your _regime_, Mr. Ballard. I
pass by the incident of the hurled stone that made that awkward patch
necessary in your ceiling: you yourself have admitted that the stone
could not have come from the blasting in the quarry. But there was
another railroad accident which deserves mention. No doubt Hoskins has
told you what he saw almost on the very spot where Braithwaite's
snuffing-out occurred. He thought it was Braithwaite's ghost--he still
thinks so. But we are less credulous; or, at least, I was. Like
Sanderson, I have been making friends--or enemies--at the Craigmiles
cattle ranch. In fact, I was down there the day following Hoskins's
misfortune. Curiously enough, there was another man who saw the
Braithwaite ghost--one 'Scotty,' a cow-boy. He was night-herding on the
ranch bunch of beef cattle on the night of the accident, and he saw the
ghost, leather leggings, Norfolk shooting-jacket, and double-visored
British cap all complete, riding a horse down to the river a little
while before the train came around the curve. And after the hullabaloo,
he saw it again, riding quietly back to the ranch."

Bromley was gripping the edge of the table and exchanging glances with
Ballard. It was the Kentuckian who broke the silence which fell upon the
group around the table when the playwright made an end.

"Summing it all up, what is your conclusion, Wingfield? You have reached
one long before this, I take it."

The amateur Vidocq made a slow sign of assent.

"As I have told you, I went into this thing out of sheer curiosity, and
partly because there were obstructions put in my way. That's human
nature. But afterward it laid hold of me and held me by its own grip.
I'm not sure that there have been any simon-pure accidents at all. So
far as I have gone, everything that has happened has been made to
happen; has been carefully planned and prepared for in advance by some
one of more than ordinary intelligence--and vindictiveness. And,
unhappily, the motive is only too painfully apparent. The work on this
irrigation project of yours is to be hampered and delayed by all
possible means, even to the sacrificing of human life."

Again there was a silence in the thick-walled office room; a silence so
strained that the clickings of the stone hammers in the yard and the
rasping cacophonies of the hoisting engines at the dam seemed far
removed. It was Bromley who spoke first, and his question was pointedly
suggestive.

"You haven't stoppe