“What do you think about Glittering Mud? Can you beat that kid? That manager of his, Black Hawk, ought to be in Wall Street! He’d have Morgan and Rockefeller and that bunch racing for the poorhouse. Well,” he added, subsiding somewhat and seating himself beside his colleague, “we’ll just have to sit and look at Old Faithful for a couple of weeks, I suppose.”
“You saw the superintendent of the whole shebang?”
“He’s away.”
“Huh. Well, we don’t want to get into any trouble with the government. Best thing is just to wait for a new permit, I suppose.”
“’Tisn’t the best thing, it’s the only thing,” said the little man.
“I wish you’d had Billy along,” said the elder man; “he could have shot the hold-up; it would have been good stuff.”
“Yes, it would have been good stuff,” agreed the little man; “good Wild West stuff. That Bulldog—what did the conductor call him?”
“Bloodhound Pete,” said the elder man.
“He was a regular feller,” said the little man, lifting one knee over the other and smiling in a way of pleasant reminiscence; “yes, he was the real thing; he had eyes like Bill Hart’s. The conductor told me afterwards that every blamed detective Uncle Sam has has been after that gent for three years—never even got a squint at him. Nobody ever saw him except passengers and express messengers and mail car clerks. He’s an artist. Conductor told me he doesn’t make any tracks—nothing—just disappears. Once a pal squealed on him and then they thought they had him. But the pal was found shot—no tracks as usual. The man’s an artist, one of the good old Jesse James school. Regular Robin Hood! Fairbanks ought to do that guy——”
“Well, he’s set us back a couple of weeks I suppose,” said the elder man, “and a thousand dollars.”