"I mean they're not my shoes. They belong to that Kauffman girl. I found them in that cabin." Hanscom sprang to his feet. "She's lying, Your Honor." "Sit down!" shouted Raines. The entire audience rose like a wave under the influence of the passion in these voices; the sheriff shouted for silence and order, and Carmody hammered on his desk, commanding everybody to be seated. At last, when he could be heard, he rebuked Hanscom. "You're out of order," he said, and, turning to Raines, requested him to take his seat. Raines shook his fist at the ranger. "You can't address such remarks to a witness. _You_ sit down." Hanscom was defiant. "I will subside when you do." "Sit _down_, both of you!" roared Carmody. They took seats, but eyed each other like animals crouching to spring. Carmody lectured them both, and, as he cooled, Hanscom apologized. "I'm sorry I spoke," he said; "but the ownership of those shoes has got to be proved. I _know_ they belong to this girl!" "We'll come to that; don't you worry," said Carmody, and he turned to Rita, who was cowering in the midst of this uproar like a mountain quail. "Who told you to deny the ownership of these shoes?" "Nobody." "Just reasoned it out yourself, eh?" he asked, with acrid humor. "Well, you're pretty smart." The girl, perceiving the importance of her denial, enlarged upon it, telling of her need of new shoes and of finding this dry, warm pair in a closet in the cabin. She described minutely the worn-out places of her own shoes and how she had thrown them into the stove and burned them up, and the audience listened with renewed conviction that "the strange woman" was the midnight prowler at the Watson cabin, and that Rita and her companions were but mischievous hoodlums having no connection with the murder. Hanscom, filled with distrust of Carmody, demanded that the sheriff be called to testify on this point, for he had made search of the cabin in the first instance. "We proved at the other session that Miss McLaren was unable to wear the shoes which made the prints." "We deny that!" asserted Raines. "That is just the point we are trying to make. We don't _know_ that this Kauffman woman is unable to wear those shoes." Carmody decided to call young Kitsong, and Throop led Rita away and soon returned with Henry, who came into the room looking like a trapped fox, bewildered yet alert. He was rumpled and dirty, like one called from sleep in a corral, but his face appealed to the heart of his mother, who flung herself toward him with a piteous word of appeal, eager to let him know that she was present and faithful. The sheriff stopped her, and her husband--whose parental love was much less vital--called upon her not to make a fool of herself.