Mary Roberts Rinehart

“ On the Wassons' invitation he remained to lunch, and when the ranch owner excused himself and rode away after the meal he sat for some time on the verandah, with Mrs. Wasson sewing and his own eyes fixed speculatively on the mountain range, close, bleak and mysterious.
“Strange thing,” he commented. “Here's a man, a book-lover and student, who comes out here, not to make living and be a useful member of the community, but apparently to bury himself alive. I wonder, why.”
“A great many come out here to get away from something, Mr. Bassett.” ”

“ The description Wasson had applied to Henry Livingstone, Bassett himself applied to the two ranch hands later on, during their interview. It could hardly have been called an interview at all, indeed, and after a time Bassett realized that behind their taciturnity was suspicion. They were watching him, undoubtedly; he rather thought, when he looked away, that once or twice they exchanged glances. He was certain, too, that Wasson himself was puzzled.
“Speak up, Jake,” he said once, irritably. “This gentleman has come a long way. It's a matter of some property.” ”

“ He had, witness the horse, fled after the thing happened. Later on, then, David Livingstone had taken him into his family. That was all.
Except for that identification of Gregory's, and for the photograph of Judson Clark.... For a moment he wondered if the two, Jud Clark and the unknown, could be the same. But Dry River would have known Clark. That couldn't be. ”