Durant looked up, surprised. "Surely all that lies wholly between you and the young woman."
"True," admitted Raish, "but as I don't mind confiding in you that the young woman is tired of me, I want her to feel secure that in satisfying her father's scruples I don't intend to take an unfair advantage of her. Suppose I set that down myself." He did so, writing rapidly, but clearly. "Now, Mr. Durant," he handed the other the pen, "you will add to your kindness to me more than you dream by placing your signature as witness to my pledge."
Durant did as he was asked, feeling that, little as he understood the matter, he was probably serving the best interests of the unfortunate Gelly.
"As witness only," he, however, stated. "It is an arrangement in which I take no moral responsibility."
"Thanks. I understand your scruples and respect them. The responsibility is mine entirely. Just at present I cannot explain, but later the whole position will be made clear."
"What's all them goin's-on?" suddenly demanded Nick, whose attention had been momentarily distracted by an argument between Mops and Sandy on the poetic merits of Rabbit Burruns. "No monkeyin' with dockiments over thar."
"I'm only directing it," explained the Dandy, who had folded the letter and inclosed it in an envelope.
Nick looked over his shoulder, breathing heavily with interest. "By gum," he ejaculated, wrathfully, "ef ye hevn't blotted my gal's name, Raish, and not fer the fust time!"
