"Mosher," said the deputy sternly, "Officer Simmons suspects that
you believed we'd be after you, and that you tore up some of the
planks from this crazy old bridge, so that our car would be wrecked.
Did you do that?"
"Oh, I suppose I must have," replied Tag, with the air of one
who feels it fruitless to deny what peace officers were prepared
to charge against one of his bad reputation.
"Then you admit damaging the bridge?" asked Valden.
"I admit nothing of the kind," Tag retorted.
"Who ripped the boards up?"
"I don't know."
"We'll prove it against you," declared Valden positively.
"Oh, I s'pose you will," grumbled Tag. "It's easy to prove anything
against old Bill Mosher's son. My dad's where he can't help me."
"Are you going to play the baby act?" asked the deputy,
half-sneeringly.
"Wait until I've had a week of good eating and sound sleeping,
and then see if you can find anything babyish about me," snapped
the prisoner.
Dick Prescott watched the pair, feeling a rising resentment against
the deputy. Yet Valden was only resorting to tricks as old as
the police themselves---the taunting of a prisoner into talking
too much and thereby betraying his guilt.
"Pardon me, Tag," Dick now interposed, "but it's a principle of
law that a prisoner doesn't have to talk unless he wants to.
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