“I notice by the Try-bune,” went on Uncle Bill with a chuckle, “that one of them English suffragettes throwed flour on the Primeer and—” His mouth opened as a fresh headline caught his eye, and when he had finished perusing it his jaw had lengthened until it was resting well down the bosom of his flannel shirt . . . The headline read:
BRAVE TENDERFOOT SAVES HIS GUIDE
FROM DEATH IN BLIZZARD
T. VICTOR SPRUDELL CARRIES EXHAUSTED OLD MAN
THROUGH DEEP DRIFTS TO SAFETY
A MODEST HERO
Uncle Bill removed his spectacles and polished them deliberately. Then he readjusted them and read the last paragraph again:
“The rough old mountain man, Bill Griswold, grasped my hand at parting, and tears of gratitude rolled down his withered cheeks as he said good-bye. But, tut! tut!” declared Mr. Sprudell modestly: “I had done nothing.”
Uncle Bill made a sound that was somewhere between his favorite ejaculation and a gurgle, while his face wore an expression which was a droll mixture of amazement and wrath.
“Oh, Lannigan!” he called, then changed his mind and, instead, laid the paper on his knee and carefully cut out the story, which had been copied from an Eastern exchange, and placed it in his worn leather wallet.
IX
The Yellow-Leg
While seated in the office of the Hinds House, with his eyes rolled to the ceiling, listening in well-feigned rapture to “Rippling Waves” on the cabinet organ, and other numbers rendered singly and ensemble by the Musical Snows, Mr. Dill in reality was wondering by what miracle he was going to carry out Sprudell’s specific instructions to keep his errand a secret.