Page:Post - Uncle Abner (Appleton, 1918).djvu/106

 Old Charlie wavered; he got another measure of the brandy in him.

"Well," he said, "it was enough to be afraid of. Look what it did to him!"

Randolph got up, then, and stood over against the man across the table.

"You Madisons are all big men. Now listen to me! It required force to break that door in, and yet there is no mark on the door; that means somebody broke it in with the pressure of his shoulder, softly. And there is another thing, Charlie, that you have got to face: Dabney was killed in his bed while asleep. The dog in the room did not make a sound. Why?"

The face of the drunken man took on a strange, perplexed expression.

"That's so, Randolph," he said; "and it's strange—it's damned strange!"

"Not so very strange," replied the justice.

"Why not?" said Charlie.

"Because the dog knew the man who did that work in your father's room!"

And again, with menace and vigor, Randolph drove at the shaken drunkard:

"Where's the knife Dabney was killed with?"

Then, against all belief, against all expectation in the men, old Charlie fumbled in a drawer beside him and laid a knife on the table.

Randolph gasped at the unbelievable success of his driven query, and my uncle rose and joined him. 93