A subdued and lengthy conversation followed between the commissioner and Burton. From their expressions and gestures it was apparent that Burton was describing the killing of old Cap Lutts. Finally Burton beckoned the deputy, who led Lem across the great room and stood him before the commissioner. The latter leaned backward and slightly to one side, while with curiously wrinkled brow he started at Lem's boots and glanced slowly and critically up Lem's corduroy trousers, past his heavy belt, across his gray flannel shirt front, and finally rested his keen eyes upon Lem's face. He did not see a hang-dog criminal. He saw before him a young mountaineer, in height a good six feet; spare of flesh, but with back-flung shoulders that promised to develop at maturity into the frame of a mighty man. He saw a candid, open countenance, though now a trifle pale, little short of handsome, and absolutely free from any indications of dissipation. He noted a well-shaped, firm mouth above a square chin; a thin, hawklike nose leading to a wide vertical forehead. Throughout this acute examination Lem's steady gray eyes never wandered from the commissioner's face. He focused his own gaze upon the commissioner's eye as intently as he would have watched a groundhog hole in the hills. Then the commissioner leaned forward and, taking up his pen, spoke softly: "So you are old Lutts's boy?" "He's a dangerous man, Cap'n," interposed Burton. "He ain't no boozer. He makes the stuff, but he don't drink it himself so you can notice it; and that makes him more dangerous. I can hook seventeen rummy-shiners before I can get half-way to a sober one. Then again, he's got the nerve of the old man, and that helps some, I reckon. He's the old man over and over--he's fixin' to lead us a dog's life, Captain." The commissioner studied Lem again. "I knew your father, Lutts," he said. "In fact, I have a small piece of lead inside me yet that your father put there." He paused again and, oddly enough, the severe frown with which he had raked the prisoner at first now vanished. He continued evenly: "Do you see those portraits along the wall? They are men who worked themselves up in the service during the thirty-five years that I can remember. They all looked for your father; they all found him. But none of them ever brought him in." The commissioner shifted his eyes to Burton. "So it was left to you, eh? Well--well, of course, I rather expected--that is, I hoped to get old Lutts alive, but----" He broke off abruptly and added his signature to the blue printed blank he had filled in, then handed the slip to Burton with: "I'll continue the hearing for further evidence--take him over to the jail, Burton." He now looked at Lem. "Have you anything to say for yourself?"