“Now, then, here’s a lawyer for you,” said Chisholm.  “Mr. Lindsey, solicitor.”

“Well, my man!” began Mr. Lindsey, taking a careful look at this queer client.  “What have you got to say to me?”

The prisoner gave Chisholm a disapproving look.

“Not going to say a word before the likes of him!” he growled.  “I know my rights, guv’nor!  What I say, I’ll say private to you.”

“Better leave us, sergeant,” said Mr. Lindsey.  He waited till Chisholm, a bit unwilling, had left the cell and closed the door, and then he turned to the man.  “Now, then,” he continued, “you know what they charge you with?  You’ve been drinking hard—­are you sober enough to talk sense?  Very well, then—­what’s this you want me for?”

“To defend me, of course!” growled the prisoner.  He twisted a hand round to the back of his trousers as if to find something.  “I’ve money of my own—­a bit put away in a belt,” he said; “I’ll pay you.”

“Never mind that now,” answered Mr. Lindsey.  “Who are you?—­and what do you want to say?”

“Name of John Carter,” replied the man.  “General labourer—­navvy work—­anything of that sort.  On tramp—­seeking a job.  Came here, going north, night before last.  And—­no more to do with the murder of yon man than you have!”

“They found his purse on you, anyway,” remarked Mr. Lindsey bluntly.  “What have you got to say to that?”

“What I say is that I’m a damned fool!” answered Carter surlily.  “It’s all against me, I know, but I’ll tell you—­you can tell lawyers anything.  Who’s that young fellow?” he demanded suddenly, glaring at me.  “I’m not going to talk before no detectives.”

“My clerk,” replied Mr. Lindsey.  “Now, then—­tell your tale.  And just remember what a dangerous position you’re in.”

“Know that as well as you do,” muttered the prisoner.  “But I’m sober enough, now!  It’s this way—­I stopped here in the town three nights since, and looked about for a job next day, and then I heard of something likely up the river and went after it and didn’t get it, so I started back here—­late at night it was.  And after crossing that bridge at a place called Twizel, I turned down to the river-bank, thinking to take a short cut.  And—­it was well after dark, then, mind you, guv’nor—­in coming along through the woods, just before where the little river runs into the big one, I come across this man’s body—­stumbled on it.  That’s the truth!”

“Well!” said Mr. Lindsey.

“He was lying—­I could show you the place, easy—­between the edge of the wood and the river-bank,” continued Carter.  “And though he was dead enough when I found him, guv’nor, he hadn’t been dead so long.  But dead he was—­and not from aught of my doing.”

“What time was this?” asked Mr. Lindsey.

“It would be past eleven o’clock,” replied Carter.  “It was ten when I called by Cornhill station.  I went the way I did—­down through the woods to the river-bank—­because I’d noticed a hut there in the morning that I could sleep in—­I was making for that when I found the body.”