strongest link against Lake. I dare say
Buttinski--Mr. Bransford--is eminently capable of bank robbery at odd
moments; but I know approximately where that noseguard was at sharp
midnight--after the watchman was shot." Here Billy swore mentally,
having a very definite guess as to how Jeff might have lost the
noseguard. "Lake, Clarke, Turnbull, Thompson, Alec or myself--one of the
six of us--brought that noseguard to the bank after the robbery, and
only one of the six had a motive--and a key."

"Only one of you had a key," corrected Jimmy cruelly. "But can't Jeff
prove where he was, maybe?"

"He won't."

"I'd sure like to see her," said Jimmy.

CHAPTER X

THE ALIBI

"And all love's clanging trumpets shocked and blew."

"The executioner's argument was, that you couldn't cut off a
head unless there was a body to cut it off from; that he had
never had to do such a thing before, and he wasn't going to
begin at _his_ time of life."--_Alice in Wonderland._

The justice of the peace, when the county court was not in session, held
hearings in the courtroom proper, which occupied the entire second story
of the county courthouse. The room was crowded. It was a new courthouse;
there are people impatient to try even a new hearse; and this bade fair
to be Arcadia's first _cause celebre_.

Jeff sat in the prisoner's stall, a target for boring eyes. He was
conscious of an undesirable situation; exactly how tight a place it was
he had no means of knowing until he should have heard the evidence. The
room was plainly hostile; black looks were cast upon him. Deputy
Phillips, as he entered arm in arm with the sometime devil, gave the
prisoner an intent but non-committal look, which Jeff rightly
interpreted as assurance of a friend in ambush; he felt unaccountably
sure of the devil's fraternal aid; Monte, lolling within the rail of
the witness-box, smiled across at him. Still, he would have felt better
for another friendly face or two, he thought--say, John Wesley
Pringle's.

Jeff looked from the open window. Cottonwoods, well watered, give
swiftest growth of any trees and are therefore the dominant feature of
new communities in dry lands. The courthouse yard was crowded with them:
Jeff, from the window, could see nothing but their green plumes; and his
thoughts ran naturally upon gardens--or, to be more accurate, upon a
garden.

Would she lose faith in him? Had she heard yet? Would he be able