made no bones
about the fact of his villainy.

Peter found Coast stripped to the waist, sitting in a chair by the
table, bathing his wounded shoulder. But the hemorrhage had stopped and
Peter saw that the bullet had merely grazed the deltoid, leaving a clean
wound, which could be successfully treated by first aid devices. So he
found his guest a drink of whisky, which put a new heart into him, then
tore up a clean linen shirt, strips from which he soaked in iodine and
bandaged over the arm and shoulder.

Meanwhile Coast was talking.

"Well, _mon vieux_, it's a little world, ain't it? To think I'd find
_you_, my old bunkie, Pete, the waiter, out here in the wilds, passin'
the buck for Mike McGuire! Looks like the hand o' Fate, doesn't it?
Superintendent, eh? Some job! Twenty thousand acres--if he's got an
inch. An' me thinkin' all the while you'd be slingin' dishes in a New
York chop house!"

"I studied forestry in Germany once," said Peter with a smile, as he
wound the bandage.

"Right y'are! Mebbe you told me. I don't know. Mebbe there's a lot o'
things you _didn't_ tell me. Mebbe there's a lot of things I didn't tell
_you_. But I ought to 'a' known a globe trotter like you never would 'a'
stayed a waiter. A waiter! _Nom de Dieu!_ Remember that (sanguine)
steward on the _Bermudian_? Oily, fat little beef-eater with the gold
teeth? Tried to make us 'divy' on the tips? But we beat him to it, Pete,
when we took French leave. H-m! I'm done with waitin' now, Pete. So are
you, I reckon. Gentleman of leisure, _I_ am!"

"There you are," said Peter as he finished the bandage, "but you'll have
to get this wound dressed somewhere to-morrow."

"Right you are. A hospital in Philly will do the trick. And McGuire pays
the bill."

Jim Coast got up and moved his arm cautiously.

"Mighty nice of you, Pete. That's fine. I'll make him pay through the
nose for this." And then turning his head and eyeing Peter narrowly,
"You say McGuire told you nothin'!"

"Nothing. It's none of my affair."

The ex-waiter laughed. "He knows his business. Quiet as death, ain't he?
He's got a right to be. And scared. He's got a right to be scared too.
I'll scare him worse before I'm through with him."

He broke off with a laugh and then, "Funny to find you guardin' _him_
against _me_. House all locked--men with guns all over the place. He
wanted one of those guys to kill me, didn't he? But I'm too slick for
him. No locked doors can keep out w