The Ledge on Bald Face Part 8

"What's makin' you so sore, Sam?" demanded one. "Did the book agent try to make up to Sis Hopkins?"

"No, it's Tug that Sis is making eyes at now," suggested another.

"That's what's puttin' Sam so off his nut."

"Leave the lady's name out of it, boys," interrupted Blackstock, in a tone that carried conviction.

"Quit that jaw now, Sam," interposed another, changing the subject, "an' tell us what ye've done with that fancy belt o' yourn 'at ye're so proud of. We hain't never seen ye without it afore."

"That's so," chimed in the constable. "That accounts for his foolishness. Sam ain't himself without that fancy belt."

Hawker stopped his cursing and pulled himself together with an effort, as if only now realizing that his followers had gone over completely to the side of the law and Tug Blackstock.

"Busted the buckle," he explained quickly. "Mend it when I git time."

"Now, boys," said Blackstock presently, "we'll git right back along to where poor Jake's still layin', and there we'll ask this here stranger what he knows about it. It's there, if anywheres, where we're most likely to git some light on the subject. I've sent over to the Ridge fer the coroner, an' poor Jake can't be moved till he comes."

The book agent, his confidence apparently restored by the att.i.tude of Blackstock, now let loose a torrent of eloquence to explain how glad he would be to tell all he knew, and how sorry he was that he knew nothing, having merely had a brief conversation with poor Mr. Sanderson on the morning of the previous day.

"Ye'll hev lots o' time to tell us all that when we're askin' ye,"

answered Blackstock. "Now, take my advice an' keep yer mouth shet."

As Blackstock was speaking, Jim slipped in alongside the prisoner and rubbed against him with a friendly wag of the tail as if to say:

"Sorry to see you in such a hole, old chap."

Some of the men laughed, and one who was more or less a friend of Hawker's, remarked sarcastically:

"Jim don't seem quite so discriminatin' as usual, Tug."

"Oh, I don't know," replied the Deputy drily, noting the dog's att.i.tude with evident interest. "Time will show. Ye must remember a man ain't _necessarily_ a murderer jest because he wears black side-lights an'

tries to sell ye a book that ain't no good."

"No good!" burst out the prisoner, reddening with indignation. "You show me another book that's half as good, at double the price, an' I'll give you----"

"Shet up, you!" ordered the Deputy, with a curious look. "This ain't no picnic ye're on, remember."

Then some one, as if for the first time, thought of the money for which Sanderson had been murdered.

"Why don't ye search him, Tug?" he demanded. "Let's hev a look in that there black knapsack."

"Ye bloomin' fool," shouted Hawker, again growing excited, "ye don't s'pose he'd be carryin' it on him, do ye? He'd hev it buried somewheres in the woods, where he could git it later."

"Right ye are, Sam," agreed the Deputy. "The man as done the deed ain't likely to carry the evidence around on him. But all the same, we'll search the prisoner bime-by."

By the time the strange procession had got back to the scene of the tragedy it had been swelled by half the population of the village. At Blackstock's request, Zeb Smith, the proprietor of the store, who was also a magistrate, swore in a score of special constables to keep back the crowd while awaiting the arrival of the coroner. Under the magistrate's orders--which satisfied Blackstock's demand for strict formality of procedure--the prisoner was searched, and could not refrain from showing a childish triumph when nothing was found upon him.

Pa.s.sing from abject terror to a ridiculous over-confidence, he with difficulty restrained himself from seizing the opportunity to harangue the crowd on the merits of "Mother, Home, and Heaven." His face was wreathed in fatuous smiles as he saw the precious book s.n.a.t.c.hed from its case and pa.s.sed around mockingly from hand to hand. He certainly did not look like a murderer, and several of the crowd, including Stephens, the game-warden, began to wonder if they had not been barking up the wrong tree.

"I've got the idee," remarked Stephens, "it'd take a baker's dozen o'

that chap to do in Jake Sanderson that way. The skate as killed Jake was some man, anyways."

"I'd like to know," sneered Hawker, "how ye're going to account for that piece o' paper, the book-agent's paper, 'at Tug Blackstock found there under the body."

"Aw, shucks!" answered the game-warden, "that's easy. He's been a-sowin' 'em round the country so's anybody could git hold of 'em, same's you er me, Sam!"

This harmless, if ill-timed pleasantry appeared to Hawker, in his excitement, a wanton insult. His lean face went black as thunder, and his lips worked with some savage retort that would not out. But at that instant came a strange diversion. The dog Jim, who under Blackstock's direction had been sniffing long and minutely at the clothes of the murdered man, at the rifled leather bag, and at the ground all about, came suddenly up to Hawker and stood staring at him with a deep, menacing growl, while the thick hair rose stiffly along his back.

For a moment there was dead silence save for that strange accusing growl. Hawker's face went white to the lips. Then, in a blaze, of fury he yelled!

"Git out o' that! I'll teach ye to come showin' yer teeth at me!" And he launched a savage kick at the animal.

"JIM!! Come here!" rapped out the command of Tug Blackstock, sharp as a rifle shot. And Jim, who had eluded the kick, trotted back, still growling, to his master.

"Whatever ye been doin' to Jim, Sam?" demanded one of the mill hands.

"I ain't never seen him act like that afore."

"He's _always_ had a grudge agin me," panted Hawker, "coz I had to give him a lickin' once."

"Now ye're lyin', Sam Hawker," said Blackstock quietly. "Ye know right well as how you an' Jim were good friends only yesterday at the store, where I saw ye feedin' him. An' I don't think likely ye've ever given Jim a lickin'. It don't sound probable."

"Seems to me there's a lot of us has gone a bit off their nut over this thing, an' not much wonder, neither," commented the game-warden.

"Looks like Sam Hawker has gone plumb crazy. An' now there's Jim, the sensiblest dog in the world, with lots more brains than most men-kind, foolin' away his time like a year-old pup a-tryin' dig out a darn old woodchuck hole."

Such, in fact, seemed to be Jim's object. He was digging furiously with both forepaws beneath the big white stone on the opposite side of the pool.

"He's bit me. I'll kill him," screamed Hawker, his face distorted and foam at the corners of his lips. He plucked his hunting-knife from its sheath, and leapt forward wildly, with the evident intention of darting around the pool and knifing the dog.

But Blackstock, who had been watching him intently, was too quick for him.

"No, ye don't, Sam!" he snapped, catching him by the wrist with such a wrench that the bright blade fell to the ground. With a scream, Hawker struck at his face, but Blackstock parried the blow, tripped him neatly, and fell on him.

"Hold him fast, boys," he ordered. "Seems like he's gone mad. Don't let him hurt himself."

In five seconds the raving man was trussed up helpless as a chicken, his hands tied behind his back, his legs lashed together at the knees, so that he could neither run nor kick. Then he was lifted to his feet, and held thus, inexorably but with commiseration.

"Sorry to be rough with ye, Sam," said one of the constables, "but ye've gone crazy as a bed-bug."

"Never knowed Sam was such a friend o' Jake's!" muttered another, with deepest pity.

But Blackstock stood close beside the body of the murdered man, and watched with a face of granite the efforts of Jim to dig under the big white stone. His absorption in such an apparently frivolous matter attracted the notice of the crowd. A hush fell upon them all, broken only by the hoa.r.s.e, half-smothered ravings of Sam Hawker.

"'Tain't no woodchuck Jim's diggin' for, you see!" muttered one of the constables to the puzzled Stephens.

"Tug don't seem to think so, neither," agreed Stephens.

"Angus," said Blackstock in a low, strained voice to the constable who had just spoken, "would ye mind stepping round an' givin' Jim a lift with that there stone!"

The constable hastened to obey. As he approached, Jim looked up, his face covered thickly with earth, wagged his tail in greeting, then fell to work again with redoubled energy.