“Yes, I'll take the boy,” said the other; “but you'll have to look sharp and lose no time. They will be sequestering the moment they hear of it, and I half suspect old Engler will be before you.”
“But my personal effects? I have things of value.”
“Hush, hush! he 'll overhear you. Come, young gentleman,” said he to me,—“come home and sup with me. The hotel is so full, they 've no quarters for you. I 'll try if I can't put you up.”
Eccles stood with his head bent down as we moved away, then lifted his eyes, waved his hand a couple of times, and said, “By-bye.”
“Isn't he coming with us?” asked I.
“Not just yet: he has some business to detain him,” said the banker; and we moved on.
CHAPTER XV. A TERRIBLE SHOCK
Herb Heinfetter was a bachelor, and lived in a very modest fashion over his banking-house; and as he was employed from morning to night, I saw next to nothing of him. Eccles, he said, had been called away, and though I eagerly asked where, by whom, and for how long, I got no other answer than “He is called away,” in very German English, and with a stolidity of look fully as Teutonic.
The banker was not talkative: he smoked all the evening, and drank beer, and except an occasional monosyllabic comment on its excellence, said little.