“None, except those I gave you.”
Mason turned his eyes to Barkler who sat smoking placidly. “What’s your idea about this, Barkler?” he asked.
Barkler gave his pipe a couple of puffs, removed it from his mouth, said, “He ain’t being blackmailed,” and resumed his smoking.
Phyllis Leeds laughed nervously.
“Mr. Barkler knew Uncle Alden in the Klondike,” she said. “He claims no man on earth could blackmail him, says Uncle Alden’s too handy with a gun.”
Barkler said, by way of correction and without removing his pipe, “Not the Klondike, the Tanana.”
“It amounts to the same thing,” she said.
Barkler seemed not to have heard her.
“He and Uncle Alden stumbled onto each other a year ago,” Phyllis explained. “They’re great friends — old cronies, you know.”
“Cronies, hell! We’re pards,” Barkler said, “and don’t make no mistake about Alden. He ain’t being blackmailed.”