But me? The first two weeks behind
bars will kill me!"
"You should have thought of that before you cracked Leigh's skull,"
retorted Deputy Valden.
"I tell you that I didn't do it, and that I never before heard
of a man of that name!" cried Tag Mosher fiercely.
"Leigh says you did," the deputy again informed the prisoner.
"Oh, well, then, we'll say that I did," agreed Tag moodily. "I'm
as good as finished, if the charge has been made. No one around
here would think of believing anything that Tag Mosher might say."
Somehow, despite the unsavory reputation of the prisoner, Dick
Prescott found himself feeling more than ordinary sympathy for
this dejected prisoner. Could it be possible that Tag really
was innocent of this last and most serious charge against him?
It didn't seem likely that the officers had gone after the wrong
young man.
"Tag is bad, and yet there's also good in him that is very close
to the surface," Prescott told himself. "It seems really too
bad to think of this young fellow being locked up, away from the
sunshine and the fresh air of the woods. And yet, if he makes
a sport of manslaughter, of course he'll have to be put away where
he can't do any harm. Oh, dear! I wonder why I feel so much
sympathy for a fellow of this kind?"
They were at the broken bridge, now, with the wreck of the automobile
lying in the creek.
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