The Land of Strong Men

by A. M. Chisholm

  CHAPTER XXXIX

  THE TURNING OF THE SCREW

  If Mr. Braden had been puzzled by Garland's conduct in the firstinstance, he became more so. Garland made him no proposition. Thethought that the latter might be dickering with the French boys crossedMr. Braden's mind, but was open to the objection that he would have toshare blackmail with them. On the whole, Mr. Braden concluded that hehad bluffed Garland. After a while the latter would part with thedocument cheaply.

  Hence, when he received a visit from Judge Riley one day about the closeof business hours, he was very little perturbed. Mackay perhaps hadtaken legal advice on his supposed right, or the judge might have comeon other business. But the lawyer's first words cleared up that point.

  "I am here," he said, "on behalf of my client, Mrs. Mackay. You areaware that she claims ownership of the land on which coal has beenfound?"

  "Her claim is nonsense," Mr. Braden asserted stoutly.

  "That's just what I am trying to clear up. As a result of what Frenchtold her she always supposed she owned the land."

  "I'm not responsible for what French told her. I'm getting tired of thisabsurd claim of hers. Her land is described in her deeds. That's herevidence of title. You ought to know that."

  "Yes, I know that," the judge admitted mildly. "As it happens, she isnow able to produce a deed from you to her father conveying the land inquestion."

  It was so entirely unexpected that Mr. Braden's heart decidedlymisbehaved. How in the name of all bad luck had this happened? HadGarland, after all, made a dicker with Mackay? Had Mackay got thoseinfernal deeds? Or had he merely a suspicion, which Riley was trying toconfirm by a fishing trip for a damaging admission?

  "Nonsense!" he said.

  "Oh, no," the judge replied cheerfully. "To be quite frank with you, ourposition is this: French, shortly before his death, delivered to hisniece a conveyance in duplicate from you to her father purporting toconvey certain lands therein described. This land lies immediately eastof the coal lands, but does not include them. We claim that this latterconveyance is the true and original one."

  "Where did you get it?" Mr. Braden demanded.

  "Suppose French, feeling his end approaching, gave it to his niece?"

  "He--" Mr. Braden began and checked himself suddenly. Riley was layingverbal traps for him. He must be careful. "If you have this conveyance,let me see it."

  "You will see it at the proper time."

  "You mean that you haven't got it," Mr. Braden charged.

  The judge smiled. "You think I am trying to trap you into an admission.Nothing of the sort. I said we could produce the documents. The onlydifference between them and the others is the description of theproperty. Same date, same witness. It's useless to deny the existence ofdocuments which I myself have seen."

  There was no doubt that the judge was telling the truth. So Garland hadsold out to Mackay. Mr. Braden's front trenches were carried, but hebelieved his second line to be impregnable.

  "I'm not denying its existence. I know all about the thing, includingthe fact that it was stolen from me."

  "The main thing is that it exists."

  "It exists, but it is worthless."

  "My clients consider it rather valuable."

  "I suppose they paid for it, but they've been stung. When I sold thatland to Winton, a clerk in my office prepared the deeds and got thedescription wrong. When I discovered the error I had new deeds preparedand executed, and they are what I suppose French gave to Winton'sdaughter. I supposed he had given them to Winton long ago. So there youare! You've found a mare's nest, and that's all there is to it."

  Judge Riley chuckled internally, though his face was grave. Braden wasdoing the obvious.

  "Don't you compare conveyances before execution in your office?"

  "Of course I do. But in this case the error was in the description whichthe clerk prepared and gave to the stenographer to copy. She copied it,and it was compared with what had been given her."

  "Then who discovered the error?"

  "I did. It struck me that the description was not correct."

  "After you had signed it and French had witnessed it?"

  "Y--yes." There was hesitation in his voice.

  "Don't you read things over before you sign and have your signaturewitnessed? Why didn't it strike you then?"

  "You aren't cross-examining me!" Mr. Braden asserted.

  "Not at all. I am just trying to understand a situation which is ratherextraordinary. Then, as I understand it, you had a new conveyanceprepared, and delivered it to French, and that's all you know about it?"

  "That's all," Mr. Braden confirmed.

  "Why didn't you destroy the other one?"

  "I suppose I overlooked it. The papers got among others."

  "And into your private safe."

  "Yes. And they were stolen from it."

  "But then you say they're worthless. You say that the two sets of paperswere drawn on the same day? The second wasn't prepared subsequently anddated back?"

  Mr. Braden hesitated, trying to read the purpose behind the question. Hewas again beginning to distrust Riley, who undoubtedly resembled anAiredale.

  "I'm almost sure it was the same day. It may have been the next."

  "But at all events within, say, forty-eight hours?"

  "Yes."

  "Perhaps your stenographer might remember? Or your clerk?"

  "That clerk is dead," said Mr. Braden without noticeable regret. "Mystenographer might or might not remember. But she could identify thepapers as being written about the same time on the same machine."

  "How?"

  "Because I had only one machine in my office at that time, and that hadcertain peculiarities of type. I scrapped it soon after that, and got anew one. If you'll compare the deeds, you'll see they must have beenwritten on the same machine."

  "A very fair point," the judge admitted blandly. "You have an excellentmemory for details. But even if you establish that they were written onthe same machine, it would not prove that they were written on the sameday. For that you would have to depend on your evidence and that of yourstenographer."

  "I don't have to prove when they were written," Mr. Braden stated. "Thedate of an instrument is _prima facie_ evidence. I know a little lawmyself, Riley."

  "A little law is a very dangerous thing to know," the judge commented.

  "And I'm not going to be cross-examined by you," Mr. Braden declared."If you contend that those deeds were made at different times it's up toyou to prove it. Can you do that, hey?"

  "Yes," the judge replied. "Absolutely!"

  Mr. Braden almost jumped, and his heart again misbehaved.

  "H--how?" he asked in a voice which shook slightly.

  "In this way," the judge replied: "The conveyance delivered by French tohis niece and dated some seven years ago, is on paper bearing thewatermark of a firm which did not exist, much less manufacture a singlesheet of paper, until two years ago!"

  It was a terrible blow, direct, unexpected, smashing through Mr.Braden's elaborate system of defense. It produced the shattering,shocking effect of high explosive. For a moment he was speechless. Herallied feebly.

  "It's--it's a lie!" he stammered. "They were written on the same legalforms, printed by the same firm."

  "On the same legal forms," the judge conceded. "But law stationers as arule don't manufacture their own paper." His face became grim, his voicerose, and he drove his accusation home as in the old days of hisgreater prosperity he had broken other carefully prepared testimony.

  "That one detail, Braden, overlooked by you and French, destroysentirely the plausible story you have invented. I am prepared to prove,and prove to the hilt, that the deeds delivered by French to my clientare forgeries, prepared by you both to defraud a young woman of landwhich, instead of being worthless as you supposed it to be when you soldit to her father in fraudulent collusion with French, you suddenlydiscovered to have a high potential value. I say I am prepared to provethis, including th
e writing of the forged instruments on the samemachine. I am prepared to prove, too, how the original deeds passed fromFrench's possession to yours. You are in danger of standing in the dockfacing a charge which carries a very heavy penalty. You must decide hereand now, whether or not you will face that charge, and the damningevidence which I am prepared to bring against you."

  Mr. Braden quailed before the stern voice and menacing finger of the oldlawyer. He was not of the stuff to fight up hill, to play out a losinggame to the last chip. What was the use? The judge had the goods on him.He sagged in his chair, all fight gone, his face white, his heartchoking him.

  "Don'--don't prosecute me, Riley!" he pleaded in a shaking voice. "I'lldo anything you say. What do you want?"