Miss Peavey drew nearer, breathing heavily. The question as to the whereabouts of her wandering boy was solved; but the abruptness of his return had caused her to bite her tongue; and joy, as she confronted him, was blended with other emotions.
“You dish-faced gazooni!” she exclaimed heatedly, her voice trembling with a sense of ill-usage, “where do you get that stuff, hiding in trees, and barking a girl’s head off?”
“Sorry, Liz. I . . .”
“And where,” proceeded Miss Peavey, ventilating another grievance, “have you been all this darned time? Gosh-dingit, you leave me a coupla days back saying you’re going to stick up this bozo that calls himself McTodd with a gat and make him get you into the house, and that’s the last I see of you. What’s the big idea?”
“It’s all right, Liz. He did get me into the house. I’m his valet. That’s why I couldn’t get at you before. The way the help has to keep itself to itself in this joint, we might as well have been in different counties. If I hadn’t happened to see you snooping off by yourself this morning . . .”
Miss Peavey’s keen mind grasped the position of affairs.
“All right, all right,” she interrupted, ever impatient of long speeches from others. “I understand. Well, this is good, Ed. It couldn’t have worked out better. I’ve got a scheme all doped out, and now you’re here we can get busy.”
“A scheme?”
“A pippin,” assented Miss Peavey.
“It’ll need to be,” said Mr. Cootes, on whom the events of the last few days had caused pessimism to set its seal. “I tell you that McTodd gook is smooth. He somehow,” said Mr. Cootes prudently, for he feared harsh criticisms from his lady-love should he reveal the whole truth, “he somehow got wise to the notion that, as I was his valet, I could go and snoop round in his room, where he’d be wanting to hide the stuff if he ever got it, and now he’s gone and got them to let him have a kind of shack in the woods.”