Whispering Smith
and would probably cover his tracks by telling me to report progress when I got to Panama.”
A clerk opened the outer office door. “Mr. Dancing asks if he can see you, Mr. McCloud.”
“Tell him I am busy.”
Bill Dancing, close on the clerk’s heels, spoke for himself. “I know it, Mr. McCloud, I know it!” he interposed urgently, “but let me speak to you just a moment.” Hat in hand, Bill, because no one would knock him down to keep him out, pushed into the room. “I’ve got a plan,” he urged, “in regards to getting these hold-ups.”
“How are you, Bill?” exclaimed the man in the easy chair, jumping hastily to his feet and shaking Dancing’s hand. Then quite as hastily he sat down, crossed his knees violently, stared at the giant lineman, and exclaimed, “Let’s have it!”
Dancing looked at him in silence and with some contempt. The trainmaster had broken in on the superintendent for a moment and the two were conferring in an undertone. “What might your name be, mister?” growled Dancing, addressing with some condescension the man in the easy chair.
The man waved his hand as if it were immaterial and answered with a single word: “Forgotten!”
“How’s that?”
94
