uld have been Maggie's. But none
of them yielded anything.

Very well. Having accepted that they lived here, it was from here that
the escape was made. They would have started the moment the snow was
melted enough to let them get out, and they would have taken, not the
trail toward the town, but some other and circuitous route toward the
railroad. But there had been things to do before they left. They would
have cleared the cabin of every trace of occupancy; the tin cans,
Clark's clothing, such bedding as they could not carry. The cans must
have been a problem; the clothes, of course, could have been burned.
But there were things, like buttons, that did not burn easily. Clark's
watch, if he wore one, his cuff links. Buried?

It occurred to him that they might have disposed of some of the
unburnable articles under the floor, and he lifted a rough board or two.
But to pursue the search systematically he would have needed a pickaxe,
and reluctantly he gave it up and turned his attention to the lean-to
and the buried stove.

The stove lay in a shallow pit, filled with ancient ashes and crumbled
bits of wood from the roof. It lay on its side, its sheet-iron sides
collapsed, its long chimney disintegrated. He was in a heavy sweat
before he had uncovered it and was able to remove it from its bed of
ashes and pine needles. This done, he brought his candle-lantern and
settled himself cross-legged on the ground.

His first casual inspection of the ashes revealed nothing. He set to
work more carefully then, picking them up by handfuls, examining and
discarding. Within ten minutes he had in a pile beside him some burned
and blackened metal buttons, the eyelets and a piece of leather from a
shoe, and the almost unrecognizable nib of a fountain pen.

He sat with them in the palm of his hand. Taken alone, each one was
insignificant, proved nothing whatever. Taken all together, they assumed
vast proportions, became convincing, became evidence.

Late that night he descended stiffly at the livery stable, and turned
his weary horse over to a stableman.

"Looks dead beat," said the stableman, eyeing the animal.

"He's got nothing on me," Bassett responded cheerfully. "Better give him
a hot bath and put him to bed. That's what I'm going to do."

He walked back to the hotel, glad to stretch his aching muscles. The
lobby was empty, and behind the desk the night clerk was waiting for the
midnight train. Bassett was wide awake by that