"Might convince them that knows Abner," said Scattergood, "but the jury'll be strangers." He paused, and asked, suddenly, "Why did you let Asa Levens come to court you?" "Because I hated him," said Mary. "Um!... Abner say anythin' to you?" "He said God had taken hold of matters and we'd better let him finish them." "When God takes holt of human affairs he mostly uses human bein's to do the rough work," said Scattergood. "Abner's innocent," said Mary, stubbornly. "Mebby so.... Mebby so." "Will you help me clear him, Mr. Baines?" "I'll help you find out the truth, Mary, if that'll keep you satisfied. Calculate I'd like to know the truth myself. Had a look at Asa's face a-layin' there by the road, and it interested me." "Did you see that?" Mary asked, with sudden excitement. "What?" asked Scattergood, curiously. "The mark.... Sometimes it showed plain. It was a mark put on Asa Levens's face as a warning to folks that God mistrusted him." "When he was dead it was different," said Scattergood, with solemnity. "It said he had r'iled God past endurance." Mary nodded. She comprehended. "The truth will do," she said, confidently. "Did Abner mention last Tuesday to you?" Scattergood asked. "No." "Where was Asa Levens last Tuesday? Do you know, Mary?" "No." "Why did Abner say to Asa yesterday, 'It's not on account of her, it's on account of _her_'?" "I don't know." "G'-by, Mary. G'-by." It was so Scattergood always ended a conversation, abruptly, but as one became accustomed to it it was neither abrupt nor discourteous. "Thank you," said Mary, and she went away obediently. As the afternoon was stretching toward evening, Scattergood sauntered into Sheriff Ulysses Watts's barn. "Who's feedin' and waterin' Asa Levens's stock?" he asked. "Dummed if I didn't clean forgit 'em," confessed the sheriff. "Any objection if I look after 'em, Sheriff? Any logical objection? Hoss might need exercisin'. Can't never tell. Want I should drive up and do what's needed to be done?" "Be much 'bleeged," said Sheriff Watts. Scattergood drove briskly to Asa Levens's farm, watered and fed the stock, and then led out of its stall Asa Levens's favorite driving mare. He hitched it to Asa Levens's buggy and mounted to the seat. "Giddap," he said to the mare, and dropped the reins on her back. She started out of the gate and turned toward town. Scattergood let the reins lie, attempting no guidance. At the next four corners the mare hesitated, slowed, and, feeling no direction from her driver, turned to the left. Scattergood nodded his head.