thing had been heard
about a woman coming down the Mississippi. He succeeded in giving the
impression that he was a detective. In the restaurant he talked with a
cocky little bald-headed man all spruced up and dandyish.

"I'm from Pittsburgh," the man said. "My name's Doss, Ronald Doss; I'm a
sportsman, but every winter I drop down here, hunting and fishing;
sometimes on the river, sometimes back in the bottoms. I suppose, Mr.
Carline, that you're a stranger on the river?"

"Why, yes-s, down this way; I live near it, up at Gage."

"I see, your first trip down. Got a nice gasolene boat, though!"

"Oh, yes! You're stopping here?"

"Just arrived this morning; trying to make up my mind whether I'll go
over on St. Francis, turkey-and deer-hunting, or get a boat and drop
down the Mississippi. Been wondering about that."

"Well, say, now--why can't you drop down with me?"

"Oh, I'd be in the way----"

"Not a bit----"

"Costs a lot to run a motorboat, and I'd have to----"

"No, you wouldn't! Not a cent! Your experience and my boat----"

"Well, of course, if you put it that way. If it'd be any accommodation
to you to have an old river man--I mean I've always tripped the river,
off and on, for sport."

"It'd be an education for me, a great help!"

"Yes, I expect it would be an education, if you don't know the river."
Doss smiled.

They walked over to the river bank. An arc light cast its rays upon the
end of the street, down the sloping bank, and in a light circle upon the
rocking, muddy waters where the fish dock and several shanty-boats
rested against the bank.

Doss whistled a little tune as he rested on his cane.

The front door of the third houseboat up the eddy opened and closed. A
man climbed the bank and passed the two with a basket on his arm.

"Come on down," Carline urged.

"Not to-night," Doss said. "I've got my room up at the hotel, and I'll
have to get my stuff out of the railroad baggage room. But I'll come
down about 10 or 11 o'clock in the morning. Then we'll fit up and drop
down the river. Good-night!"

Doss watched Carline go down to the dock and on to his boat. Then he
went up the street and held earnest confab with a man who had a basket
on his arm. They whispered ten minutes or so, then the man with the
basket returned to his shanty-boat, and within half an hour was back up
town, carrying two suitcases, a gun case, and a duffle bag.

Doss went to the smaller hotel with these things a