“Will your headquarters back up my operatives?”
“I’ll do that! I’m playing this game on my own hook. There’ll be no fight. The bluff will be enough, if I have the men. And if I have to—well, there’s a fight between lumberjacks every season on that river, and there’s a big wall of woods between Skulltree dam and New York, Mern! I’ll take my chances up behind that wall. Get the men for me.”
“When are you leaving?”
“One o’clock this afternoon—Grand Central.”
“I’ll deliver the men to you there.”
Craig stamped away across the glass-littered floor and disappeared.
“Well,” averred the chief when Latisan came out from behind the partition, “it looks as if somebody had been attending to your job for you, son! Also looks as if there might be considerable more doing right away!”
“So that’s more of your devilish business, is it, sending gunmen to fight honest workers?” demanded the drive master, with venom.
“Business is still business with me in spite of the looks of this office,” returned Mern, unruffled. “Latisan, you can’t beef about not getting a square deal—and I’ve put you in the way of getting a tip. It looks to me——”
“Just the same as it looks to me!” cried the young man. “We’re fully agreed as to all the looks! Good day!”