“You think you can show cause why that revolver shouldn’t be turned over to the Fleming estate?” he demanded.  “Well, if I don’t get it, right away, Mr. Goode will get a court order for it.  You had no right to impound that revolver, in the first place; you removed it from the Fleming home illegally in the second place, since you had no intention of holding any formal inquest, and you’re holding it illegally now.  A court order might not be all we could get, either,” he added menacingly.  “Now, if you have any reason to suspect that Mr. Fleming committed suicide ... or was murdered, for instance ...”

“Oh, my heavens, no!” Kirchner cried, horrified.  “It was an accident, pure and simple; I so certified it.  Death by accident, due to inadvertence of the deceased.”

“Well, then,” Rand said, “you have no right to hold that revolver, and I want it, right now.  As Mr. Goode’s agent, I’m responsible for that collection, of which the revolver you’re holding is a part.  That revolver is too valuable an asset to ignore.  You certainly realize that.”

“Well, I don’t have any intention of exceeding my authority, of course,” Kirchner disclaimed hastily.  “And I certainly wouldn’t want to go against Mr. Goode’s wishes.”  Humphrey Goode must pull considerable weight around the courthouse, Rand surmised.  “But you realize, that revolver’s still loaded....”

“Oh, that’s not your worry.  I’ll draw the charges, or, better, fire them out.  It stood one shot, it can stand the other five.”

“Well, would you mind if I called Mr. Goode on the phone?”

Rand did, decidedly.  However, he shook his head negligently.

“Certainly not; go ahead and call him, by all means.”

The coroner went away.  In a few minutes he was back, carrying a revolver in both hands.  Evidently Goode had given him the green light.  He approached, handling the weapon with a caution that would have been excessive for a Mills grenade; after warning Rand again that it was loaded, he laid it gently on his desk.

It was a .36 Colt, one of the 1860 series, with the round barrel and the so-called “creeping” ramming-lever.  Somebody had wound a piece of wire around it, back of the hammer and through the loading-aperture in front of the cylinder; as the hammer was down on a fired chamber, there was no way in God’s world, short of throwing the thing into a furnace, in which it could be discharged, but Kirchner was shrinking away from it as though it might jump at his throat.

“I put the wire on,” the coroner said.  “I thought it might be safer that way.”

“It’ll be a lot safer after I’ve emptied it into the first claybank, outside town,” Rand told him.  “Sorry I had to be a little short with you, Mr. Kirchner, but you know how it is.  I’m responsible to Mr. Goode for the collection, and this gun’s part of it.”

“Oh, that’s all right; I really shouldn’t have taken the attitude I did,” Kirchner met him halfway.  “After I talked to Mr. Goode, of course, I knew it was all right, but ...  You see, I’ve been bothered a lot about that pistol, lately.”