Page:The Road to Monterey (1925).pdf/205

 spoke of that trick which seemed more than the hint of knowledge unrevealed. Henderson believed if he could get this out of Simon, grown friendly and loquacious in the hope of coming into his prisoner's watch and money, it might be a lever to lift him out of his own desperate condition. He seemed abstractedly to draw the three gold coins that he possessed out of his pocket, to shuffle them aimlessly in his fingers in the way of one whose thoughts overshadow his actions.

"It is a mystery as thick as a fog," Simon declared. His eyes shifted to follow the quick-shuffled gold pieces; he turned in his deep interest and stood holding the bars of the door.

"It was somebody in Don Abrahan's own house," said Henderson, speaking with more certainty than guess. "Here, Simon. What good is money to a dead man? You were right."

Henderson dropped a ten-dollar piece into Simon's hand. Simon's face was close to the bars, his nose almost between them.

"And what good is knowing things that must soon pass out of him like water out of a broken olla?" Simon asked.

"What harm, then? Who was it that robbed Don Abrahan last night, Simon?"

Henderson dropped the two remaining gold-pieces from one hand to the other, and back again, as if he cooled them to put them in his pocket.

"There was a talk last night under a window," said Simon, pressing his face to the bars. "I was