“A deputy sheriff come up.  Pete said his brother-in-law had been hanging round lately and had talked very dangerous about the medicine man.  He said the brother-in-law had probably done the job.  But Pete had pulled this too often before when in difficulties.  The deputy said he’d better come along down to Red Gap and tell the district attorney about it.  Pete said all right and crawled into his tepee for his coat and hat—­crawled right on out the back and into the brush while the deputy rolled a cigarette.

“That was when he joined this bunch of noble redmen to advertise the vanishing romance of the Great West—­being helped out of the country, I shouldn’t wonder, by some lawless old hound that had feelings for him and showed it when he come along in the night to the ranch where he’d nursed her and her baby.  They looked for him a little while, then dropped it; in fact, everybody was kind of glad he’d got off and kind of satisfied that he’d put this bad Injin, with his skull-duggery, over the big jump.

“Then he got homesick, like I told you, and showed up here at the door; and I saw it was better for him to give himself up and get out of it by fair and legal means.  Now!  You got it straight that far?”

I nodded.

“So Pete took my advice, and a couple days later I hurried down to Red Gap and had a talk with Judge Ballard and the district attorney.  The judge said it had been embarrassing to justice to have my old Injin walk in on ’em, because every one knew he was guilty.  Why couldn’t he of stayed up here where the keen-eyed officers of the law could of pretended not to know he was?  And the old fool was only making things worse with his everlasting chatter about his brother-in-law, every one knowing there wasn’t such a person in existence—­old Pete having had dozens of every kind of relation in the world but a brother-in-law.  But they’re going to have this bright young lawyer defend him, and they have hopes.

“Then I talked some.  I said it was true that everybody knew Pete bumped off this old crook that had it coming to him, but they could never prove it, because Pete had come to my place and set up with me all night, when I had lumbago or something, the very night this crime was done thirty-odd miles distant by some person or persons unknown—­except it could be known they had good taste about who needed killing.

“At this Judge Ballard jumps up and calls me an old liar and shook hands warmly with me; and Cale Jordan, that was district attorney then, says if Mrs. Pettengill will give him her word of honour to go on the witness stand and perjure herself to this effect then he don’t see no use of even putting Kulanche County, State of Washington, to the expense of a trial, the said county already being deep in the hole for its new courthouse—­but for mercy’s sake to stop the old idiot babbling about his brother-in-law, that every one knows he never had one, because such a joke is too great an affront to the dignity of the law in such cases made and provided—­to wit:  tell the old fool to say nothing except ’No, he never done it.’  And he shakes hands with me, too, and says he’ll have an important talk with Myron Bughalter, the sheriff.