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Page 56
Suddenly he uttered a hollow chuckle. "Kilbride!" he ejaculated. "Mind
his josh that day--'bout it might be me, or Gully?--an how Gully laughed,
tu, wid th' hand of um like this?"
Napoleonic fashion he thrust his huge fist between the buttons of his
stable-jacket.
"Yes, by gad!" said Yorke reflectively. "I sure do, now. And I'll bet
he had his right hand on his gun, too! Force of habit, I guess, if he's
an ex-deputy-sheriff. From what little he's dropped he's sure knocked
around some, I know. Hard to say where, and what the beggar hasn't been
in his time. This accounts for him being so blooming close about the
Western States. It's always struck me as being queer, that, because,
say, look at the slick way he rides and ropes! He's never picked that up
in five years over on this Side--and that's all he claims he's been in
Canada."
"Besides" chimed in Redmond, eagerly, "that yarn of his about that hobo
swiping his dough, Sergeant! 'Frame-up,' p'raps, . . . gave it to him
and told him to beat it? . . ."
"Aw, rot!" said Yorke, disgustedly. He sniffed, with his peculiar
mannerism, "that's dime-novel stuff, Red. D'ye think he'd be fool enough
to risk that, with the chances of the fellow being picked up any minute
and squealing on him?" He was silent a moment. "Rum thing, though," he
murmured, "the way that hobo did beat us to it."
"'Some lokil man,' sez Kilbride," remarked Slavin musingly. "Just th'
last one ye'd think av suspectin'. An' Gully, begod, sittin' right
there! . . . talk 'bout nerve! . . ."
"But, good heavens!" burst out Yorke. "Whoever would have suspected
him?" He laughed a trifle bitterly. "It's all very well for us to turn
round now and say 'what fools we've been,' and all that. If we'd have
been the smart, 'never-make-a-mistake' Alecks, like we're depicted in
books, why, of course we'd have 'deducted' this right-away, I suppose?
Oh, Ichabod! Ichabod! An Englishman, too, by gad! I'll forswear my
nationality."
"Whatever could he have on Larry, though?" was Redmond's bewildered
query. "Say, that sure was a hell of a trick of his--using Windy's
horse--while the two of them were scrapping--trying to frame it up on
him!"
"Eyah," soliliquised the sergeant sagely. "'Twill all come out in th'
wash. Whin cliver, edjucated knockabouts like Gully du go bad; begob,
they make th' very wurrst kind av criminals. They kin pass things off
wid th' high hand an' kape their nerve betther'n th' roughnecks--ivry
toime.
"Think av that terribul murdherer, Deeming--an' thim tu
docthors--Pritchard an' Palmer, colludge men, all av thim. An' not on'y
men, but wimmin, tu. 'Member Mrs. Maybrick? All movin' in th' hoighth
av society!"
He was silent a moment, then his face fell. "I must take a run inta th'
Post an' see th' O.C. 'bout this," he resumed. "Tis an exthornary case.
There's just a possibility we may be all wrong--jumphin' at conclusions
tu much. Th' ould man! . . . I think I can see th' face av um. He'll
shling his pen across th' Ord'ly-room. 'Damn th' man! Damn th' man!'
he'll cry. 'Go you now an' apprehend um on suspicion thin! Fwhy shud I
kape a dog an' du me own barkin'?' An' thin he'll think betther av ut an'
chunt 'Poppycock, all poppycock! . . . As you were, Sarjint'--an' thin
he'll call in Kilbride. Eh! fwhat yez laughin' at, yeh fules?" he
queried irritably.
In spite of the gravity of the situation, the expression on their
superior's cadaverous face just then--its droll mixture of apprehension
and perplexity was more than Yorke and Redmond could stand. Awhile they
rocked up against each other--a trifle hysterically; it was the reaction
to nerves worked up to a pitch of intense excitement.
"Yez gigglin' idjuts!" growled Slavin. "Come on, let's get home! No use
us shtandin here longer--gassin' like a bunch av ould washer-wimmin full
av gin an' throuble."
In silence they trudged on to the detachment. "'Ome, sweet 'ome! be it
never so 'umble!" quoth Yorke, as they reached their destination, "Hullo!
who's this coming along?" Shading his eyes with his hand he gazed down
the trail. "Looks like Doctor Cox and Lanky."
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