“Well, Mr. Blake, let’s get down to business,” Blind Charlie’s voice floated out to her. “You’ve had a day to think over my proposition. Now what have you got to say to it?”
There was a brief silence. When Blake did speak, Katherine could discern in his repressed tone a keen aversion for his companion.
“My position is the same as last night. What you say is all guesswork. There is nothing in it.”
Blind Charlie’s voice was soft—purringly soft.
“Then why didn’t you ask me to go to hell, and stay at home instead of coming out here?”
There was again a short silence.
“Come now,” the soft voice persuaded, “let’s don’t go over what we did last night. I know I’m right.”
“I tell you you’re only guessing,” Blake doggedly returned. “You haven’t a scrap of proof.”
“I don’t need proof, when I’m certain about a thing,” gently returned the voice of Blind Charlie. “I’ve been in politics for forty-eight years—ever since I was nineteen, when I cast my first vote. I’ve got sharpened up considerable in that time, and while I haven’t been in on much in the last ten years, I can still smell a fat deal clean across the state. For the last three months I’ve been smelling, and smelling it keener every day, that you’ve got a rich game going.”
“And so”—rather sarcastically—“you set Bruce on, to try to run the game down!”