"Saw him distinctly," the coroner repeated. "Mr. Quimby's face is not to be mistaken."
"If he saw him," retorted Jake, with unexpected cunning, "then the flames had got a start. One don't see in the dark. They hadn't got much of a start when I left. So he must have gone up to my room after I came down."
"It was before the alarm was given; before Mr. Hammersmith here had crawled out of his room window."
"I can't help that, sir. It was after I left the stable. You can't mix me up with Quimby's doings."
"Can't we? Jake, you're no lawyer and you don't know how to manage a lie. Make a clean breast of it. It may help you and it won't hurt Quimby. Begin with the old lady's coming. What turned Quimby against her? What's the plot?"
"I don't know of any plot. What Quimby told you is true. You needn't expect me to contradict it!"
A leaden doggedness had taken the place of his whilom good nature. Nothing is more difficult to contend with. Nothing is more dreaded by the inquisitor. Hammersmith realised the difficulties of the situation and repeated the gesture he had previously made toward the door leading into an adjoining compartment. The coroner nodded as before and changed the tone of his inquiry.
"Jake," he declared, "you are in a more serious position than you realise. You may be devoted to Quimby, but there are others who are not. A night such as you have been through quickens the conscience of women if it does not that of men. One has been near death. The story of such a woman is apt to be truthful. Do you want to hear it? I have no objections to your doing so."
"What story? I don't know of any story. Women have easy tongues; they talk even when they have nothing to say."
"This woman has something to say, or why should she have asked to be confronted with you? Have her in, Mr. Hammersmith. I imagine that a sight of this man will make her voluble."
A sneer from Jake; but when Hammersmith, crossing to the door I've just mentioned, opened it and let in Huldah, this token of bravado gave way to a very different expression and he exclaimed half ironically, half caressingly:
"Why, she's my sweetheart! What can she have to say except that she was mighty fortunate not to have been burned up in the fire last night?"
Doctor Golden and the detective crossed looks in some anxiety. They had not been told of this relation between the two, either by the girl herself or by the others. Gifted with a mighty close mouth, she had nevertheless confided to Hammersmith that she could tell things and would, if he brought her face to face with the man who tried to shoot him while he was helping her down from the roof. Would her indignation hold out under the insinuating smile with which the artful rascal awaited her words? It gave every evidence of doing so, for her eye flashed threateningly and her whole body showed the tension of extreme feeling as she came hastily forward, and pausing just beyond the reach of his arm, cried out:
"You had a hand in locking me in. You're tired of me. If you're not, why did you fire those bullets my way? I was escaping and – "
Jake thrust in a quick word. "That was Quimby's move – locking your door. He had some game up. I don't know what it was. I had nothing to do with it."
This denial seemed to influence her. She looked at him and her breast heaved. He was good to look at; he must have been more than that to one of her restricted experience. Hammersmith trembled for the success of their venture. Would this blond young giant's sturdy figure and provoking smile prevail against the good sense which must tell her that he was criminal to the core, and that neither his principle nor his love were to be depended on? No, not yet. With a deepening flush, she flashed out:
"You hadn't? You didn't want me dead? Why, then, those bullets? You might have killed me as well as Mr. Hammersmith when you fired!"
"Huldah!" Astonishment and reproach in the tone and something more than either in the look which accompanied it. Both were very artful and betrayed resources not to be expected from one of his ordinarily careless and good-humoured aspect. "You haven't heard what I've said about that?"
"What could you say?"
"Why, the truth, Huldah. I saw you on the roof. The fire was near. I thought that neither you nor the man helping you could escape. A death of that kind is horrible. I loved you too well to see you suffer. My gun was behind the barn door. I got it and fired out of mercy."
She gasped. So, in a way, did the two officials. The plea was so specious, and its likely effect upon her so evident.
"Jake, can I believe you?" she murmured.
For answer, he fumbled in his pocket and drew out a small object which he held up before her between his fat forefinger and thumb. It was a ring, a thin, plain hoop of gold worth possibly a couple of dollars, but which in her eyes seemed to possess an incalculable value, for she had no sooner seen it than her whole face flushed and a look of positive delight supplanted the passionately aggrieved one with which she had hitherto faced him.
"You had bought that?"
He smiled and returned it to his pocket.
"For you," he simply said.
The joy and pride with which she regarded him, despite the protesting murmur of the discomfited Hammersmith, proved that the wily Jake had been too much for them.
"You see!" This to Hammersmith, "Jake didn't mean any harm, only kindness to us both. If you will let him go, I'll be more thankful than when you helped me down off the roof. We're wanting to be married. Didn't you see him show me the ring?"
It was for the coroner to answer.
"We'll let him go when we're assured that he means all that he says. I haven't as good an opinion of him as you have. I think he's deceiving you and that you are a very foolish girl to trust him. Men don't fire on the women they love, for any reason. You'd better tell me what you have against him."
"I haven't anything against him now."
"But you were going to tell us something – "
"I guess I was fooling."
"People are not apt to fool who have just been in terror of their lives."
Her eyes sought the ground. "I'm just a hardworking girl," she muttered almost sullenly. "What should I know about that man Quimby's dreadful doings?"
"Dreadful? You call them dreadful?" It was Doctor Golden who spoke.
"He locked me in my room," she violently declared. "That wasn't done for fun."
"And is that all you can tell us? Don't look at Jake. Look at me."
"But I don't know what to say. I don't even know what you want."
"I'll tell you. Your work in the house has been upstairs work, hasn't it?"
"Yes, sir. I did up the rooms – some of them," she added cautiously.
"What rooms? Front rooms, rear rooms, or both?"
"Rooms in front; those on the third floor."
"But you sometimes went into the extension?"
"I've been down the hall."
"Haven't you been in any of the rooms there, – Number 3, for instance?"
"No, sir; my work didn't take me there."
"But you've heard of the room?"
"Yes, sir. The girls sometimes spoke of it. It had a bad name, and wasn't often used. No girl liked to go there. A man was found dead in it once. They said he killed his own self."
"Have you ever heard any one describe this room?"
"No, sir."
"Tell what paper was on the wall?"
"No, sir."
"Perhaps Jake here can help us. He's been in the room often."
"The paper was blue; you know that; you saw it yourselves yesterday,"