e the only thing
in the world he wants! Obstreperous parent adumbrated in the foreground,
shotgun in hand. I don't allow Cassowary to carry any money--would rather
risk contamination myself than expose him to it. If he stays with me for
a few years, his accumulated income will roll up so that he can endow
orchestras and art museums all through the prairie towns of the West, and
become a great benefactor of mankind."

Hood's story was manifestly absurd, and yet he invested it with a certain
plausibility. Even Cassowary, as Hood described him, seemed a wholly
credible person, and the bills Hood had drawn from his pocket bore all
the marks of honest money.

Dinner was announced, and Hood lounged down-stairs and into the
dining-room arm in arm with Deering. A tapestry on the wall immediately
attracted his attention. After pecking at the edges with his long,
slender fingers he turned to his seat with a sigh.

"Preposterous imitation! I dare say it was passed off as a real Gobelin,
but I know the artist who fakes those things--a New Jersey genius and
very smooth at the game."

Deering had never paid the slightest attention to the tapestry, which had
hung in the room for a dozen years, but he apologized in a vein of irony
for its spuriousness, and steeled himself against complaints of the food;
but after tasting the soup Hood praised it with enthusiasm. He was wholly
at ease, and his table manners were beyond criticism. He seemed
indifferent to the construction Deering or the bewildered Briggs might
place upon his confessions, to which he now glibly addressed himself.

"A couple of years ago I was roaming through the Western provinces with a
couple of old friends who persist--against my advice, I assure you--in
the childish pastime of safe-blowing. We got pinched _en bloc_, and as I
was broke I had to sponge on the yeggs to get me out of jail."

Briggs dropped a plate and Deering frowned at the interruption. Hood went
on tranquilly:

"However, I was immured only three weeks, and the experience was
broadening. That was in Omaha, and I'll say without fear of contradiction
that the Omaha jail is one of the most comfortable in the Missouri
Valley. I recommend it, Deering, without reservation, to any one in
search of tranquillity. After they turned me loose I introduced myself to
an old college classmate--fraternity brother--no danger of exposure. I
had him put me up at the Omaha Club, and then I gave a dinner to the
United