"Not guilty, ma'am."
His jaunty insouciance struck a spark from her. "That is what you told us before, and within half an hour we found out that you knew where the booty was hidden. Before that discrepancy was cleared up you convinced us of your innocence by stealing the money a second time."
"What did I do with it?" he asked.
"How should I know?"
From his pocket he drew a note book. Between two of its leaves was a slip of paper which he handed to Moya. It was a receipt in full from the treasurer of the Gunnison County Fair association to John Kilmeny for the sum previously taken from him by parties unknown.
The girl looked at him with shining eyes. "You repented and took the money back?"
"No. I didn't repent, but I took it back."
"Why?"
"That's a long tale. It's tied up with the story of my life--goes back thirty-one years, before I was born, in fact. Want to hear it?"
"Yes."
"My father was a young man when he came to this country. The West wasn't very civilized then. My father was fearless and outspoken. This made him enemies among the gang of cattle thieves operating in the country where his ranch lay. He lost calves. One day he caught a brand blotter at work. The fellow refused to surrender. There was a fight, and my father killed him."
"Oh!" cried the girl softly in fascinated horror.
"Such things had to be in those days. Any man that was a man had sometimes to fight or else go to the wall."
"I can see that. I wasn't blaming your father. Only ... it must have been horrible to have to do."
"The fellow thieves of the man swore vengeance. One night they caught the chief--that's what I used to call my father--caught him alone in a gambling hell in the cow town where the stockmen came to buy provisions. My father had gone there by appointment to meet a man--lured to his death by a forged note. He knew he had probably come to the end of the passage as soon as he had stepped into the place. His one chance was to turn and run. He wouldn't do that."
"I love him for it," the girl cried impetuously.
"The story goes that he looked them over contemptuously, the whole half dozen of them, and laughed in a slow irritating way that must have got under their hides."
Moya, looking at the son, could believe easily this story of the father. "Go on," she nodded tensely.
"The quarrel came, as of course it would. Just before the guns flashed a stranger rose from a corner and told the rustlers they would have to count him in the scrap, that he wouldn't stand for a six to one row."