November Joe/Chapter 15

Evening had fallen before we ultimately arrived at Kalmacks. We approached the house with care and entered by a window at the back, as Joe thought it possible the front entrances might be commanded from the wood on that side.

We went at once to the room where Worke was lying and Joe gave him a rapid description of the man he had shot.

"That's Tomlinson," said Worke at once. "Them two brothers lives together. What have they been doing?"

"You'll know afore night," replied Joe. "What are their names?"

"Dandy is the one with the black beard, while him they calls Muppy is a foxy-coloured man."

"Thank you," said Joe. "Now, Bill, if you keep them names to yourself, I'll come back in half an hour and tell you who it was shot you."

​On leaving Worke, round-eyed at these words, we went to the living-room, where Petersham and Linda were finishing their supper. On Joe's appearance Linda started up and ran to him.

"You're wounded!" she cried.

"It's nothin' much, Miss Linda."

But as we laid him down on the couch, he seemed to lose consciousness. Petersham brought brandy, and Linda, holding Joe's head upon her arm, put it to his lips. He swallowed some of it and then insisted upon sitting up.

"I must bind up your shoulder—we must stop the bleeding." Linda's distress and anxiety were very evident.

"It's very kind of you, Miss Linda, but here's Mr. Quaritch—he's a bit of a doctor and he'll save you the trouble. It is only a scratch. And there's something we ought to do first."

"The thing we are going to do right now and first is to dress your wound."

And Joe had to give way. With her capable and gentle hands Linda soon dressed the wound and afterwards insisted on sending for Puttick ​to help him to his bunk. To this, Joe raised no objection.

He was sitting, white of face, propped with cushions when the game-warden entered the room. Puttick gave him a sharp glance.

"So you've got it," said he. "I warned you. Lucky you're not dead."

"Yes, ain't it?" returned Joe.

Well I knew that soft drawl, which November's voice never took except in moments of fiercest tension.

"You'd best join your hands above your head, Ben Puttick. Lock the thumbs. That's right!"

Joe had picked my revolver from the table and held it pointed at Puttick's breast.

"He's mad," screamed Puttick.

"Tie his hands, Mr. Quaritch. Miss Linda, will you please to go away?"

"No, Joe! Do you think I'm frightened?"

"Huh! I know you're brave; but a man acts freer without the women looking on."

Without a word she turned and walked out of the room.

"Puttick's going to confess, Mr. Petersham," went on November.

​"I've nothing to confess, you fool!"

"Not even that story you invented about the man with the red hanker across his face . . . the man who was n't never there?"

"What's he ravin' about?" cried Puttick.

"Have you forgot them long-haired Tomlinson brothers that . . ."

The effect of this speech on Puttick was instantaneous. Evidently he leaped to the conclusion that he had been betrayed, for he turned and dashed for the door. We flung ourselves upon him and by sheer weight bore him to the ground, where we quickly overpowered him, snarling and writhing.

Some hours later we sat round November Joe who was stretched upon the couch. Puttick had been tied up and imprisoned in the strongest room.

"No, Mr. Petersham," Joe was saying. "I don't think you'll have much more trouble. There was only three men in it. One's dead; one's locked up, and I dare say we'll find a way of dealing with number three."

"What I don't understand," said Linda, "is ​how you found out that Puttick was in it. When did you begin to suspect him?"

"Last night; when Mr. Petersham did n't go to Butler's Cairn. The fellas who promised to meet him never put in there either. That was queer, was n't it? Of course it could mean just one thing―that some one had told 'em that Mr. Petersham were n't coming. There was only us three and Puttick knew. So Puttick must 'a' been the one to tell."

"But, November," I said, "Puttick never left the house, for you remember you found no tracks on the sand. How, then, could he let them know?"

"I guess he waved a lantern or made some other sign they'd agreed on."

"But why did n't you tell me all this at once?" exclaimed Petersham.

"Because I were n't sure. Their not going to Butler's Cairn might 'a' been chance. But this morning, when Puttick comes in with his yarn about the man with the red hanker across his face, that made him hold up his hands, and threatened him when he was mending the canoe, I begun to think we should n't be so ​much longer in the dark. And when I went down and had a look around by the river, I knew at once his story was a lie, and that he'd got an interest in scaring Mr. Petersham away."

"How did you know that?"

"You mind Puttick said the fella come just when he was beginnin' to mend the canoe? I took a look at the work he'd done on it and he could n't 'a' got through all that under an hour. He's fixed a little square of tin over the rent as neat as neat. And then was n't it queer the fella should have come on him there?—a place he would n't be in not one morning of a hundred."

"You believe he made up the whole story? And that no one came at all?"

"I'm pretty sure of it. There was n't a sign or a track and as to the fella's jumpin' from stone to stone, there's distances of fourteen and sixteen feet between. Still he might 'a' done it, or he might 'a' walked in the water, and I were not going to speak till I were sure."

"Go on. We're still in the dark, Joe," said Linda.

"Well, Miss Linda, you remember how Put​tick advised Mr. Petersham to pay or go, and how I told him to stick it out, and when I'd given him that advice, I said to you that I was going across to Senlis Lake, and asked Mr. Quaritch to tell Puttick. I thought there was a good chance that Puttick would put on one of his partners to scare me. You see nobody knew which way I were going but you and him, so it'd be fair certain that if I was interfered with, it would prove Puttick guilty."

"That was clever, though you ran a horrible risk. Was there any particular reason why you chose to go to Senlis Lake?"

"Sure. I wanted to see if any one had been over there looking for your brooch. On'y us and Puttick knew it was lost, and you'd said how your father had paid dollars and dollars for it. When a thing like that's lost, woodsmen'll go miles to try to find it, and Puttick must 'a' told the Tomlinsons, for there was tracks all around our fire where we boiled the kettle."

"Do you think they found my brooch?"

"Huh, no! I pick'it up myself five minutes after you drop'it. I only kep' it, pretendin' it ​was lost, as a bait like. I've told you what happened to me coming back and how I had to shoot Dandy Tomlinson. His shooting at me after I was down give me a surprise, for I did n't think he'd want to do more than scare me, but I guess it was natural enough, for Puttick was gettin' rattled at me always nosin' round."

"It's all very clear, November, and we know everything except who it was shot Bill Worke."

"I guess Muppy Tomlinson's the man."

"What makes you think that?"

"Bill were shot with a 45–75 Winchester. Both Puttick and Dandy Tomlinson carries 30–30's. Muppy's rifle is a 45–75."

"How can you know what sort of rifle was used to shoot with? The bullet was never found," said Linda.

"I picked up the shell the first time I was over with you."

"And you never told me!" said she. "But that does n't matter. What I'm really angry with you for is your making me promise not to go out yesterday and then deliberately going out yourself to draw their fire. Why did you do ​it? If you had been killed I should never have got over it."

"And what 'ud I have done if you'd been killed, Miss Linda?"

"What do you mean, Joe?" said Linda softly.

"I mean that if one of the party I were with got killed in the woods while I was their guide, I'd go right into Quebec and run a boardinghouse or become a politician. That's all I'd be good for!"