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Robertson nodded to his fireman, for Heysham had told him the story, and presently the vibration grew yet sharper. The gaunt telegraph-posts no longer swept past in endless files, but reeled toward us under the fan-shaped blaze huddled all together in a fantastic dance, while willow bluffs leaped up out of the whiteness and vanished again as by magic into the dim prairie.
Thus in the case of Rhodes, tried some years ago for forging letters of attorney for transferring South Sea Stock belonging to one Mr. Heysham, the prosecutor, Mr. Heysham, was not admitted to swear himself against the prisoner because in case of conviction six thousand pounds stock must have replaced to his account.
"Stopping train passed two hours ago," said the station agent. "Won't be another until the Montreal express comes through. Heard the stock cars passed Brandon by daylight they'll be in Winnipeg now." "You have one move left," said Heysham. "Hire a special! Comes high, of course, but it's cheaper than losing your cattle.
The snow came down in earnest before we had made two more leagues, and, steering partly by the wind and partly by instinct of direction, I held on half-choked and blinded, more and more slowly, until, when at last the case looked hopeless, Heysham shouted, for a telegraph post loomed up. "You have reached the railroad, anyway," he said. "The only question is how far from the station are we?"
Heysham," said Aline, "and you ought to tell us what it is. I want to know exactly what you meant when you added 'Confidence men." Then I started, and Heysham bowed as he answered: "You are evidently new to the wicked ways of this country, Miss Lorimer. I meant that some unprincipled person has, I fear, unfortunately taken your brother in. I have suspicions.
Heysham, though uninterested, seemed equally determined, and rode well, so the long miles of grass rolled behind us. Now a copse of birches flitted past, now a clump of willows, or the tall reeds of a sloo went down with a great crackling before us, then there were more swelling levels, for our course was straight as the crow flies from horizon to horizon, and we turned aside for no obstacle.
It was dusk when with lowered heads we charged through the scattered birches of a ravine bluff, and far down in the hollow beneath I caught the dull gleam of snow-sprinkled ice. "It's a mean-looking gully," gasped Heysham. "I guess that creek's not frozen hard, and it's pretty deep.
"No," I answered with a gleam of hope, "he was neither;" but Aline broke in: "The man you mention drove here in a wagon some weeks earlier, and I know how he got the local knowledge the other, with the red face, was Thomas Fletcher. He lived on the prairie, Mr. Heysham, and there must have been three in the plot." I rose from the table, flinging back my chair, but Heysham nodded gravely.
We returned to the station, and later in the day I entertained Robertson and Heysham with the best luncheon I could procure, when for once we drank success to Number Forty in choice vintages. "I can't sufficiently thank you, Heysham," I said when we shook hands. "Now, advise me about those cattle; and is there anything I can do for you?"
Once waited on a man called Carrington and he wasn't even civil." "Sit down," I said, laughing. "This is my sister, and at least we can offer you a meal, but you are too late to sell our stock. I have just returned from shipping Jasper's as well as my own under charge of a new partner of Gardner's." Heysham looked puzzled. "It's a reliable firm almost as good as our own," he said.
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