“Shucks! is it so rotten bad as all that, partner?” bleated the disgusted Perk, “All I c’n say is I sure do hope it was a nice brand new five-dollar bill he handed over to the yeller dog, an’ that it’s agoin’ to turn out to be a sample o’ their bogus money outfit. Serve the slick renegade if he got hisself pulled in for passin’ a counterfeit note on some guy that ain’t goin’ to sit by and take what’s comin’ to him without raisin’ a nice howl.”
“Don’t be too vindictive, Perk,” Jack told him.
“Say, partner, ever see the boob afore?” the other demanded.
“If you mean the chap who was pumping my driver for all that was out, Perk, I can’t say that I have. He was a flashily dressed man, with loud clothes that would stamp him as a gambler, like those who used to travel on these Mississippi River steamboats in the old days before the Civil War, fleecing unsuspecting passengers out of all their money and I haven’t the least doubt but what he’s a member of the very gang we’re expecting to round up. Mr. Adkins told me it was simply amazing the vastness of the combine Slippery Slim’s managed to gather around him but he was certain it must number many scores of workers, all obeying the orders of the mainspring—crooked Slim Garrabrant.”
“Huh! the more you keep on tellin’ me them big stories, Jack, the happier it all makes me ’cause I seem to just know there’s bound to be a heap o’ rough house stuff croppin’ up, to cool my blood, ragin’ hot just now.”
“Some fine day you’ll be rubbing up against enough fighting to make you call quits with the game. Perk, my boy; and it’s just likely to crop up before long if indications count for anything. I felt pretty sure from his swagger that this fellow might be the very same master mind in charge of that Ryan boat—then, too, when he walked away he had a little limp, which might have come from striking the ground so hard after his chute let him down.”
“Darned pity he didn’t break a leg, or even his measly ol’ neck, I’d say,” grumbled Perk, one of his fits of resentment gripping him just then. “Got no use for these treacherous snakes that squirm, and worm their way into the confidence o’ honest gents, on’y to play a low-down trick, an’ fill their pockets with smackers.”
“There’s one thing we’ve got to guard against,” suggested Jack, who seemed to have a faculty for looking at every side of a picture, and anticipating troubles that might never have occurred to others less gifted.
“As what, partner?” asked Perk, brightening up once more.
“Delay is what they may be hoping for—some way to hold us here while important news is carried to headquarters. I can even see how they might make some sort of ridiculous charge against us to the police, in hopes we would be held several days under suspicion.”