“More likely some travelers stormbound like ourselves,” returned Joe practically. “Let’s take a squint at them.”
They tiptoed their way through the hall to a room opening on the right. The door, half 238 broken from its hinges, was standing open, and in the darkness they saw the tips of two lighted cigars.
As this was not at all ghostly and they did not care to intrude, they were about to retire as softly as they had come, when Joe was startled by hearing his own name. Jim’s hand shot out and clenched his friend’s arm, and they stood there like statues.
“That was a slick trick you put over on Matson,” said a voice which Joe recognized instantly as belonging to Beckworth Fleming. He had heard that voice before when he had made its owner kneel in the dirt of the road and beg Mabel’s pardon for his insolence.
“I think myself it was rather clever,” drawled another familiar voice, that of Braxton. “He fell for it like a lamb.”
“He’s a pretty keen chap usually, too,” remarked Fleming. “How is it you caught him napping?”
“I picked out just the right time,” said Braxton complacently. “And I don’t deny that luck helped me a little. If McRae and Barclay hadn’t gone away just the time they did, it might not have worked. But I got him talking about handwriting, and the first thing you know he’d scribbled his name on the blank sheet. I took good care that only the bottom of the sheet was where he could 239 reach it. Then I slipped the paper into my pocket, sent it to you to have the contract printed above the signature, and you know the rest.”
“Easy meat,” chuckled Fleming.
“Too easy,” chortled Braxton. “It makes me laugh every time I think of it.”
Joe stepped into the room, followed by Jim.