CHAPTER VIII
A THIRD ARM TO THE OLD-FASHIONED DOUBLE CROSS
“
The fresh Hick!” observed Mr. Pickins savagely. “I’d like to hand him a bunch of knuckles.”
Mr. Pickins was not now in character, but was clad in quite ordinary good clothes; his prominent cheek-bones, however, had become two white spots in the midst of an angrily red countenance.
“I don’t know as I blame him so much,” said Phelps. “The trouble is we sized him for about the intelligence of a louse. Anybody who would stand for your Hoop-pole County line of talk wouldn’t need such a careful frame-up to make him lay down his money.”
“There’s something to that,” agreed Short-Card Larry. “I always did say your work was too strong, Pick.”
“There ain’t another man in the crowd can play as good a Rube,” protested Mr. Pickins, touched deeply upon the matter of his art. “I don’t know how many thousands we’ve cleaned up on that outfit of mine.”