The blood surged up under Young Denny’s dark skin until it touched his crisp black hair, and the fat man hastened to throw a touch of jocularity into the statement.
“Yep, you’ve disappointed ’em sorely. But I’ve been monopolizing all the conversation. I can’t convince myself that you’ve come down here merely to say me a touching farewell. Was there––was there something you wanted to see me about in particular?”
It was the very opening for which Denny had been waiting––the opening which he had not known how to make himself, for his plan for procedure by which he was to accomplish it was just as indistinct as his resolution had been final. He nodded silently, uncertain just how to begin, and then he plunged desperately into the very middle of it.
“I thought maybe you could tell me if this was true 101 or not,” he said, and he drew from his pocket the paper which bore the account of Jed The Red’s victory over The Texan. A hint of a frown appeared upon the forehead of the man in brown as he took the folded sheet and read where Denny’s finger indicated––the last paragraph of all.
“The winner’s share of the receipts amounted to twelve thousand dollars,” was its succinct burden.
He read it through twice, as if searching for any puzzling phrase it might contain.
“I certainly can,” he admitted at last. “I wrote it myself, but it’s no doubt true, for all that. Not a very big purse, of course, but then, you know, he isn’t really championship calibre. He’s just a second-rate hopeful, that’s all. It seems hard to find a real one these days. But why the riddle?” he finished, as he handed back the paper.
“Why, I thought if it was true maybe I’d ask you to tell me if I––how I could get a chance at him.”
The boy’s explanation was even more flounderingly abrupt than his former question had been, but his eyes never wavered from the newspaper man’s face. The latter laid his notebook upon the truck with exaggerated care and rose and faced him.
“Another!” he lamented in simulated despair. But the next moment all the bantering light went from his face, while his eyes flashed in lightning-like appraisement over Denny’s lean shoulder-heavy body, from his 102 feet, small and narrow in spite of the clumsy high boots, to his clean-cut head, and back again. There was a hint of businesslike eagerness in that swift calculation of possibilities. The boy shifted consciously under the scrutiny.