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Nora giggled behind her fingers, but her mistress did not even smile at the awkwardness of Patrolman McGuffey. "Thank you so much," she said sweetly. While Beatrice Whitford waited in the little library for the Arizonan to join her, she sat in a deep chair, chin in hand, eyes fixed on the jetting flames of the gas-log. A little flush had crept into the oval face.
"Say, don't do that. I got heart trouble," he said in a voice dry as a whisper. "What about that onloadin' proposition?" asked the Arizonan. "I'll see to it right away." Presently the clerk, with a lantern in his hand, was going across to the railroad tracks in front of Dave. He had quite got over the idea that this lank youth was a safe person to make sport of.
"Oh, no, we'll go inside," he said softly. The men looked at each other and battled. The eye is a more potent weapon than the rapier. The shallow, shifty ones of the gunman fell before the deep, steady ones of the Arizonan. "Slim" Jim, with a touch of swagger to save his face, stepped into the cab and sat down. Clay followed him, closing the door.
"You can't salve Jim with soft soap." "Did I mention soft soap?" "I heard some one most killed Jerry Durand last night," said Annie abruptly, staring at Lindsay's bruised face. "Was it you?" "Yes," said the Arizonan simply. "Did you get the girl?" "They dropped her to save themselves. My friend found her with a man and took her from him."
The gang leader was taking no part in the fight. The crowd parted. Out of the pack a pair of strong arms and lean broad shoulders ploughed a way for a somewhat damaged face that still carried a debonair smile. With pantherish litheness the Arizonan ducked a swinging blow. The rippling muscles of the plunging shoulders tossed aside a little man in evening dress clawing at him.
It belonged to the more talkative of the two gunmen he had surprised at the pretended poker game. He knew, too, without being told that this man and "Slim" Jim Collins were one and the same. The memory of Annie's stricken face carried this conviction home to him. The Arizonan picked up his revolver in time to see the car sweep around the next corner and laughed ruefully at his own discomfiture.
And why, since Clarendon was trembling lest it be discovered, should the Arizonan too join the conspiracy of silence? At any rate she would not uncover her hand. "He told us several things," she said significantly. "You've got to make open confession, Clary." The ex-pugilist chewed his cigar and looked at her. "What would he confess? That the man with him murdered Collins?"
Clay caught him off his balance, using a short arm jolt which had back of it all that twenty-three years of clean outdoors Arizona could give. The gangster hit the pavement hard. He got up furious and charged again. The Arizonan, busy with the other man, tried to sidestep. An uppercut jarred him to the heel.
He rang the bell and waited, his right hand on the pocket of his overcoat. The door opened cautiously a few inches and a pair of close-set eyes in a wrinkled face gimleted Clay. "Whadya want?" "The old man sent me with a message," answered the Arizonan promptly. "Spill it." "Are you alone?" "You know it." "Got everything ready for the girl?" "Say, who the hell are youse?" "One of Slim's friends.
This is three cracks you've had at me and I'm still a right healthy rube." "Don't bank on fool luck any more. I'll get you sure," cried Durand sourly. The gorge of the Arizonan rose. "Mebbeso. You're a dirty dog, Jerry Durand. From the beginning you were a rotten fighter in the ring and out of it. You and yore strong-arm men!
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