"Nothin' like it," Bridges shook his head. "He gnawed 'em naked, then done a war-dance with their feathers in his hat. He left 'em bruised an' bleedin'."
For a time the two friends ate in silence, then Broad mused, aloud:
"Letty 'most cried, eh? Say, I wonder what she really thinks of him?"
"I don't know. Miller told me she was all broke up, and I was goin' to take her home and see if I could fathom her true feelin's, but—Phillips beat me to it."
"Phillips! He'll have to throw out the life-line if Laure gets onto that. She'll take to Letty just like a lone timber-wolf."
"Looks like she'd been kiddin' us, don't it? She calls him her 'brother' and he says she's his masseur—you heard him, didn't you?" There was another pause. "What's a masseur, anyhow?"
"A masseur," said Mr. Broad, "is one of those women in a barber-shop that fixes your fingernails. Yes, I heard him, and I'm here to say that I didn't like the sound of it. I don't yet. He may mean all right, but—them foreigners have got queer ideas about their women. Letty's a swell kid and she's got a swell job. What's more, she's got a wise gang riding herd on her. It's just like she was in a church—no danger, no annoyance, nothing. If Doret figures to start a barber-shop with her for his masseur, why, we'll have to lay him low with one of his own razors."
Mr. Bridges nodded his complete approval of this suggestion. "Right-o! I'll bust a mirror with him myself. Them barber-shops is no place for good girls."
Broad and Bridges pondered the matter during the day, and that evening they confided their apprehensions to their fellow-workers. The other Rialto employees agreed that things did not look right, and after a consultation it was decided to keep a watch upon the girl. This was done. Prompted by their pride in her, and a genuinely unselfish interest in her future, the boys made guarded attempts to discover the true state of her feelings for the French Canadian, but they learned little. Every indirect inquiry was met with a tribute to 'Poleon's character so frank, so extravagant, as to completely baffle them. Some of the investigators declared that Rouletta was madly in love with him; others were equally positive that this extreme frankness in itself proved that she was not. All agreed, however, that 'Poleon was not in love with her—he was altogether too enthusiastic over her growing popularity for a lover. Had the gamblers been thoroughly assured of her desires in the matter, doubtless they would have made some desperate effort to marry 'Poleon to her, regardless of his wishes-they were men who believed in direct action—but under the circumstances they could only watch and wait until the uncertainty was cleared up.
Meanwhile, as 'Poleon continued his celebration, Rouletta grew more and more miserable; at last he sobered up—sufficiently to realize he was hurting her. He was frankly puzzled at this; he met her reproaches with careless good-nature, brushing aside the remonstrances of Lucky Broad and his fellows by declaring that he was having the time of his life, and arguing that he injured nobody. In the end the girl prevailed upon him to stop drinking, and then bound him to further sobriety by means of a sacred pledge. When, perhaps a week later, he disappeared into the hills Rouletta and her corps of self-appointed guardians breathed easier.
But the boys did not relax their watchfulness; Rouletta was their charge and they took good care of her. None of the Rialto's patrons, for instance, was permitted to follow up his first acquaintance with "the lady dealer." Some member of the clan was always on hand to frown down such an attempt. Broad or Bridges usually brought her to work and took her home, the Snowbird and the Mocha Kid made it a practice to take her to supper, and when she received invitations from other sources one or the other of them firmly declined, in her name, and treated the would-be host with such malevolent suspicion that the invitation was never repeated. Far from taking offense at this espionage, Rouletta rather enjoyed it; she grew to like these ruffians, and that liking became mutual. Soon most of them took her into their confidence with a completeness that threatened to embarrass her, as, for instance, when they discussed in her hearing incidents in their colorful lives that the Mounted Police would have given much to know. The Mocha Kid, in particular, was addicted to reminiscence of an incriminating sort, and he totally ignored Rouletta's protests at sharing the secrets of his guilty past. As for the Snowbird, he was fond of telling her fairy-stories. They were queer fairy-stories, all beginning in the same way: