He paused, and his voice changed to its former note.
“You see I had to have a little help on this job. It had a big loose end.
“I went in and sat down in a pew. It was dim and quiet and I got right down to business. I didn’t run in any of the prayer-book curtain-raisers. I put the thing right up to the boss.
“‘Now, look here, Governor,’ I said, ‘has a helpless little girl got a pull with you, or is it bunk? Because I’m a-goin’ to call you, and if the line your barkers are putting out is on the level, you’ve got to come across with the goods. If there’s nothing to it, the Government ought to shut ’em up on a fraud order—I’m a-goin’ to carry one end of this thing; get busy at the other end!’
“Then I went out.
“That night I went over to see little Westridge.
“They’d been to dinner at Jordan’s Pond and had come in early. Westridge wasn’t in the hotel; he was stopping with the Lesterfields; a big, gray stone house facing the sea. The butler showed me in. There wasn’t anybody about but Westridge. The Lesterfields were down at Newport.
“He was surprised to see me—didn’t understand it; he’d never met me in the social line. But it was America where anything might happen, even a man come to see you that you hadn’t been introduced to.”
The speaker paused to move one of his knees; he lifted it with his hands.
“I didn’t waste any time cutting brush before Mr. Westridge. I went right in to what I had to say. My line was: friend of the girl’s father, blunt old Western business man, no manners, and don’t give a cuss for you. Easy stuff, you see, and the kind of thing your Englishman expects in the ‘States.’