s. He did it so clumsily, though, that my suspicions were
aroused at once. Of course I bluffed him--or thought I had--easily for
the moment, but one day I happened to be in the Post Office getting my
mail when, amongst a bunch of letters on the counter I saw one addressed
to 'Gavin Blake, Esq., Governor of Barmsworth Prison, England.' Old
Kelly, the postmaster, having his back to me at the time, fumbling around
the pigeon-holes, I promptly annexed this letter and slipped it into my
pocket.

"When I opened it up my suspicions were verified. Young Blake wrote to
his father that he'd come across a man whom he could almost swear to as
being one of the three convicts who'd broken out of Barmsworth some years
back. He asked what steps he'd better take in the case--if the original
warrant issued for me could be forwarded to the Mounted Police, and so
on. He said his intentions were to try and gain further evidence, and in
the meantime to confide in no one about his suspicions until he received
definite instructions what steps to take.

"I guess the devil must have got a good grip on me again after I'd read
that letter. It seemed no use trying to redeem the past with outsiders
like young Blake making it their business to butt in and lay one by the
heels. Anyway, like Satan at prayers, I didn't feel like being coolly
sacrificed when my years of honest effort were drawing near their reward
in the shape of a fairly prosperous ranch--just at the whim of a lazy,
profligate young busy-body.

"From that hour Larry Blake was practically--'gone up.' I'd deliberately
made up my mind to put him out of business on the first convenient
opportunity that presented itself. That opportunity came on the night he
was fighting with Moran in the hotel. I thought I could kill two birds
with one stone. I'll admit it was a devilish idea, but I was desperate.
Of course things didn't shape out as I'd planned--Moran's alibi for
instance, or that hobo, Drinkwater.

"I know to you it will only appear sheer nonsense on my part ever to
start in attempting to justify my--my abolishment of him. But this--what
I am going to tell you--is the absolute truth of what happened. In the
first place--when he spotted me bringing Moran's horse into the stable
that night--although I was mad and man-handled the poor devil at the
time--I felt fairly easy in my mind later, thinking he would drift out of
town next day, after the manner of his kind. But when