BROPHY was distinctly inhospitable when Lida walked into the tavern.
She curtly stated her errand as she passed him on her way to the stairs, and when she returned with her bag he allowed her to leave without opening his mouth. She took the money he offered and put it in her pocket without counting it.
The men who were about the place were silent, too. The fact that Flagg was sending her away in his own hitch stirred their curiosity and had considerable to do with keeping their rude tongues off a person who had evidently come to an understanding with the master of the big house.
“Where are ye headed, Dick?” asked a bystander while the girl was in the tavern.
“Up and down,” stated the old man, cryptically.
“Well, if you want to overtake them chums of hers you’ll have to lay on the braid pretty smart! If they kept on going at the rate they started off they’re halfway to the junction by now.”
When the girl was in her seat Dick sent the bays along at a sharp clip down the highway by which Crowley and his companion had departed.
Lida had conferred with Dick on the way down from the big house and had decided on a bit of guile to divert the attention of the gossips of Adonia from her real objective. According to all appearances she was in full flight toward the city, or else was chasing up Ward Latisan; the cynics, after that affair in the street when she had pleaded with the young man, opined that she was brazen enough to do almost anything that a girl should not.
Brophy watched her out of sight.
“If it ain’t one thing it’s another with these table girls,” was his sour comment. “I don’t know what I’m liable to draw next; the Queen of Sheby, maybe!”