McAllister and His Double

by Arthur Cheney Train

Then it was that McAllister resolved to do something desperate.

II

"I'm perfectly delighted to have the Baron. Why didn't you bring Pierrepont, too? How d'y' do, Baron? Let me present you to my husband. Gordon—Baron de Ville. I'll put you and Mr. McAllister together. We're just a little crowded. You've hardly time to dress—dinner in just nineteen minutes."

"Zank you! It ees so vera hospitable!" said the Baron, bowing low, and twirling his mustache in the most approved fashion.

"Come on, de Ville." McAllister slapped his Old-Man-of-the-Sea upon the back good-naturedly. "You can give Mrs. Blair all the risque Paris gossip at dinner." They followed the second man upstairs. Although an old friend of both Mrs. Blair and her husband, McAllister had never been at the Scarsdale house before. It was new, and massively built. They were debating whether or not to call it Castle Blair. The second man showed them to a room at the extreme end of a wing, and as the servant laid out the clothes McAllister thought the man eyed him rather curiously. Well, confound it, he was getting used to it. Barney lit a cigarette and measured the distance from the window to the ground with a discriminating eye.

"Well," said the clubman, after the second man had finally retired, "are you satisfied? And what the deuce is going to happen now?"

Barney sank into a Morris chair and thrust his feet comfortably on to the fender.

"Fatty," said he, as he blew a multitude of tiny rings toward the blaze, "you're a wizard! Never seen such nerve in my life—and you only out two months! You've got the clothes, and, what's more, you've got the real chappie lingo. It's great! I'm sorry to have to pull in such an artist. I am, honest. An' now you've got to go behind prison bars! It's sad—positively sad!"

"Look here!" demanded McAllister. "Do you mean to tell me you're such a bloomin' ass as to think that I'm a crook, a professional burglar, who's got an introduction into society—a what-do-you-call-him? Oh, yes—Raffles?"

Barney grinned at his victim, who was just getting into his dress-coat.