"His brother from the East inherited it," said the storekeeper. "He came
and sold out, lock, stock and barrel. Not that there was much. A few
cattle and horses, and the stuff in the ranch house, which wasn't
valuable. There were a lot of books, and the brother gave them for a
library, but we haven't any building. The railroad isn't built this far
yet, and unless we get oil here it won't be."
"The brother inherited it, eh? Do you know the brother's name?"
"David, I think. He was a doctor back East somewhere."
"Then this Henry Livingstone wasn't married? Or at least had no
children?"
"He wasn't married. He was a sort of hermit. He'd been dead two days
before any one knew it. My wife went out when they found him and got him
ready for the funeral. He was buried before the brother got here." He
glanced at Bassett shrewdly. "The place has been prospected for oil, and
there's a dry hole on the next ranch. I tell my wife nature's like the
railroad. It quit before it got this far."
Bassett's last scruple had fled. The story was there, ready for the
gathering. So ready, indeed, that he was almost suspicious of his luck.
And that conviction, that things were coming too easy, persisted through
his interview with the storekeeper's wife, in the small house behind the
store. She was a talkative woman, eager to discuss the one drama in
a drab life, and she showed no curiosity as to the reason for his
question.
"Henry Livingstone!" she said. "Well, I should say so. I went out right
away when we got the word he was dead, and there I stayed until it was
all over. I guess I know as much about him as any one around here does,
for I had to go over his papers to find out who his people were."
The papers, it seemed, had not been very interesting; canceled checks
and receipted bills, and a large bundle of letters, all of them from a
brother named David and a sister who signed herself Lucy. There had
been a sealed one, too, addressed to David Livingstone, and to be opened
after his death. She had had her husband wire to "David" and he had come
out, too late for the funeral.
"Do you remember when that was?"
"Let me see. Henry Livingstone died about a month before the murder at
the Clark ranch. We date most things around here from that time."