“Say, I’ll hand you that check like daddy giving a stick of candy to the baby!” said Craig with hearty emphasis. “I’ll own up that I have been killing time here in the city, waiting to get a line on Latisan—where he is. I have found that he’s a lunatic when he’s ugly—and there’s no telling how far a grudge will drive a man in the big woods. So he’s here in town?”
“Yes, and I’m rigging hopples to keep him here, I tell you. Come in at two forty-five. See the tame tiger!”
Then Mern called in Crowley, who was very ill at ease, but was obstinately and manifestly at bay. “Let’s see. Didn’t I understand you to say, Buck, that Miss Kennard had gone chasing Latisan?”
“That’s the way I figured it.”
“You’re wrong. He’s chasing her. That’s why he came in here.”
The chief had snarled, “You’re wrong,” in a peculiarly offensive tone. Mr. Crowley, after his proclaimed success in the Latisan case, had come up a number of notches in self-esteem and was inclined to dispute an allegation that he was wrong in that matter or in anything else. He was provoked into disclosures by sudden resentment. “She stood out there in the public street and said she was in love with him and would marry him after the drive was down, and she grabbed up his cap and coat when he ran away, and if it ain’t natural to suppose that she was going to chase him up and hand ’em over, then what?”
“Look here, Crowley, what kind of a yarn is this?”
“It’s true.”
“Why didn’t you tell me before?”
“It didn’t have anything to do with the case, as I was working it. It was a side issue!” Crowley raised his voice, insisting on his own prowess. “The idea was to get him off the job—and I did it. I claim——”