"Perhaps, Mr. Gabriel Conroy," said Jack, with sudden coolness and deliberation of speech, and a baleful light in his dark eyes, "perhaps you'll be good enough to tell me what this means--what _is_ your little game? Perhaps you'll kindly inform me what I'm lying here crippled for? What you were doing up in the Court House, when you were driving those people crazy with excitement? What you're hiding here in this blank family vault for? And maybe, if you've got time, you'll tell me what was the reason I made that pleasant little trip to Sacramento? I know I required the exercise, and then there was the honour of being introduced to your little sister--but perhaps you'll tell me WHAT IT WAS FOR!" "Jack," said Gabriel, leaning forward, with a sudden return of his old trouble and perplexity, "I thought _she_ did it! and thinkin' that--when they asked me--I took it upon _myself_! I didn't know to ring _you_ into this, Jack! I thought--I thought--thet--it 'ud all be one--thet they'd hang me up afore this--I did, Jack, honest!" "And you didn't kill Ramirez?" "No." "And you reckoned your wife did?" "Yes." "And you took the thing on yourself?" "I did." "_You_ did!" "I did!" "You DID?" "I did!" Mr. Hamlin rolled over on his back, and began to whistle "When the spring time comes, gentle Annie!" as the only way of expressing his inordinate contempt for the whole proceeding. Gabriel slowly slid his hand under Mr. Hamlin's helpless back, and under pretext of arranging his bandages, lifted him in his arms like a truculent babe. "Jack," he said, softly, "ef thet picter of yours--that coloured woman"---- "Which?" said Jack, fiercely. "I mean--thet purty creature--ef she and you hed been married, and you'd found out accidental like that she'd fooled ye--more belike, Jack," he added, hastily, "o' your own foolishness--than her little game--and"---- "_That_ woman was a lady," interrupted Jack, savagely, "and your wife's a"----But he paused, looking into Gabriel's face, and then added, "Oh git! will you! Leave me alone! 'I want to be an angel and with the angels stand.'" "And thet woman hez a secret," continued Gabriel, unmindful of the interruption, "and bein' hounded by the man az knows it, up and kills him, ye wouldn't let thet woman--that poor pooty creeture--suffer for it! No, Jack! Ye would rather pint your own toes up to the sky than do it. It ain't in ye, Jack, and it ain't in me, so help me, God!" "This is all very touching, Mr. Conroy, and does credit, sir, to your head and heart, and I kin feel it drawing Hall's ball out of my leg while you're talkin'," said Jack, with his black eyes evading Gabriel's and wandering to the entrance of the tunnel. "What time is it, you d--d old fool, ain't it dark enough yet to git outer this hole?" He groaned, and after a pause added fiercely, "How do you know your wife did it?"