Then he wrote a telegram to his office in New York explaining that he had been motoring, which accounted for his failure to call for his passage to Banff, thoughtfully adding that the cost of his unused sleeping car tickets should be charged to his personal account. After composing these messages he redeemed his suitcase in the check room and dropped it beside the Governor's battered kit bag on the platform.
"Ah! Burning the wires a little? I hope you are committing no indiscretion, son. I was admiring your baggage; that suitcase of yours would hold a king's wardrobe. We'll drive to the hotel, get a bath and a solid, old-fashioned breakfast, a hearty meal such as old Ike Walton recommended to fishermen eager for the early worm, and plan our further travels."
The Governor commanded the best service of the inn, obtaining two adjoining rooms with bath. He registered elaborately as Reginald Heber Saulsbury and wrote Archie down as Ashton Comly, dashingly indicating the residence of both as New York. In response to an inquiry for mail for Mr. Saulsbury the clerk made search and threw out a letter which the Governor opened indifferently and after a glance crumpled into his pocket.
"A note from Red Leary," he explained when they had reached their rooms. "He's slipping along slowly toward Brattleboro, where we're to deliver that loot we've got to pick up. You will pardon my cheek in registering for you; unwarrantable assumption. I choose Ashton Comly as a dignified and distinctive alias; sounds a little southern; you may consider yourself for the present a scion of an ancient house of the Carolinas. As for me, Saulsbury's a name I saw chalked on a box-car in the Buffalo yards and Reginald Heber is a fit handle to it. When I was in prep school we had a lecture by an eminent divine on the life of Reginald Heber, hymn writer, and that sort of thing. I'm rather ashamed of myself for borrowing the name of a man of singularly pure life, but it's the devil in me, lad! It's an awful thing to be born with a devil inside of you, but it could hardly be said that my case is unique. Here you are, also the possessor of a nasty little devil, and obviously, like me, a man of good bringing up. That's why I've warmed to you. You tried pulling rough talk on me at our first meeting, but you've got Harvard written all over you. No, not a word! We are two brunette sheep far astray from the home pastures and not apologizing for our color or previous condition of servitude."
Archie had always enjoyed the ease of good inns, and being in a comfortable house with his own effects at hand, he might have forgotten that he was a fugitive if it hadn't been for the propinquity of his companion, who was addressing himself with elaborate ceremonial to the preparation of his bath. The Governor's bag contained an assortment of silk shirts and underwear, a dress suit, a handsome set of toilet articles, and as Archie scrutinized them approvingly the Governor smiled, stepped to the door, and locked it.
"The property of a fastidious gentleman of breeding, you would say! You would never dream that thing has a false bottom!"
Archie would not have dreamed it, but the Governor dumped the remaining contents on the bed, fumbled in the bottom of the bag, lifted a concealed flap, and drew out a long fold of leather.
"You might think it a surgeon's pocket-kit, son, but you would be greatly in error. Drills, jimmies, even a light hammer—and here's a little contrivance that has been known to pluck the secret from most intricate combinations—my own invention. The common yegg habit of pouring an explosive fluid into the cracks of a strong box is obsolete. I hold that such a procedure is vulgar, besides being calculated to make an ugly noise when not perfectly muffled. By George, Archie, it occurs to me that you must have left your kit behind you in that absurd drug store at the Harbor! It is just as well that you are no longer encumbered with those playthings. Trust the Governor in future. I'm yearning for a cool grapefruit, so bestir yourself."
"I want to learn all the modern improvements," said Archie, fingering the burglar tools. "I've been playing the game wrong—decidedly wrong!"
"My favorite pupil!" cried the Governor, from the tub in which he was already rolling and splashing. "You shall be my successor when I pass on to other fields. Destiny has thrown you in my path for this very purpose. You will rank high among the crooks of all history, the king of the underworld, feared and loved by the great comradeship who prey upon the world by night!"