The Heart of the Range Part 47

"Huh," Luke contented himself with grunting, and subsided.

"No fuss a-tall, Thompson?" resumed Racey.

"Nary a fuss."

"And you was here alla time Dale was here?"

"I was here before Dale come, and I was still here when Dale--went away."

"In the same room with him?"

"In this room, yeah. In the same room with him alla time. Sh.o.r.e."

"Then if Dale had had a riot with anybody else but the stranger man you'd 'a' knowed it."

"You betcha. He didn't have no trouble, only with the stranger."

"Did anybody else have any trouble with anybody while you was here?"

At this Thompson frowned. Where were Racey's questions leading him?

Was it a trap? Knowing Racey as he did, he feared the worst. He would have liked to leave the questioned unanswered. But this was impossible. As it was, he was delaying his answer longer than good sense warranted. Both Jake Rule and Kansas Casey were staring at him fixedly. Racey regarded him steadily, a slight and sinister smile lurking at the corner of his mouth.

"Well," prompted Racey, "you'd oughta be able to tell us whether there was any other fights while you was here?"

"They wasn't," plunged Thompson. "Everything was salubrious till Dale started his battle."

"And when did you get here?" pursued Racey.

"Oh, I'd been here all night."

"And you dunno of any other brush except the one between Dale and the stranger?"

"I done said so forty times," Thompson declared, peevishly. "How many times have I gotta repeat it?"

"As many times as yo're asked," put in the sheriff, sharply.

"Didja see anybody get hurt--have a accident or something while you were here, Thompson?" Racey bored on.

Thompson shook an impatient head. "n.o.body got hurt or had a accident."

"Then," said Racey, turning suddenly on McFluke, "how did you get that black eye?"

CHAPTER XXI

GONE AWAY!

McFluke's eyes flickered at the question. His body appeared to sink inward. Then he straightened, and flung back his wide shoulders, and glowered at Racey Dawson.

"I ran into a door this morning," said the saloon-keeper in a tone of the utmost confidence.

"Oh, you ran into a door, did you," Racey observed, sweetly. "And what particular door did you run into?"

"The front door."

"That one?" Racey indicated the door of the barroom.

"That one."

"We'll just take a look at that door."

Accompanied by the deeply interested sheriff, who was beginning to sniff his quarry like the old bloodhound he was, Racey crossed to the barroom door. He looked at the door. He looked at the sheriff. The sheriff looked only at the door.

"Door's opened back flat against the wall, Mac," said the sheriff.

"Was she like this when you ran into her?"

"Course not," was the heated reply. "She was swingin' open."

Racey squatted down on the floor. "Lookit here, Sheriff."

The sheriff stooped and regarded the wooden wedge under the door that jammed it fast. Racey drew a finger across the top of the wedge. He held up the finger-tip for the sheriff's inspection. The tip was black with the dust of weeks.

"That door has been wedged back all this hot weather," said Racey, gently. "Look at the dust under the door on both sides of the wedge, too. Bet that wedge ain't been out of place for a month."

Softly as he spoke McFluke heard him. "---- you! I tell you that door was opened this mornin'! I hit my head on it! Ask 'em all! Ask anybody! Jack, lookit here--"

"I didn't see you hit yore head on the door," interrupted Jack Harpe.

"Maybe you did, I dunno."

Racey raised a quick head as Jack Harpe spoke. Quite plainly he saw Jack Harpe accompany his words with a slight lowering of his left eyelid. Racey glanced at McFluke. He saw the defiant expression depart from the McFluke countenance, and a look of unmistakable relief take its place.

Racey dropped his head. The sheriff was speaking.

"Mac," he was saying, "yo're lyin'. Yo're lyin' as fast as a hoss can trot. You never got yore black eye on this door. I dunno why yo're sayin' you did, but I'm gonna find out. Till--"

"You won't have far to go to find out," struck in Racey Dawson. "I know how he got his black eye."

"How?" demanded the sheriff, his grizzled eyebrows drawing together.

"Dale gave it to him," was the answer pat and pithy.

"He did not!" The saloon-keeper began to roar instantly, and had to be quieted by Kansas Casey.

When order was restored Racey explained his deductions. The sheriff listened in silence. Then he went to the body of the dead man, and examined the bruised and broken right hand.

"I'm tellin' you," declared Racey with finality, "he hit somebody when he broke that hand."