“Doctor Livingstone telephoned me.  Sit down, man, and let me look at you.  You’ve given me more trouble than any human being on earth.”

“Sorry,” Dick said awkwardly, “I seem to have a faculty of involving other people in my difficulties.”

“Want a drink?”

“No, thanks.  I’ll smoke, if you have any tobacco.  I’ve been afraid to risk a shop.”

Bassett talked cheerfully as he found cigarettes and matches.  “The old boy had a different ring to his voice to-night.  He was going down pretty fast, Livingstone; was giving up the fight.  But I fancy you’ve given him a new grip on the earth.”  When they were seated, however, a sort of awkwardness developed.  To Dick, Bassett had been a more or less shadowy memory, clouded over with the details and miseries of the flight.  And Bassett found Dick greatly altered.  He was older than he remembered him.  The sort of boyishness which had come with the resurrection of his early identity had gone, and the man who sat before him was grave, weary, and much older.  But his gaze was clear and direct.

“Well, a good bit of water has gone over the dam since we met,” Bassett said.  “I nearly broke a leg going down that infernal mountain again.  And I don’t mind telling you that I came within an ace of landing in the Norada jail.  They knew I’d helped you get away.  But they couldn’t prove it.”

“I got out, because I didn’t see any need of dragging you down with me.  I was a good bit of a mess just then, but I could reason that out, anyhow.  It wasn’t entirely unselfish, either.  I had a better chance without you.  Or thought I did.”

Bassett was watching him intently.

“Has it all come back?” he inquired.

“Practically all.  Not much between the thing that happened at the ranch and David Livingstone’s picking me up at the cabin.”

“Did it ever occur to you to wonder just how I got in on your secret?”

“I suppose you read Maggie Donaldson’s confession.”

“I came to see you before that came out.”

“Then I don’t know, I’m afraid.”

“I suppose you would stake your life on the fact that Beverly Carlysle knows nothing of what happened that night at the ranch?”

Dick’s face twitched, but he returned Bassett’s gaze steadily.

“She has no criminal knowledge, if that is what you mean.”

“I am not so sure of it.”

“I think you’d better explain that.”

At the cold anger in Dick’s voice Bassett stared at him.  So that was how the wind lay.  Poor devil!  And out of the smug complacence of his bachelor peace Bassett thanked his stars for no women in his life.

“I’m afraid you misunderstand me, Livingstone,” he said easily.  “I don’t think that she shot Lucas.  But I don’t think she has ever told all she knows.  I’ve got the coroner’s inquest here, and we’ll go over it later.  I’ll tell you how I got onto your trail.  Do you remember taking Elizabeth Wheeler to see ‘The Valley?’”