THE DESERT MOON MYSTERY BY KAY CLEAVER STRAHAN 28 ‘Well,” I said, "that means Shat I've got about half an hour to disguise a family meal as a company dinner—” "Don’t bother,” she inter rupted “They won’t be here for luncheon—dinner. I need to see them only about ten ! minutes ” I didn’t bother—answering. If she didn’t know any more about the ways of the people j In this country than that, I didn't see why I should take ; St on myself to teach her. But she was right. She j talked to them a few minutes; and, though I insisted that they slay for dinner, off they went, tt was an insult to the Desert Moon Ranch. Every- : one on the place, but Miss MacDonald, knew It. Two weeks before. If a couple of friends had left the ranch at eleven-thirty in the morning, willi no reasonable excuse for so doing, Sam would have blowa up and burst with rage. That noon he was not even decently indignantly interest ed. He had plenty of interest, though, concerning the find ing of the attic key. He had had it all settled, and was satisfied that, since it had been proven that Gaby had been killed on the stairway, it aise had been proven that no member of the household could have been implicated. Now this second key coming to light, the key that must have been put over back of 2he wood before the fire was lighted that night, and that must have been blackened in that one fire, because there had been no fire in that fire pluce since, dragged, to quote Sam. not wishing to use such words on my own hook, “Every damn one of us badk into the damn mess again. “Sam,” I said, and I guess my only excuse is that I was still angry at having my honest word doubted, “do you know what I think? I think that Miss MacDonald—though land knows she is a nice girl, and a living wonder as help In the kitchen and around the house—is going to be a flat fizzle from start to finish when it comes to discovering the murderer.” ‘That’s kind of the way I got it sized up, too,” Sam said. “But U she’s good help to you, •he’s worth a lot more than her expenses.” “It isn’t the cost of her," I •aid. “I’m afraid she is going to d* a lot of harm around here.” “Good-night, Mary!” he •aid. ‘If anyone can do any more harm around here than has been done already—why, leave ’em do it.” “Ngt much with ycur ‘leave Vmi do its,' I said. “My idea Is that we’ve had about enough trouble. What I’m getting at is this, Sam; I think that fool girl, at present, is suspecting you more than any other one of us.” “That’s the v;ay I had that sized up, too,” he said “But let her go ahead. If she can prove I’m guilty, I'm willing to hang for it.” “Don’t be a fool, Sam,” I snapped. “Did you ever hap pen to hear of circumstantial evidence ?” •You bet. But they can’t bang more than one innocent person on circumstantial evi dence, and there’s enough of that stuff around here now to hang about five or six of us. Til take my chances with the jest of you, Mary.” “Lands, Sam,” I was taken •back, “do you think she sus pects me?” Something pretty close to the old twinkle came into Sam’s eyes. “Well. Mary, Gaby was one extra to do for and •he came late to meals and pestered you quite a lot. Furthermore, though it hasn’t been made a point of, you were all alone In the kitchen for the hour between five and six o’clock. You might have slipped up and have done the deed between the time you put the meat on and took the biscuits out.” I knew that he thought he was being funny; but I didn’t like it. “see here, Sam,” I be gan, “Danny was going back and forth all the time—” “ ‘Now then,’ ” Sam inter rupted, mocking Miss Mac Donald. “Did Miss Canneziano have any particular reason for watching you? No. I see. Then I am afraid, she can not be positive that you were not out of the kitchen. Twenty minutes often seem like two hours and sixteen minutes— “I’ll tell you what, Mary,” Sam got sudenly serious. “I’m going to wait a few more days, and then if this lady isn’t pro gressing a deal faster than she is a present, I’m going to pay her off, full amount, of course, and wire to ’Frisco for a plain, ordinary, he-man de tective to come up here and take hold of things. By the way,” he went on, ‘does it seem to you that Danny and Canneziano are getting along all right?” “I judge it isn’t a case of their getting along, much,” I said. “So far as I know, she hasn’t spoken a word to him since she greeted him the evening she came home.” “Well,” he hesitated, “Well —I know a mite further than had it all settled , and was that isn’t dinner time— may uc. He went into the dining room, and I followed him. All during the dinner, and the same had been true of every meal since the first breakfast I’ve mentioned, John hardly took his eyes off of Miss MacDonald. I made a way to speak to him about it, alone, right after dinner. "John,” I said "For Mercy’s sake, what do you want to sit and stare at Miss MacDonald for, during meals, like she was the place where you had lost something?” He blushed. "Gosh, Mary! I haven’t been doing that, have I?” "You certainly have. It doesn’t look nice, John. Why do you do it?” "I didn’t know that I did. But, on the square, did you ever see anything as pretty— I mean, as clean and —well, kind of comforting looking? She changes so, too; like a diamond, or a desert, or a sunrise, or—something. Did you ever see anyone as in teresting to look at, Mary?" "Never mind asking me,” I said. "Just you go and ask Danny some of those ques tions.” "Danny,” he answered, "is —well, Danny is Danny, of course. She’s different.” "Better take to watching | how different she is,” I ad vised, and left him to think it over, and went into the living-room. Canneziano was loafing around in there. "Mary," he said. “I’ll make a dicker with you.” CHAPTER XLVI A Dicker Not with me,” I said, and started up the stairs. Curiosity like mine is a curse. I’d gone about four steps up when it caught me. "What’s your old dicker?” I said. "If you’ll persuade Sam to give me the ten thousand for producing the murderer, I’ll split it with you.” I am tired of apologizing for myself. I will state, merely, that I managed to say the one > thing, under those circum stances, that I should not have said. Do you know who the murderer is?” Thereby prov ing that I was possessed of about as much diplomacy as an alarm clock. “Certainly not,” he an- ' swered. He had not hesitated; j he had looked straight into my eyes. But I knew that he believed that he had lied. “See here,” I said. “I take it that one five thousand dollars is as good to you as another. 1 If you know who committed the murder, and will produce him, I’ll give you the five thousand dollars myself." “Don’t say that, Mary,” Dan ny stepped out from behind the long curtains at the end of the south windows. Cannezlano jumped like a spurred bronco. “Spying, eh, my lady?” She spoke directly to me. “Listen, Mary; don’t ever, for any reason, enter into any sort of an agreement with this man. If he knows, or thinks that he knows, who the mur derer is, he can be forced to tell without a bribe. If he had known for one day, one hour, i and had witheld the informa tion, he is, in effect an ac complice—there is a legal term for it, but I have for gotten it. I am going out, now, to find Uncle Sam, and bring him here and tell him that this man says that he knows who committed the murder. Mary, you telephone to the sheriff in Telko—” “Just a moment, please,” Cannezlano spoke smoothly and smilingly. “I have said, definitely, that I do not know who killed the Gaby. And—I do not know. I am bored, un speakably bored. I should like to try my hand at detecting this—er, villian. But,” he shrugged his narrow shoul ders, “with no impetus—” “The fact that she was your own daughter—” I began, notiy. “Don’t, Mary,” Danny Inter rupted, with a sigh. “There is no use. You and he do not speak the same language.” “How is thla?” Canneziano said, and went on speaking, very rapidly, in some foreign language. Danny stood and stared at him without a mite of ex pression on her face. He paused for breath. She said, “I have forgotten my Italian. I do not understand you, and I am glad that I do not. Come, Mary, shall we go upstairs?” In the upper hall she said that she wanted me to go with her to Miss MacDonald, because she wanted to tell Miss MacDonald what had just happened. We knocked on her dor. She greeted us pleasantly enough, but there was a pucker be tween her eyebrows. “You have asked us,” Danny began at once, “to tell you nothing about the case. Does that mean that you do not wish to have us tell you of day by day developments, which seem to have a direct bearing on the case?” “As, for instance?” Miss MacDonald questioned. Danny told her about what I had happened, from the tlrua she had stepped behind the curtains, until she and I had come upstairs together. Miss MacDonald’s first ques tion was, “Why were you watching him?” “Because,” Danny answered, straight, “I think he came here with some evil purpose. I should like to find out what that purpose is.” “Why were you so eager to prevent Mrs. Magin’s making a pact with him?” “Miss MacDonald, a woman who has dealt with criminals, as you must have, should not need to ask that question.” “But,” Miss MacDonald per sisted. “you have not dealt with criminals.” “I have dealt with this man. I know that he is bad and crafty. For five thousand dol lars he would perjure himself ewer and over again. He would produce witnesses who would perjur themselves. You know the ways of criminals better than I do, Miss MacDonald. I know, as Uncle Sam knows, that it is unsafe to deal with them.” “Has this man approached you with offers similar to this one, Miss Canneziano?” "He ha* had no opportunl* ty.” “You are sure of that?” Danny's chin went up a trifle. “I don’t understand.” "I think you do.” Danny turned to me “Mary,” she said, “yesterday afternoon that man came tc my room when I was alone He slipped in, closed my door and locked it. I ran into Gaby’s room, but I could not get oul of it because the doors were locked. I went into Gaby’s bathroom and locked mysell in. I stayed there for half an hour, or longer, urftil he left Miss MacDonald evidently thinks that he and I were ir, conversation during that time I have no proof that we weren’t. Do you believe me Mary?” “I do, with all my heart,” 1 said. Miss MacDonald persisted. “You told no one about this?” “I did not dare to tell. It John thought that that man —” She stopped short. “Yes?” questioned Miss Mac Donald. “I mean that John would fight with him; would whip him within an inch of his life.” “Why should you care?” Danny looked at me. “She’d care, I said, answer Ing the appeal in her big, hurt eyes, “because she is a woman, Miss MacDonald. It may be hard for you to understand; but women, who aren’t crime analysts, don’t want theii men fighting.” “Thank you. Mary,” Danny said, and walked hurriedly oul of the room. CHAPTER XLVII /in mu “Mrs. Magin,” Miss Mac Donald began, right off, the minute the door had closed behind Danny, “I want to ask you to help me with this case.” “I couldn’t be any help to you,” I said. I guess I was rather tart about it. “Why not?” “One reason is,” I said, “that anybody who doesn’t know any better than to suspicion Dan ny, in this affair, would need a lot more help, to get any where, than I could give them.” “My only suspicion concern ing Miss Canneziano,” she answered, “is that she knows more than she is willing to tell. I may be wrong about that. Have you any other reason for refusing to help me?” “Only that you don’t believe a word that I say. If you would consider that I am, anyway, trying to be honest and if you’d do the same with the others, until you are sure that you have reason to do other wise, I’d consider it an honor to help you, and I’d thank you kindly.” “I am afraid that I don’t entirely understand.” “Crime and wickedness,” 1 told her, “aren’t the general rules of the world. If they were, all the good people would have to be locked up, for safety’s sake, while the crim inals ran loose for lack ol space to confine them. Why, instead of doubting my simple word, this morning, when 1 told you how Sam always lighted a fire, for any excuse, couldn’t you have believed that I was telling the . truth, and that whoever put the key in there knew that Sam would light the fire, and so throw suspicion on himself?” “That is possible,” she ad mitted. “But the key, there, leads me to suppose that whoever put it there, to hide it, would be too stupid for much subtle reasoning. Keys, you know don’t burn.” “They don’t,” I agreed. “But we never take the ashes out of the fireplace as you did this morning. We open the ash dump and shoot them down into a barrel in the basement. Every few months the ashes are emptied in starvation field, eight miles or more away from here. Not a bad way to get the key off the place, if that was what he wanted. Not a bad way, either, to throw more suspicion on Sam, if the key was found.”