CHAPTER IX
He had called her up the following morning from the office, and had told her that he thought he had better not see her for a while.
And she had answered with soft concern that he must do what he thought best without considering her.
What other answer he expected is uncertain; but her gentle acquiescence in his decision irritated him and he ended the conversation in a tone of boyish resentment.
To occupy his mind there was, that day, not only the usual office routine, but some extra business most annoying to Sharrow. For Angelo Puma had turned up again, as shiny and bland as ever, flashing his superb smile over clerk and stenographer impartially.
So Sharrow shunted him to Mr. Brooke, that sort of property being his specialty; and Brooke called in Shotwell.
“Go up town with that preposterous wop and settle this business one way or another, once for all,” he whispered. “A crook named Skidder owns the property; but we can’t do anything with him. The office is heartily sick of both Skidder and Puma; and Sharrow desires to be rid of them.”
Then, very cordially, he introduced Puma to young Shotwell; and they took Puma’s handsome car and went up town to see what could be done with the slippery owner of the property in question, who was now permanently located in New York.
On the way, Puma, smelling oppressively aromatic and looking conspicuously glossy as to hair, hat, and boots, also became effusively voluble. For he had instantly recognised Shotwell as the young man with whom that disturbingly pretty girl had been in consultation in Sharrow’s offices; and his mind was now occupied with a new possibility as well as with the property which he so persistently desired to acquire.