when they first met, an
hour or two before, nor even hinted at such a salute. But now, as
earlier in the day when her dash toward the stables had left him
standing rigid in the middle of the lawn, she failed to see the
expression that settled upon Wickersham's long face. It was Dexter
Allison this time who noticed it, and hours later, when he and
Wickersham sat and faced each other in the downstairs room in the house
on the hill, which served as Allison's office, he remembered and
recognized it.

"You wanted to talk with me?" Wickersham inquired as he entered the
room that evening.

Somehow Wickersham's unending politeness had always irritated Allison.
That night his smoothly infectionless question nettled him.

"Your damned fool, Harrigan, bungled last night!" he blurted out. "He
messed things up, beautifully. He not only failed, but he failed to
get away without being seen. That's what comes of entrusting a job
like that to a drunken sot."

Wickersham seated himself--sat and caressed a cigarette. Coolly he
waited and blinked his eyelids.

"My man?" he murmured. "My man?"

"Ours then," Allison corrected sharply. "Ours." Then he seemed to
recollect himself and his voice became less abrupt. "Listen. This
afternoon I had a talk with O'Mara. That is, I started to have a talk
with him, but--but he beat me to it. And in just about three minutes
he told me that he'd caught Harrigan on the job--not mentioning any
names, I don't mean--but he didn't need to, And he told me more than
that. He as good as gave me to understand that he'd know where to
place the blame, if there was any more interference with his men."

Wickersham crossed a long leg and blew a thin blue streamer of smoke.

"Yes?" he intoned bodilessly.

It brought a blaze to Allison's eyes--that nerveless monosyllable.

"That doesn't interest you, eh?" he snapped. "Doesn't interest you at
all! Well, it does me. Three months ago I bought into this affair
because I was as sure as any man could be that I'd collect a hundred
per cent on my money, next spring. Elliott and Ainnesley? Pah!--Nice
gentle old ladies, when it comes to a game like this. They're
anachronists; they are honest business men, twenty years behind the
times. You've heard of taking candy from children. Well, that's what
it looked like then. But it doesn't look that way any longer. Talk
with you? Yes, I did want to talk. I wanted to tell you that if you'd
like to sw