodded absent-mindedly, waved one arm in a gesture of dismissal. Dick started to file out with the others, when he heard Cameron calling his name. Turning sharply upon his heel, he strode back to the inspector’s desk and saluted.
“Dick, you young rascal,” began the mounted police official, “I’ve been wanting to have a talk with you for a long time. You see, I have received a letter concerning you and Toma. It came from the Commissioner of the Canadian Royal North West Mounted at Ottawa.”
“I received a letter from him, too,” said Dick, “about a year ago. In this letter he said that he had considered favorably my application to join the mounted police, and that I should hold myself in readiness to report at the barracks at Regina.”
“And you’ve heard nothing from him since?”
“Not a word, sir.”
“Didn’t you ever think that this was a little strange?”
“Well—er—” Dick flushed. “As a matter of fact, inspector, I’ve been so busy—we’ve all been so busy—that I haven’t had much time to bother my head about it.”
Inspector Cameron laughed and nudged Dick slyly.
“Would you care to hear a paragraph or two from the letter thatIreceived?”
“Yes, sir. That is, if you’d care to read it, sir.”
“I do wish to read it. Here it is.” Cameron picked up a typewritten sheet on the desk in front of him. “Now prepare yourself for a shock.”
“Regarding your request,” read the commandant, “that Recruits Kent and Toma should be retained at your detachment for special police service, I wish to say that although such an arrangement is not usual and often not advisable, we have decided to make a concession to you in this particular case.”
“Great Scott!” exclaimed Dick.
“So you see it was my fault that you didn’t go to Regina. You boys are too valuable to lose.”
Dick’s face beamed like the sun. He felt that some great force underneath him had lifted him up and that now he was being whirled around and around the room in a rose-tinted cloud. He couldn’t speak because he was so happy.
“Don’t stand there looking like a ninny. Compose yourself, my boy. Here’s your first month’s salary check. Here’s another one for Toma. Came direct from the paymaster at Ottawa. I haven’t one for Sandy because he didn’t put in his application. You tell him he’d better—if he wants to work for me. And while you’re telling him that, you might slip this bit of paper into his pocket with my compliments. Drawn from my own personal account.”
Dick recalled afterward that he had thanked the inspector, but he never could quite remember how he had gotten out of the room. He often wondered if he hadn’t floated out in triumph and in regal state on that rose-tinted cloud.
Three boys sat on the edge of a huge raft that drifted lazily over the clear, cool surface of Whitefish Lake, near Fort Good Faith. It was a hot day in late summer. Heat waves danced across the water. There wasn’t a speck of a cloud anywhere in sight. Neither was there another craft on the lake. With the exception of the three young sportsmen, no person might have been found within a radius of ten miles, which was fortunate, else it might have been discovered that not one of the trio wore any clothes. Naked as on the day they were born, they sat and dangled their feet in the water. “Mr. MacClaren told me that you were here,” Dick was saying. “I stopped just long enough to have something to eat, then I came right over. I was so anxious to tell you how everything came out.”
“How long did you remain at detachment headquarters?” asked Sandy.
“Four days,” replied Dick. “It was longer than I should have stayed, but I was anxious to learn what they were intending to do with young Carson. Inspector Cameron gave his case a special hearing the day before I left. You can imagine how pleased I was at the outcome.”
“What was the outcome? Let him off with a light sentence, I suppose.”
“You couldn’t guess. He’s out on probation. Inspector Cameron would have sent him to Edmonton for trial, along with the rest of them, if it hadn’t been for Corporal Rand. During the hearing Rand proved to everybody’s satisfaction that Reynold hasn’t full control of his mental powers—in a way almost an idiot. He doesn’t fully realize yet what he’s done.”
“So they sent him home,” said Sandy.
“I took him home.”
“Great Scott! How did that happen?”
“Inspector Cameron asked me to,” answered Dick. “I couldn’t very well refuse, could I? I didn’t really want to go—but I’m glad now. Sandy—if you could have seen Mr. and Mrs. Carson’s faces when we walked through the door, you’d have felt repaid a million times.”
“I can believe that. What did they say?”
“I can’t remember all they said. At a time like that, things people say don’t count. It’s what they do and how they feel that really matters. I can’t explain exactly what I mean. But if you’d been there, you’d understand.”
“I think I understand now, Dick,” said Sandy softly.
“That experience will make a man of him. He’s changed already. And the girl, too. It was a lesson for both of them.”
Toma dropped off the raft a moment later, during a lull in the conversation, and swam in widening circles around them. For a short time the two boys watched him, then suddenly, with a little start, Dick seized his trousers and plunged one hand in a pocket.
“There! I’d almost forgotten. Here’s a check for both of you from Inspector Cameron. Toma,” he called, “come back!”
Toma swam back to the raft, and then Dick told them of his interview with the commandant, not forgetting to mention the letter that had been read to him.
“Wish I’d put in my application too,” sighed Sandy.
“It isn’t too late yet. Inspector Cameron told me to tell you.”
“I’ll write one out this very day,” decided Sandy.
Toma regarded his check thoughtfully.
“How I spend all this money?” he wanted to know.
“A new saddle,” suggested Dick.
“Got ’em good one now.”
“A rifle then.”
“Plenty rifle.”
“Tell you what,” impishly advised Sandy, “tell you what, Toma, you can save your money and later on purchase a Chinese chest.”
“One that dates back to the Ming dynasty,” Dick elaborated.
“Ugh!” said the young Indian.
THE END
[1]Author’s Note: An expression frequently heard in the North. It means here “beyond the borders of the wilderness.”
[1]Author’s Note: An expression frequently heard in the North. It means here “beyond the borders of the wilderness.”