Part 14 (1/2)
The girl made no comment upon the use of the name which he had applied to her, and in the darkness he could not see her features, nor did he see the odd expression upon the boy's face as he heard the na of the nocturnal raid he so recently hadthe fact that his pockets bulged to the stolen belongings of that young lady? But whatever was passing in his mind he permitted none of it to pass his lips
As the three stood waiting in silence Giova ca aardly at her side
”Did he find anything to eat?” asked the man
”Oh, yes,” exclaimed Giova ”He fill up now That ly now”
”Well, I' forward ht--especially while he was hungry!”
Giova laughed a low, h ”I don' think he no hurt you anyway,” she said ”Now he know you my frien'”
”I hope you are quite correct in your sur any chances”
Willie Case had been taken to Payson to testify before the coroner's jury investigating the death of Giova's father, and with the dollar which The Oskaloosa Kid had given hie in an orgy of dissipation the moment that he had been freed from the inquest Ice cream, red pop, peanuts, candy, and soda water may have diminished his appetite but not his pride and self-satisfaction as he sat alone and by night for the first ti place Willie was now a s from the pretty waitress of The Elite Restaurant on Broadway; but at heart he was not happy for never before had he realized what a great proportion of his anatolanced fearfully at the forainst the white of the table cloth, he flushed scarlet, assured as he was that the waitress who had just turned away toward the kitchen with his order was convulsed with laughter and that every other eye in the establishlued upon him To assume an air of nonchalance and thereby impress and disarlass holder near the center of the table and upset the sugar bowl Ilared ferociously at the ceiling He could feel the roots of his hair being consulance that required all his will power to consummate showed him that no one appeared to have noticed his faux pas and Willie was again slowly returning to normal when the proprietor of the restaurant came up from behind and asked hihtful a half hour as that within the brilliant interior of The Elite Restaurant Twenty-threefor his order to be served and sevenhis check Willie'swas in itself a sermon on efficiency--there was no lost motion--no waste of time He placed hishis has into pieces of a size that would per; then hehis knife and fork alternately with bewildering rapidity shot a continuous strea maw
In addition to the etable in a side-dish and as dessert four prunes The etable dish on the empty plate, seized a spoon in lieu of knife and fork and--presto! the side-dish was empty Whereupon the prune dish was set in the empty side-dish--four deft motions and there were no prunes--in the dish The entire feat had been acco a neorld's record for red-headed far twenty five and one half seconds Willie walked what seemed to him a mile from his seat to the cashi+er's desk and at the last instant buhtly in Willie's hand was thirty five cents and his check with a like amount written upon it Amid the crash of crockery which followed the collision Willie slammed check and money upon the cashi+er's desk and fled Nor did he pause until in the reassuring seclusion of a dark side street There Willie sank upon the curb alternately cold with fear and hot with sha, and into his heart entered the iron of class hatred, searing it to the core
Fortunately for youth it recuperates rapidly from mortal blows, and so it was that another half hour found Willie wandering up and down Broadway but at the far end of the street from The Elite Restaurant A motion picture theater arrested his attention; and presently, parting with one of his two re dimes, he entered The feature of the bill was a detectivein the world could have better suited Willie's psychic needs It recalled his earlier feats of the day, in which he took pardonable pride, and raised hiain to a self-confidence he had not felt since he entered the ever to be hated Elite Restaurant
The show over Willie set forth afoot for hoh; but what lay at the end of the long as infinitely worse, as Willie's father had warned hi, preferably Before he had gone two blocks from the theater Willie had concocted at least three tales to account for his tardiness, either one of which would have done credit to the iard or a Jules Verne; but at the end of the third block he caught a glihts of ho histhe entrance to an alley Old trees grew in the parkway at his side At the street corner a half block away a high flung arc swung gently froht upon the alley'sfroe bulk of a bear Terrified, Willie juht have caught sight or scent of him he poked his head cautiously around the side of the bole just in tiirl conized her at the first glance--she was the very girl he had seen burying the dead man in the Squibbs woods Instantly Willie Case was transfor sleuth At a safe distance he followed the girl and the bear through one alley after another until they came out upon the road which leads south froe and his companions When they turned toward the oldclapboards for any chance reht indicate their future plans He heard theht oron to another location which they had evidently decided upon but no clehich they dropped
”The objection to ree, ”is that we can't make a fire to cook by--it would be too plainly visible from the road”
”But I can no fin' road by dark,” explained Giova ”It bad road by day, ver' ht No, we got stay here til e, ”we can eat some of this canned stuff and have our ha, eh?”
”And now that we've gotten through Payson safely,” suggested The Oskaloosa Kid, ”let's change back into our own clothes This disguise makes h His quarry would reht, and atoward Payson and a telephone as fast as his legs would carry him
In an old brick structure a hundred yards below themachinery of Payson had been installed before the days of the great central power plant a hundredas they lay stretched upon the floor
”I tell you I seen hiuy froot up like a Gyp; but I knew hiht This scenery of hisphoney doin', or I wouldn't have trailed hi I done it, fer he hadn't ben there fivecomes The Kid an' a skirt and pretty soon a nudder chicken wid a calf on a string, er mebbie it was a sheep--it was pretty husky lookin' fer a sheep though An' I sticks aroun' a uy call the first skirt 'Miss Pri to note the effect of his words on his hearers They were electrical The Sky Pilot sat up straight and slapped his thigh
Soup Face opened hisfire to his ragged trousers Dirty Eddie voiced a characteristic obscenity
”So you sees,” went on Coluet both the dame and The Kid Two of us can take her to Oakdale an' claim the reward her old man's offerin' an' de odder two can frisk de Kid, an'--an'--”