“But—he can’t be here without us knowing it.”

“I’m telling you that I do know it.”

“Have you seen him yourself?” demanded the treasurer incredulously.

“Seen him, talked with him, cursed him and cuffed him,” announced Ridgway with a reminiscent gleam in his eye.

“Er—what’s that you say?” gasped the astounded Eaton.

“Merely that I have already met Simon Harley.”

“But you said—”

“—that I had cursed and cuffed him. That’s all right. I have.”

The president of the Mesa Ore-producing Company leaned back with his thumbs in the armholes of his fancy waistcoat and smiled debonairly at his associate’s perplexed amazement.

“Did you say—CUFFED him?”