. . . What would you say of a doctor who couldn't tell
the difference between a wound made by a man bumping his head when he
fell and by a smashing blow with a gun-barrel? Patten doesn't guess
yet that it was the blow Moraga gave me the other night which came so
close to ringing down the sable curtains for me."
"Moraga?" she asked with quickened interest. "Not the same Moraga who
shot Brocky Lane?"
"The same little old Moraga," he assured her lightly. "You needn't
mention it abroad, of course; I don't think Galloway got a chance to
talk with him and we are not sure yet that he even knows Moraga was
here. But I know somebody put me out in the dark by hammering me over
the head; and Tom Cutter found blood on Moraga's revolver. But we
wander far afield. Coming back to Patten, do we agree that he is
something of a dub?"
"I'd rather not discuss him."
"Exactly. And I, being in the talkative way, am going to tell you that
he has made blunders before now; that at least one man died under his
nice little fat hands who shouldn't have died outside of jail; that
long ago I had my suspicions and began instituting inquiries; that now
I am fully prepared to learn that Caleb Patten has no more right to an
M.D. after his name than I have."
"You must be mistaken.
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