Beyond the revolver he saw the grinning face of Mike
Duffy, erstwhile lumberjack, then bootlegger, and now policeman; under
the Hicks regime.
"Shaved her off, eh?" taunted the man. "Well, mebbe you'd 'a' fooled
most folks, but you hain't fooled me none, special' as I be'n layin' in
the brush watchin' you fer half an hour. You'd of got away from the
rest of 'em too."
XI
Old John McNabb had not been long at his desk when the telephone bell
rang and he picked up the receiver.
"Hello--who? Hicks? He--what? Where is he now? Got away! Well, you
get him! Get him, or I'll get you! If he ain't back in jail to-day,
off comes your buttons to-morrow--do you get that?" Old John banged
the receiver onto the hook, and launched what would undoubtedly have
been a classic of denunciatory profanity, had it not been interrupted
in its inception by Jean, who had slipped into the office unnoticed at
the beginning of the telephone conversation.
"Why, Dad!" exclaimed the girl laughing, as the red-faced man whirled
upon her in surprise. "What a beastly temper you are in this morning!
Who got away, and why are you so anxious to have him caught?"
"Oskar got away," he growled, apparently somewhat mollified by his
daughter's tone. "Hicks started for jail with him an' Oskar knocked
him down in the alley an' got away."
"Oskar! Jail! What do you mean?"
"I mean just what I say," answered McNabb, meeting the girl's startled
gaze squarely.
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