“Know the man?” asked Dave Henderson.
“Yes,” said Kelly. “His name's Speen—he's a plain-clothesman.” He shook his head in a troubled way, and suddenly laid both hands on Dave Henderson's shoulders. “Dave, what are you going to do?”
Dave Henderson laughed shortly.
“Do you want to know?” He flung out the words in a sort of bitter gibe. “Well, I'll tell you—in confidence. I'm going to blow the head off a friend of mine.”
Dave Henderson felt the hands on his shoulders tighten.
“What's the use, Dave?” said Square John Kelly quietly. “I suppose it has something to do with that Tydeman wad; but what's the use? You've got four thousand dollars. Why not start clean again? The other don't pay, Dave, and——” He stopped.
Dave Henderson's face had hardened like flint.
“There's a good deal you don't know,” he said evenly. “And I guess the less you know the safer you'll be. I owe you a lot, John; and the only way I can square it now is to tell you to stand from under. What you say, though I know you mean it, doesn't make any dint in five years of hell. I've got a debt to pay, and I'm going to pay it. Maybe I'll see you again—maybe I won't. But even a prison bird can say God bless you, and mean it; and that's what I say to you. They won't have any suspicions that there's anything of any kind between you and me; but they'll naturally come here to see if they can get any information, when that fellow Speen out there turns in his report. You can tell them you advised me to start clean again, and you can tell them that I swear I don't know where that hundred thousand dollars is. They won't believe it, and you don't believe it. But let it go at that! I don't know what's going to break loose, but you stand from under, John. I'm going now—to get acquainted with Mr. Speen. It wouldn't look just right, in my supposed condition, for you to let me have another drink in your place, after having staked me; but I've got to make at least a bluff at it. You stay here for a few minutes—and then come out and chase me home.” He held out his hand, wrung Square John Kelly's in a hard grip, turned abruptly away—and staggered out into the barroom.
Clutching his ten dollars in his hand, and glancing furtively back over his shoulder every step or two, Dave Henderson neared the door. Here, apparently reassured that his benefactor was not watching him, and apparently succumbing to an irresistible temptation, he sidled up to the bar—beside the man with the brown peaked cap.
“Kelly's all right—s'il right,” he confided thickly to the other. “Ol' friend. Never turns down ol' friend in hard luck. Square John—betcher life! Have a drink?”