and twirled his eyeglasses between
his fingers.

"Why should that idea have occurred to you?" the Senator asked again.
"So far as I am informed, Wade is also liable to arrest for complicity
in the Jensen murder; in addition to which he has effected a jail
delivery and burglarized my office. It seems to me, if he has been
kidnaped as you say, that I am the last person to have any interest in
his welfare, or his whereabouts. Why do you come to me?"

This was too much for Santry's self-restraint.

"What's the use of talkin' to him?" he demanded. "If he ain't done it
himself, don't we know that Moran done it for him? To hell with
talkin'!" He shook a gnarled fist at Rexhill, who paid no attention
whatever to him, but deliberately looked in another direction.

"That is why we are here," said Trowbridge, when he had quieted Santry
once more. "Because we have good reason to believe that, if these acts
do not proceed from you, they do proceed from your agent, and you're
responsible for what he does, if I know anything about law. This man
Moran has carried things with a high hand in this community, but now
he's come to the end of his rope, and he's going to be punished. That
means that you'll get yours, too, if he's acted under your orders." The
cattleman was getting into his stride now that the first moments of his
embarrassment were passed. His voice rang with authority, which the
Senator was quick to recognize, although he gave no evidence that he was
impressed. "Has Moran been acting for you, that's what we want to know?"

"My dear fellow,"--Rexhill laughed rumblingly,--"if you'll only stop for
an instant to think, you'll see how absurd this is."

"A frank answer to a frank question," Trowbridge persisted. "Has he
been acting for you? Do you, at this moment, know what has become of
Wade, or where he is?"

"That's the stuff!" growled Santry, whose temples were throbbing under
the effort he put forth to hold himself within bounds.

"I do not!" the Senator said, bluntly. "And I'll say freely that I would
not tell you if I did."

Santry's hands opened and shut convulsively. He was in the act of
springing upon Rexhill when Trowbridge seized him.

"You're a liar!" he roared, struggling in his friend's grasp. "Let me at
him. By the great horned toad, I'll make him tell!"

"Put that man out of this room!" Rexhill had arisen in all of his
ponderous majesty, roused to wrath at last. His pudgy finger shook as he
pointed t