The Breaking Point
Page 96The description Wasson had applied to Henry Livingstone, Bassett himself
applied to the two ranch hands later on, during their interview. It
could hardly have been called an interview at all, indeed, and after a
time Bassett realized that behind their taciturnity was suspicion. They
were watching him, undoubtedly; he rather thought, when he looked away,
that once or twice they exchanged glances. He was certain, too, that
Wasson himself was puzzled.
"Speak up, Jake," he said once, irritably. "This gentleman has come a
long way. It's a matter of some property."
"What sort of property?" Jake demanded. Jake was the spokesman of the
two.
is if Henry Livingstone had any family."
"He had a brother."
"No one else?"
"Then it's up to me to trail the brother," Bassett observed. "Either of
you remember where he lived?"
"Somewhere in the East."
Bassett laughed.
"That's a trifle vague," he commented good-humoredly. "Didn't you boys
ever mail any letters for him?"
He was certain again that they exchanged glances, but they continued
irritation and amusement.
"What'd I tell you?" he asked. "Like master like man. I've been here ten
years, and I've never got a word about the Livingstones out of either of
them."
"I'm a patient man." Bassett grinned. "I suppose you'll admit that one
of you drove David Livingstone to the train, and that you had a fair
idea then of where he was going?"
He looked directly at Jake, but Jake's face was a solid mask. He made no
reply whatever.
From that moment on Bassett was certain that David had not been driven
find out, was whether the two ranch hands knew that he had gone into the
mountains, or why. He surmised back of their taciturnity a small mystery
of their own, and perhaps a fear. Possibly David's going was as much a
puzzle to them as to him. Conceivably, during the hours together on the
range, or during the winter snows, for ten years they had wrangled and
argued over a disappearance as mysterious in its way as Judson Clark's.
He gave up at last, having learned certain unimportant facts: that the
recluse had led a lonely life; that he had never tried to make the place
more than carry itself; that he was a student, and that he had no other
peculiarities.