"Ten years ago a boy named Ned Keegles went to Dakota. I am glad to see that you are familiar with the name," he added with a smile as Langford started and stiffened in his chair, his face suddenly ashen. "You knowing Keegles will save me explaining a lot," continued Dakota. "Well, Keegles went to Dakota--where I was. He was eighteen and wasn't very strong, as young men go. But he got a job punching cows and I got to know him pretty well--used to bunk with him. He took a liking to me because I took an interest in him. "He didn't like the work, because he had been raised differently. He lived in Albany before he went West. His father, William Keegles, was in the hardware business with a man named Langford--David Dowd Langford. You see, I couldn't be mistaken in the name of the man; it's such an uncommon one." He smiled significantly at Sheila, and an odd expression came into her face, for she remembered that on the night of her coming he had made the same remark. "One day Ned Keegles got sick and took me into his confidence. He wasn't in the West for his health, he said. He was a fugitive from the law, accused of murdering his father. It wasn't a nice story to hear, but he told it, thinking he was going to die." Dakota smiled enigmatically at Sheila and coldly at the now shrinking man seated in the chair beside the fireplace. "One day Keegles went into his father's office. His father's partner, David Dowd Langford, was there, talking to his father. They'd had hard words. Keegle's father had discovered that Langford had appropriated a large sum of the firm's money. By forging his partner's signature he had escaped detection until one day when the elder Keegles had accidentally discovered the fraud--which was the day on which Ned Keegles visited his father. It isn't necessary to go into detail, but it was perfectly plain that Langford was guilty. "There were hard words, as I have said. The elder Keegles threatened to prosecute. Langford seized a sample knife that had been lying on the elder Keegle's desk, and stabbed him, killing him instantly. Then, while Ned Keegles stood by, stunned by the suddenness of the attack, Langford coolly walked to a telephone and notified the police of the murder. Hanging up the receiver, he raised the hue and cry, and a dozen clerks burst into the office, to find Ned Keegles bending over his father, trying to withdraw the knife. "Langford accused Ned Keegles of the murder. He protested, of course, but seeing that the evidence was against him, he fought his way out of the office and escaped. He went to Dakota--where I met him." He hesitated and looked steadily at Langford. "Do you see how the trails have crossed? The crooked one and the straight one?" Langford was leaning forward in his chair, a scared, wild expression in his eyes, his teeth and hands clenched in an effort to control his emotions. "It's a lie!" he shouted. "I didn't kill him! Ned Keegles----"