“I learned that I was being supported and sent to college from funds furnished by a firm of New York lawyers, and that aroused my suspicion.  I knew that Mrs. Hines was not my mother.  I finally learned that I was the son of Elihu Clark and Harriet Burgess.

“I felt that I should have some part of the estate, and I developed a hatred of Judson Clark, whom I knew.  I made one attempt to get money from him by mail, threatening to expose his father’s story, but I did not succeed.

“I visited my mother, Hattie Thorwald, and threatened to kill Clark.  I also threatened Henry Livingstone, and his death came during a dispute over the matter, but I did not kill him.  He fell down and hit his head.  He had a weak heart.

“My foster-sister had gone on the stage, and Clark was infatuated with her.  I saw him a number of times, but he did not connect me with the letter I had sent.  My foster-sister’s stage name is Beverly Carlysle.

“She married Howard Lucas and they visited the Clark ranch at Norada, Wyoming, in the fall of 1911.  I saw my sister there several times, and as she knew the way I felt she was frightened.  My mother, Hattie Thorwald, was a sort of maid to her, and together they tried to get me to go away.”

Bassett looked up.

“Up to that point,” he said, “I wrote it myself before I saw him.”  There was a note of triumph in his voice.  “The rest is his.”

“On the night Lucas was killed I was to go away.  Bev had agreed to give me some money, for the piece had quit in June and I was hard up.  She was going to borrow it from Jud Clark, and that set me crazy.  I felt it ought to be mine, or a part of it anyhow.

“I was to meet my mother in the grounds, but I missed her, and I went to the house.  I wasn’t responsible for what I did.  I was crazy, I guess.  I saw Donaldson on the side porch, and beyond him were Lucas and Clark, playing roulette.  It made me wild.  I couldn’t have played roulette that night for pennies.

“I went around the house and in the front door.  What I meant to do was to walk into that room and tell Clark who I was.  He knew me, and all I meant to do was to call Bev down, and mother, and make him sit up and take notice.  I hadn’t a gun on me.

“I swear I wasn’t thinking of killing him then.  I hated him like poison, but that was all.  But I went into the living-room, and I heard Clark say he’d lost a thousand dollars.  Maybe you don’t get that.  A thousand dollars thrown around like that, and me living on what Bev could borrow from him.

“That sent me wild.  Lucas took a gun from him, just after that, and said he was going to put it in the other room.  He did it, too.  He put it on a table and started back.  I got it and pointed it at Clark.  I’d have shot him, too, but Bev came into the room.

“I want to exonerate Bev.  She has been better than most sisters to me, and she has lied to try to save me.  She came up behind me and grabbed my arm.  Lucas had heard her, and he turned.  I must have closed my hand on the trigger, for it went off and hit him.