A SAD SORT OF CASE. 203%. HE haze of autumn after- A noon was spread’ iike a eT @Q veil of golden gauze over the foothills of the Sierra, wo deepening into purple shad- ows iu the canyons and fading into a paler but opaque blanket where it stretched away toward the west above the valley of the San Joaquin. Pas- sengers on the coach rolling down the Yosemite stage road through the for- est caught glimpses of the lower hills and the shoreless sea of yellow haze beyond them, and regretted that they were soon to leave the cool, bracing air of the mountains and plunge be- neath that sea of dust and smoke into the quivering heat of the plains. They threw back” their shoulders and inhaled deep draughts of air laden with the pungent odors of pine and fir, and felt that it was good to be alive. The coach rolled over the thick car- pet of dust, laid by the long rainless summers upon the road, silently save for the creaking of the harness and the occasional grinding of the brake; and the stillness of afternoon in the forest was broken only by the tapping of a woodpecker fitting acorns into the holes he had drilled in dead trees during the summer, or by the rustling fall of a cone from a lofty sugar pine. Yosemite had exhausted the exclama- tory vocabulary of the garrulous, and awed the judicious into reverent si- lence, and even the man from Phila- delphia had ceased asking questions of the driver. A deer crossed the road and trotted lightly up the mountain side, a dun shadow flitting among the red-brown trunks of the pines, and Bock Gridley only pointed toward it with his whip. The passengers whispered and gazed at the graceful animal, bt made no sounds that might alarm it. They felt the brooding stillness of the Sierra, and unconsciously fell into the mood of the autumn afternoon. When the whip-like report of a rifle shot, faint and far, but not to be mistaken, came echoless to their ears, they felt vague resentment at ‘the intrusive sound. The coach swung around a sharp bend at the foot of a steep grade, and the horses were at a walk, when a man stepped from behind a tree jnto the road and held up his hand. He was a red-bearded giant, ‘massive and pow- erful. He wore only a blue shirt, open at the throat and chest, and overalls, His feet anid his head were bare; and his hair, the eolor of the Sequoia’s bark, was tousled like an urchin’s, In his right hand Ire held a rifle. - Rock Gridley’s foot, was on the brake, and he had the team well in hand. In an instant the coach came to a dead stop, and the passengers had the first thrill of an adventure with stage rob- bers; which most of them half hoped for and more ‘than half dreaded from the hour when they first took seat in a California stage coach. (At first glance th® blonde giant pre- sented a formidable figure, but the menace of his huge form and his weapon was belied by his ruddy, jo- cund visage, and the passengers felt like apologizing for their tremors when they saw, instead of a mask, the wide, blue eyes and frank smile of the mountaineer. 3 » “Howdy, Rock?” was the stranger's greeting to the driver. “Hello, Wes,” Tosponded Gridley. What's up?’ “Seen anything of an “Injun as you came along?’ ‘“‘Reckon so. Feller went down ‘into the gulch this side of Chinquepin. Moccasin tracks crossed “the road at Frenchy’s oak. After him?” “Kind of; but. guess he’s hittin’ the high places an’ won't come back. There's; another one in the road down by my shack. . Watch out and don’t run over him, Rock.” “Accident?” “Kind of.” “Going back? “Might as well.” The big man climbed to the box be- side the driver, and the eoach went on down the grade. At intervals there was a low rumble of the big man’s voice, unintelligible to the passengers, to which the driver responded with occasional grunts and nods; but none of the passengers ventured to ask ques- tions, although their curiosity was ex- cited tq a keen pitch by the vague hints conveyed in the first brief col- loquy. Perhaps a mile farther on the road doubled a spur of the mountain, and came into a straight ang comparatively level stretch of a few hundred yards. Perched above the road was a cabin of unpainted boards, and opposite, in a clearing, was a rough shed. In the middle of the road, between the shacks, lay a dark, huddled object, an insistent blot in a patch of intense yellow sunlight. The passengers leaned out over the sides of the coach, stared at the dark figure, and talked in low, hushed tones, but the driver and his: companion seemed to pay no heed to it and ‘made no comment as they approached. The leaders swerved, pricked their ears forward, and blew short blasts through their nostrils when they came near the object. and Rock Gridiey spoke to them sharply and set the brake, bring- ing the team to a halt. Two of the passengers jumped out and stepped quickly toward the body, while the others gazed at it in faseination. Wesley Lee. the red- bearded giant, descended deliberately and walked over to the group. awed “The man is dead,” announced onc of the passengers, turning a keen look upon Wesley's grave countenance. > | dian! J know. “I ’lowed he might be,” said Wes, softly. : “He's been shot. Here's in the back of his head.” “You don’t say! Now, that's cur’ous, ain't it? Rock, this gentleman says the diseased is dead,.an’ has a hole in his head. I kind of #picioned that a bullet hole myself.” Rock looked calmly down at the body, nodded, and cheerfully asserted: “Deader’'n a door nail,” was what he said. Wesley “lifted the limp figure easily in his huge drms, and placed it upon the bank at the roadside. It had lain in the road face downward, an awk- ward sprawl of a body, dressed ‘in a calico shirt and faded overalls, . with a mass of coarse black hair covering the head and concealing the sides of the face. Laid upon its back, it was seen to be the corpse of an evil-looking Indian, and Rock Gridley at once rec- ognized it and named it. “Lame George,” said Rock. : “Um-ub,” said W esley. sure enough.” “You seem to know the man,” broke in the alert passenger, who had been taking note of everything. “Probably you know who murdered him. This doesn’t look much like an accident.” “I'm not saying he was murdered,” replied the big mountaineer slowly, “but it does look bad, for a fact. I ain't making any charges, stranger, but there was another Injun here, an’ he's skipped. Rock seen him scootin’ through the bresh up yonder. Seeins like there was ground for suspicion.” The inquisitive tourist agreed with significant emphasis that there was ground for suspicion, and he might have gone on to plainer speech but for the driver's abrupt call of “All aboard?’ There is mo arguing with the autocrat of the box about starting or stopping, and therefore the passen- gers climbed quickly to their plac es, and a crack of the whip started the team. “Tell the judge to send up a buck- board for the remains, or come: along himself if he wants to hold an in- quest,” was Wesley's parting injunc- tion, to which Rock replied: ‘Right. So long!” as the coach swung along down the grade .into the shadows of the forest. The alert passenger fell into a brown study, while the others chattered ex citedly about the grim incident oT their journey. He had taken the seat Desipe the driver, and presently he sid, in low tone: “Driver, who killed Cnt George?” . ‘ey didn't see nobody Kill him,” re- plied Rock in a confidential tone. “Of course, you didn’t; but what do you think? I think .that man Wes, as you call him, shot the Indian.” “Stranger,” drawled Rock solemnly, “my job is driving hosses, not thinking. When a man forgets his job and goes to thinking, trouble begins. I had my lesson. Over on the Big Oak Flat road, coming down Priest's Hill «with a full load of tourists, I got to thinking about something that wasn’t any of my busi- ness, and instead of making the turn I drove straight off the road and landed the whole outfit in the tops ofa bunch of bull pines in, the gulch. That's the place they call ‘Gridley’s. cut-off’ to this day. But don’t let that discourage you. You keep right on thinking; ‘twon’t disturb me a bit.” Gridley’s manner was. gravely re- spectful, and there was no hint of asperity in his tone. . The passenger smiled, being a man of discernment and some hunior; and relapsed into fiiotahtem silence. The result of his meditations was a resolve to stay over a day at the little settlement at the end of the day’s journey, and observe the further development of the case. He was ¢ lawyer, and therefore inter- ested. : At the stage station the tourists found eager listeners to their story, and none of the reticence which char- acterized Reck Gridley, and the little community was soon buzzing with the news that Wes Lee had killed, the no- torious Indian vagabond, Lame George. Not one of the tourists had ventured to make direct assertion that Wes was responsible for the Indian's death, but the fact seemed to be taken for granted by the gossiners on the hotel porch. After the departure of the outgoing stage in the morning there was a general mqvement of the village popu- lation toward the stage company’s har- ness shop, which was also the office of the district's sole representative of the law, the upholder of the peace and dignity of the State' of California, Judge Bruce, who exercised the func- tions of corener, notary, and comniit- ting magistrate. As the judge, decorously delicate. left the hotel to go down to his ofiice, the interested tourist joined him, gnd began questioning him as to methods of procedure. He learned that the in- quiry about to be held .would be vir- tually an inquest, but if cause for be- lieving that a crime had been commit- ted should appear, it w ould become, a preliminary hearing of the case against the person accused. So far it was all plain to the Eastern lawyer, although it seemed to him ‘a crude system. ‘‘And where is the mur- derer now 7?” he asked in all simplicity. “The which?’ said the judge in a puzzled tone. % “The homicide, the prisoner. see him anywhere.” “Oh!” r«ponded the judge, as if light kad been thrown upon a dark subject. “You mean the man who killed the In- He be along pretty soon; es quite a few wiles away, you ” “It’s George, TI don’t will he 1 “Do you: mean. 110. say - Ye is a large? Isn’t he in jail or ‘even under arrest?’ Itwas the judge's turn to be shecked, and he obviously was when he tuned an amazed face to the tourist, and blurted out: “In‘jail!® Put a man in jail for shooting ‘a drunken Injun! Never heard of such. a thing in all my life. No, sir, Wes Lee isn’t in jail —firstly, because we haven't any ‘jail and don’t need none; and secondly, be- cause that’s him coming over the bridge not more’n half an hour late.” The big mountaineer’ Ss swinging stride soon brought Rim. into the group in front of the harness “shop. He had, attired himself in lis “store clothes; even to-necktie and Boots, his hair and beard were carefully. combed, ‘and his ruddy” cheeks hdd-a distinctly