But you later went to the office of Jacoby, Haight & Co., and looked over the files of their correspondence with Radnor Gaylord and verified his statement in every particular, did you not?"
"Yes, I did, but still—"
"That is all I wish to ask, Mr. Clancy.
I think the reason is evident," I added, turning to the jury, "why I was willing to pay in order to get rid of him.
Nobody's character, nobody's correspondence, was safe while he was in the house."
The detective retired amidst general laughter and I could see that feeling had veered again in Radnor's favor.
The total effect of the evidence respecting the ha'nt and the robbery was good rather than bad, and I more than fancied that I was indebted to the sheriff for it.
Radnor was not called again and that was the end of the testimony in regard to him.
The rest of the time was taken up with a consideration of Cat-Eye Mose and some further questioning of the negroes in regard to the ha'nt.
Old Nancy created considerable diversion with her account of the spirited roast chicken.
It had changed materially since I heard it last.
She was emphatic in her statement that
"Marse Rad didn't have nuffen to do wif him.
He was a sho' nuff ha'nt an' his gahments smelt o' de graveyard."
The evidence respecting Mose brought out nothing of any consequence, and with that the hearing was brought to a close.
The coroner instructed the jury on two or three points of law and ended with the brief formula:
"You have heard the testimony given by these witnesses.
It remains for you to do your duty."
After an interminable half hour the jury-men filed back to their seats and the clerk read the verdict:
"We find that the said Richard Gaylord came to his death in Luray Cavern on the 19th day of May, by cerebral hemorrhage, the result of a wound inflicted by some blunt weapon in the hands of a person or persons unknown.
We recommend that Radnor Fanshaw Gaylord be held for trial before the Grand Jury."
Rad appeared dazed at the verdict; though in the face of the evidence and his own stubborn refusal to explain it, I don't see how he could have expected any other outcome.
As for myself, it was better than I had feared.
CHAPTER XV FALSE CLUES
The fight had now fairly begun.
The district attorney was working up the side of the prosecution, aided, I was sure, by the over-zealous sheriff.
It remained for me to map out some definite plan of action and organize the defence.
As I rode back to Four-Pools in the early evening after the inquest, I continued to dwell upon the evidence, searching blindly for some clue.
The question which returned most persistently to my mind was
"What has become of Cat-Eye Mose?"
It was clear now that upon the answer to this question hinged the ultimate solution of the mystery.
I still clung to the belief that he was guilty and in hiding.
But five days had elapsed since the murder, and no trace of him had been discovered.
It seemed incredible that a man, however well he might know his ground, could, with a whole county on his track, elude detection so effectually.
Supposing after all that he were not guilty, but the sheriff's theory that he had been killed and the body concealed, were true; then who, besides Radnor, could have had any motive for committing the crime?
There was nothing from the past that afforded even the suggestion of a clue.
The old man seemed to have had no enemies but his sons.
His sons?
The thought of Jeff suddenly sprang into my mind.
If anyone on earth owed the Colonel a grudge it was his elder son.
And Jeff had more than his share of the Gaylord spirit which could not lightly forgive an injury.
Could he have returned secretly to the neighborhood, and, following his father into the cave, have quarreled with him?
Heaven knows he had cause enough!
He may, in his anger, have struck the old man without knowing what he was doing, and overcome with horror at the result, have left him and fled.
I was almost as reluctant to believe him guilty of the crime as to believe it of Radnor, but the thought having once come, would not be dismissed.
I knew that he had sunk pretty low in the nine years since his disappearance, but I could never think of him otherwise than as I myself remembered him.
He had been the hero of my boyhood and I revolted from the thought of deliberately setting out to prove him guilty of his father's murder.
I spurred my horse into a gallop, miserably trying to escape from my suspicion; but the more I put it from me as impossible, the surer I became that at last I had stumbled on a clue.
Automatically, I began adjusting the evidence to fit this new theory, and reluctant as I was to see it, every circumstance from the beginning fitted it perfectly.
Jeff had returned secretly to the neighborhood, had taken up his abode in the old negro cabins and made his presence known only to Mose.