affair
to the exclusion of all other interests. The Flobert rifle was laid
away, the printing press gathered dust. Over and over he visualized the
scene, until he could shut his eyes and reproduce its every detail--the
hillside with its scattered, half-burned old logs, the popple thicket
shining white, the scrub oaks with red rustling leaves, the patch of
brown that looked exactly like a partridge; and then the whirl of the
cap in the air as the bullet struck, and the horrible sinking feeling
before he turned to flee. A dozen small things he had not noticed
consciously at the time, now stood out clear. He remembered that the
supposed partridge had stood out against the sky; that the ground broke
gently up just beyond the black log. "Mr. Kincaid must have been
standing on a stump," he thought. He recalled now his own exact
position, and figured the course of the bullet. "It must have gone in
just at the tip top," he figured. "That's the only way it could have
done without hurting his head. Otherwise, it would have scalped him."
Over and over he turned the facts until gradually he evolved an exact
picture of what had occurred--here was the victim, here the murderer.
Inquiry disclosed the spot where Pritchard's body had been found. It was
up-hill from the spot Bobby had shot the cap--and about ten feet away.
"He must just have done it," he said with a shudder.

"Why?" demanded Johnny to whom he confided these reasonings. "Maybe it
was before."

"No," argued Bobby. "Because then when I shot the cap off, if Pritchard
had been alive, we'd have heard from him."

"Maybe Mr. Kincaid killed him to keep him from chasing us," suggested
Johnny.

Bobby considered this romantic suggestion but shook his head.

"No," said he, "there wasn't time for Mr. Kincaid to kill him and then
walk down to the other end of the thicket. He must have run when I
shot."

"Do you think they'll convict Mr. Kincaid?"

"Papa says he doesn't think so," said Bobby. "He says nobody can prove
Mr. Kincaid was at the place."

"We could."

"We're going to shut up!" said Bobby sharply.

XXIII

THE TRIAL

General opinion did not, however, share Mr. Orde's optimism. The
circumstantial evidence was very strong. Interest in the trial was such
that people came from far out in the country to attend it. Every day of
the preliminaries the court-room was filled with silent spectators. The
boys, eluding the vigilance of the women and utterly disregar