ther thought, when he looked away,
that once or twice they exchanged glances. He was certain, too, that
Wasson himself was puzzled.

"Speak up, Jake," he said once, irritably. "This gentleman has come a
long way. It's a matter of some property."

"What sort of property?" Jake demanded. Jake was the spokesman of the
two.

"That's not important," Bassett observed, easily. "What we want to know
is if Henry Livingstone had any family."

"He had a brother."

"No one else?"

"Then it's up to me to trail the brother," Bassett observed. "Either of
you remember where he lived?"

"Somewhere in the East."

Bassett laughed.

"That's a trifle vague," he commented good-humoredly. "Didn't you boys
ever mail any letters for him?"

He was certain again that they exchanged glances, but they continued
to present an unbroken front of ignorance. Wasson was divided between
irritation and amusement.

"What'd I tell you?" he asked. "Like master like man. I've been here ten
years, and I've never got a word about the Livingstones out of either of
them."

"I'm a patient man." Bassett grinned. "I suppose you'll admit that one
of you drove David Livingstone to the train, and that you had a fair
idea then of where he was going?"

He looked directly at Jake, but Jake's face was a solid mask. He made no
reply whatever.

From that moment on Bassett was certain that David had not been driven
away from the ranch at all. What he did not know, and was in no way to
find out, was whether the two ranch hands knew that he had gone into the
mountains, or why. He surmised back of their taciturnity a small mystery
of their own, and perhaps a fear. Possibly David's going was as much a
puzzle to them as to him. Conceivably, during the hours together on the
range, or during the winter snows, for ten years they had wrangled and
argued over a disappearance as mysterious in its way as Judson Clark's.

He gave up at last, having learned certain unimportant facts: that the
recluse had led a lonely life; that he had never tried to make the place
more than carry itself; that he was a student, and that he had no other
peculiarities.

"Did he ever say anything that would lead you to believe that he had any
family, outside of his brother and sister? That is, any direct heir?"
Bassett asked.

"He never talked about himself," said Jake. "If that's all, Mr. Wasson,
I've got a steer bogged down in the north pasture and I'll be going."

On the Wassons' in