Kilgore growled at the frivolity, and then Beaudoin raised a finger. “What’s up there?”
“The attic,” Julian said.
Beaudoin pointed to a door.
“And that?”
“Mr. Harry’s bedroom.”
“Where sexual relations were had with the deceased girl?”
“Yes, sir.”
Beaudoin signaled. “Your Honor, I’d like the jury to see the room.”
More than a score of men were in the bedroom, staring at the walnut bookcases filled with learned books in a dozen languages that filled the walls to the ceiling, the fine paintings, the tanks of experimental fish, microscopes and scientific equipment and a hideous African mask carved in stinkwood—a rare wood from South Africa. A mutter of interest subsided as Beaudoin called for silence in Spanish and English. He pointed to a portiere and spoke with apparent foreknowledge.
“What’s behind that curtain?”
“Why, nothing,” Harry said uneasily.
Beaudoin said quietly, “Sheriff Duer, would you mind pulling that curtain aside?”
The door was set high in the wall; it was not more than two feet square, a door that might have closed off a laundry chute. On a signal, Mike Duer drew over an ornate bench and reached into the recess.
The Navajo rug was the mate of the one that had been wrapped around the body of Honey Morgan—the same size, five feet by four, and of the same general pattern and colors. It was stained deeply with blood. Kilgore went pale; Dan McCandless gasped in shock.
Judge Hazledine said, “Sheriff, you will impound this rug and have those stains tested to determine whether they are animal bloodstains or stains of human blood.”
There was a moment of silence. “There’s no need for that,” said Harry McCandless finally. “It’s human blood, all right. Honey Morgan’s blood.”
Kilgore whirled, glaring savagely at the boy to make him keep shut. But Hazledine said, “Are you making an admission?”
“No, I’m simply telling you it’s Honey’s blood,” Harry said dully, waving Kilgore away. “She had a bad nosebleed the night she was here. Doc Hewlitt corroborated that in his testimony. She was drunk, and fell down and bled all over this carpet.”
“You didn’t mention this nosebleed in your testimony,” Beaudoin said.
Harry said, “No one asked me about it.”
“And why did you hide the blanket this way?” Beaudoin demanded.
Harry said, “Because I was sure the sheriff would misunderstand if he found a bloody blanket.”
Beaudoin persisted. “And how would you account for the other bloody blanket—the twin of this one, found wrapped around the corpse?”
Harry hesitated. “I don’t know about that.”
“Enough,” Hazledine said. “These questions can wait for our return to court. There is another site to visit, is there not?”
“Yes,” Beaudoin said.
“Have we further business here?” asked the judge.
They did not, and the party filed out. Kilgore felt drenched with sweat. Never before had a client of his gone to the gallows—but he had a strong hunch that the record was about to be broken. Harry’s mystifying attitude, his lies and evasions, the incredible way Beaudoin and Duer plucked evidence out of the air, the general feeling against the defendant—all these were turning the tide against Kilgore.
The group was leaving the ranch now, setting out on some new journey. Kilgore sat back in his buggy, refusing to talk, silently suffering the twin agonies of his infected ear and his collapsing case. The prosecution party, in the lead, followed the main road out of Wa-po-nah and up into the hills toward the Sanchez farm. But halfway there they turned off the main road, taking an unmarked trail that led into the underbrush.
“What in thunder?” Kilgore wondered.
Beaudoin called a halt before the ruins of an abandoned house, well back from the main road. He said to the judge and the assembled listeners, “If we continue on this road, we will arrive at the Sanchez farm. But first, let’s take a view of this house.”
“What house?” Kilgore asked strongly.
“You’ll see!” Beaudoin replied. “Mr. Duer, will you ask the jurors to follow? This way, Judge!”
It was an Eastern-style house of brick, which lay crumbling in ruins in the snow. An Eastern homesteader, Manley Pearce Duell, a poet and writer with a romantic interest in the West, had begun some years earlier to build the house in the pure mountain air with some vague notions about ranching—notions that had died under the harsh realities of cattle diseases and falling prices dictated by meat packers in Abilene, St. Louis, and Chicago. It lay midway on a direct route between Wa-po-nah and the Sanchez farm in the distant hills where the girl’s body had been found. In a wooden form, covered with drifting bits of grass, was a crumbling whitish mass of friable substance.
“Your Honor,” Beaudoin said, “it don’t take any scientific tests to show that this stuff is builder’s plaster. Just the kind of stuff that was found by Father Crespin in the poor girl’s mouth. It just shows that she was brought along this way.”
Kilgore said, “What of it? We know her mouth was stuffed with plaster. That don’t make Harry McCandless any guiltier than before. We also know she had to be brought this way to get out to the Sanchez place. It’s interesting—but how does it add up?”
Judge Hazledine said, “It does add to the record.” He pointed out, “It does account for this mysterious substance. On the other hand, who was responsible?”
A shout of pure joy came up from the interior of the ruin. Mike Duer came lumbering out of the ruin, studying a small object in his hand. A grin of devilish exultation split his dark face.
“The ring! The ring!”
Indeed it was the ring! The ring—the Lucero diamond ring—had been found hidden in the corner of the ruin, wrapped in a silk handkerchief bearing the Wa-po-nah insignia and Harry McCandless’ monogram!
Beaudoin said ringingly: “I think this demonstrates the guilt of the defendant conclusively and beyond doubt. He stopped here, hid the incriminating ring he had taken from the girl, stuffed his victim’s mouth with plaster, and continued on to drop the body elsewhere. Then—”
“Enough, Mr. Beaudoin,” Hazledine declared. “We will return to the courtroom to conclude this case.”
Stricken, Dan McCandless howled in grief. An answering roar of rage came from the angry crowd.
“String the bastard up right here!” boomed a deep voice. “We don’t need to finish the trial!”
“Get him! Get Harry McCandless!”
Mike Duer gestured, and instantly guns were facing the milling crowd. Behind the protective barrier, Kilgore clenched his fists until the nails dug deep into his palms; Dan McCandless, his face bloodless, gritted his teeth to keep from bursting into tears in front of these people.
Harry was white-faced and shaken and for the first time since the day of his arrest was silent. In the midst of hatred, he stood in the cold, licking his mouth nervously and holding his hands over his ears.
“Why? Why?” Dan McCandless moaned. “Why would my boy do this thing? Why should this happen to us?”
Kilgore sat back in the pitching carriage, nursing his throbbing ear, which was covered with a woolen scarf. It seemed to him that the wind cut through the protective covering—but the physical pain was no less keen than the pain of sympathy and grief for the stricken family. He felt close to collapse and struggled to keep his last ounce of strength.
“I don’t see how you can be blamed,” Clem Erskine ventured. “You tried a brilliant case, Mr. Kilgore. But I guess that’s it—”
Kilgore’s pain-tinged eyes were instantly wide with anger. “That is not it!” he said with wrath. “This case is far from over!”
Clem looked bewildered.
“Kilgore never throws in the sponge!” Kilgore said strongly. “Kilgore’s fighting heart is indomitable. When the last appeal has been refused, when executive clemency has been denied, whe
n the highest court in the land has refused redress—that is Kilgore’s finest moment. Even when the trap has been sprung, even when the defendant’s neck has been broken, even then Kilgore will not admit defeat. Kilgore will fight if only to vindicate the memory of his innocent client. No case is lost until Kilgore himself is lying in the grave! And even then, the memory of Kilgore’s eloquence—the recollection of his fighting heart—the echo of his living voice heard throughout the land will speak the innocence of Kilgore’s man! I have not yet begun to fight.”
“Mr. Kilgore,” said Clem earnestly, “you’re a sick man, and I just don’t see how you can finish this case. Dr. Hewlitt told me he’s sure you’ve got a mastoiditis. In all this cold, you’re endangering your life. I don’t know what Miss Hilleboe will say.”
Kilgore grunted. “Sarah Hilleboe is sure to tell me I’ve got to get up to Denver for surgery, or they’ll be burying me as soon as the ground thaws out enough to dig. I know that croak.”
“It’s the living truth—”
Kilgore closed his eyes and shrank into the warmth of his sheepskin coat. “I’ve got a case to try,” he said grimly. “Shut up!”
Kilgore entered the silent courtroom shakily the following morning and made his way to the counsel table, where Harry McCandless was waiting, flanked by deputies, manacled for the first time since the trial had started. Kilgore’s legs kept wanting to give way under him. His face was flushed and feverish. One entire side of his skull seemed to be rotting away, to be turning into a soggy, putrefying mass.
He said in a barely audible voice, “Your Honor, the disclosures yesterday seem damning indeed. I ask for an adjournment of one week while—while reconsidering the new developments—”
“Refused,” Hazledine said coldly.
Kilgore shivered. “Your Honor, there is a possibility that I will have a new witness—a witness whose testimony may have a strong bearing in deciding this case. The defendant’s sister went to Denver three days ago to contact this witness. I have not yet heard from her. For this reason I ask the adjournment.”
Hazledine shrugged. “Today is Friday, Mr. Kilgore. I’ll grant your adjournment—until nine o’clock Monday morning. If you can produce your new witness by then, fine. If not, the case goes to the jury. This court stands adjourned until then!”
Kilgore’s shoulders slumped. All he had now was the weekend. Carlotta remained silent. And there was only the slimmest chance that her journey would accomplish anything.
And who was giving the information to Duer? Who had told the prosecution about Eli Weingarten, about the bloody carpet, about the diamond ring? The victory had been in Kilgore’s grasp—and then the blows had fallen like jests of the gods. It was all too mystifying. Exhausted, frayed, baffled, Jake Kilgore shuffled out of the courtroom, trying to conceal from the onlookers the extent of his weakness.
19.
A DAY had passed since the astonishing disclosures. Dan McCandless had taken the Saturday-morning train to Santa Fe. Now, at two that afternoon, he faced Governor Charles Tellegen in the governor’s private office. Tellegen ordinarily did not conduct Territorial business on Saturdays, but McCandless had wired ahead, requesting the interview, and the governor had consented.
Dan McCandless had walked through hell for hours before making his fateful decision. Friday evening, at Wa-po-nah, Isabella had confronted him.
“My son will die,” she said stonily. “He has committed this crime, and not even Kilgore can save him. But you can!”
“Me?” Dan McCandless asked.
Isabella’s Castilian eyes were ablaze. “The governor would grant him clemency if you offered something valuable in return for the favor.”
“Tellegen can’t be bribed, Isabella.”
“It would not be a bribe. You would offer the governor information—about a certain terrible crime committed in this Territory twenty years ago. The murder of Don Alfredo Lucero!”
“No!” McCandless cried. It was a wail of despair, a horrible sound to come from a man so big.
“Your son, McCandless—the bearer of your name. He will die unless ancient guilt is expiated!”
McCandless shook his head with some of his old fierce strength. “It’s no matter for Tellegen. No matter for the law at all. You know nothing about it.”
“I know that Harry will die—and you alone can save him!” Isabella rose. “Think about it, Dan McCandless.”
Alone, McCandless thought.
Harry will die. My son. My only son.
For three hours his only companion was a bottle of brandy, as he fought with himself, fought to sustain his courage. He could save Harry, all right—but only at the cost of betraying the code he had lived by. Only at the cost of his life.
Now he sat in an overstuffed chair, peering out of bloodshot eyes at the dignified and tranquil face of the governor of the Territory of New Mexico. McCandless said slowly, “There’s no doubt any longer. The boy will be found guilty. Kilgore is holding out for miracles, but there’s no hope for a favorable verdict. None at all.”
Tellegen looked sympathetic. “Certainly you plan to appeal, Mr. McCandless?”
McCandless scowled. “We could appeal it right up to the throne of God, Governor. The verdict would still stand. As sure as we both sit here, that boy committed that murder. I tried not to believe it up till the last, but what they uncovered yesterday shakes my faith and destroys it. He’s guilty.”
The governor appeared uncomfortable. “Well, Mr. McCandless, I don’t see what you expect me to do.”
“Grant clemency,” said McCandless starkly.
The governor paused. “In a case of this importance I’d have to contact the President for that. But I don’t see how I can be expected to make such a request. And though I’m deeply sympathetic toward your personal tragedy, I feel that an exception—”
Dan McCandless gripped the corners of the broad desk and said, “I’m not asking an exception. I’m offering a quid pro quo. In return for the life of my son—for a Presidential pardon—I can offer testimony in another murder case of some importance to this Territory.”
Tellegen said, “Please explain.”
“I’ll reopen the murder of Don Alfredo Lucero.”
“Is this a joke, Mr. McCandless?”
“I was never more serious.” McCandless was bathed in perspiration. A constricting band of fear tightened around his heart. He forced himself to go on. “The murder of Don Alfredo was a Federal offense, cognizable in the Federal court because it was committed on an Indian reservation. I was present at the murder.” His hands shook convulsively. “I guess that makes me an accomplice in a way, after the fact. But I’ll testify against the actual killer, who is a man quite well known in this Territory.”
“You aren’t talking about—”
“Yes. Joel Tilley.”
Tellegen’s eyes widened. “You’ve kept silent for twenty years, Mr. McCandless?”
“It was between Tilley and me, and no concern of the law. But I can’t keep shut any longer. If I want to save Harry, I have to tell what I know about Tilley. I’m sure you’d welcome a chance to destroy the power of Joel Tilley in this Territory, Governor.”
“Yes, of course. But—”
“Well, there’s the quid pro quo. Give me Harry’s life and I’ll give you Tilley’s.”
“Do you realize that you’ll be leaving yourself open for severe reprisals?” Tellegen asked.
McCandless shrugged. “They’ll be reprisals against me, not against my family. I’ll get only what I deserve. Will you grant the pardon?”
Tellegen pursed his lips. “When will the trial end?”
“I guess it’ll go to the jury on Monday. They can’t need much time for their verdict.”
“I’ll wire the President tonight. I can’t interfere with the trial. But if the verdict goes against your son, I’ll be able to grant the pardon.”
“You’re certain?”
“Absolutely, Mr. McCandless. I’ll word my request
in such a way as to show him I’ve given my oath. He’ll support me. And in return—”
“Yes. I’ll testify against Tilley. It’s a deal.”
“Your son will not hang, Mr. McCandless.”
McCandless nodded abstractedly. Rising, he thanked the governor and left. He walked bleakly from the governor’s mansion, knowing that he had just signed his own death warrant.
The wire was dated Thursday, and it was from Denver.
VANCE AGREES TO EXAMINE BODY STOP WE ARRIVE SAN CARLOS SATURDAY NIGHT HOPE ALL IS WELL STOP NEWSPAPER STORIES MOST FRIGHTENING
CARLOTTA
Kilgore’s eyes gleamed. “He’s coming! Vance, from Denver! He’s going to have a look at the body!” Sudden excitement pervaded him. “Clem, get down to the station, it must be almost time for their train to be coming in. Sarah, get your dictation pad! I have to request a second autopsy on the Morgan girl! We’re not licked yet, damn it all to everlasting brimstone! Not by a mile!”
Clem and Sarah exchanged puzzled glances.
“He’s expecting a miracle,” Clem muttered.
“It’s the fever,” Sarah whispered hoarsely. “He’s half out of his mind, thinking that this Denver man is going to wave a magic wand.”
“Kilgore will be disappointed.”
“He’ll be unbearable,” Sarah said. She shrugged. “My conscience tells me to swear out a restraining order getting him out of that trial and to a doctor. But my common sense tells me not to, because Kilgore would slaughter me when he gets well.”
“Sarah! Sarah!” came the booming roar. “Get yourself in here, woman! Has Clem gone yet? That train will be here any minute! We can’t waste time!”
By quarter to nine on Monday morning, the little courthouse was jammed, and the overflow spilled out into the plaza. Word had gone around that this was to be the final day of the trial, and everyone had come for the exciting moments ahead—the closing speeches of the rival attorneys, and then the decision of the jury. Everyone wanted to see the look on Dan McCandless’ face when the foreman stood up to announce the verdict of guilty.
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