“Thank you, I won’t. Just the same, I think that a dive like that before each meal might reduce your flesh and do you a lot of good,” added the fat boy, eyeing the rather corpulent gentleman critically.
The Overland Riders groaned, for Stacy had undone whatever good he might have accomplished. Instead of being disturbed at Stacy’s remark, however, the gentleman introduced himself, saying that he was Colonel Scott, President of the C. V. & A. Railroad. Stacy then introduced him to “Grace Harlowe Gray’s Overland Riders.”
“Eh? Grace Harlowe Gray?” repeated the colonel reflectively. “Where have I heard that name? I seem to know it well, and yet—” He regarded the flushed face of Grace with inquiring gaze. “No, there is nothing familiar to me in that face, but somehow the name revives old memories. Do I know you?”
Grace laughed.
“I believe you have never seen me before, sir.”
“But the name is so familiar,” persisted the colonel.
“I am not at all amazed at that, sir, for under that name I once sent you a message that might have been, and probably was, construed as impudent,” she said, flushing still more deeply.
“Eh?” Colonel Scott looked puzzled. “I don’t understand. I—”
“You were Master of Transportation of the Northern Railroad in France, were you not, sir?” suggested Grace demurely.
“Yes. But—”