Latisan whirled suddenly after the girl closed the door behind her--came
about on his heels so quickly that he nearly bumped into the assiduous
operative Crowley, who had been taking desperate chances that evening.
But Latisan's gaze was directed downward in deep thought as he walked
slowly away, and he did not perceive the eavesdropper.
Mr. Crowley had heard aplenty, so he informed himself; he had followed
them all the way from the big house down to the tavern, treading close
behind, depending on their absorption in each other, his shoes in his
hand, not minding the ledges and the mud; and he was in his mental
stocking feet, too, treading on the bedrock of the obvious, as he
figured on the proposition.
He had been told many times, Mr. Crowley had, that he possessed a
single-track mind and was not fitted to deal with the subtleties of
criminal investigation and had not the expansive wit to comprehend the
roundabout ways of steering victims to their doom. But Mr. Crowley was
indubitably fitted by training to write a handbook on the art of
double-crossing--and he reckoned he knew an out-and-out job of that sort
after what he had heard that evening. For his own peace of mind, and to
save himself from going crazy by reason of any more puzzlement over Miss
Kennard's alleged mysterious methods in her work, he kept insisting to
himself that she was merely double-crossing the Vose-Mern agency in the
good old-fashioned way. Not his the task to wonder why!
He rushed up to his room and started in on his report. It had stuck
in Crowley's crop--seemed humiliating--to be made a subaltern in the
case of women operatives. He believed that at last he was in right
and proper on the grand opportunity of his career; he would come down
from the bush with the bacon; Elsham had fallen down and Kennard was
double-crossing--and Crowley, good old reliable Crowley, would show
Chief Mern where the credit should go! He set his little, cheap
typewriter on his sturdy knees and pecked away stolidly with his
forefingers.
Latisan remained outdoors a long time, for the night matched the gloom
of his thoughts. And once more, in spite of himself, his dark ponderings
concerned themselves with suspicions as to what and who this girl really
was.
In his early deference to her he had been ready and willing to believe
all she said about herself, and his suspicion had seemed to be
extinguished; he realized that it merely had been smoldering. Why would
not a waitress marry him, one of the Latisans of the Tomah? Was he what
old Flagg had so inelegantly stated--a sapgag where a girl was
concerned? He began to distrust his strength as a man; he had wasted a
day in New York; he was ready to give up his man's job on the Noda
because he could not get his thoughts away from her and on his work. His
last stay at headwaters had been hours of torture. He had gone to sleep
dreaming of the girl instead of putting his attention on the problems of
the morrow--and the details of the drive that spring needed all sorts of
judgment and foresight.
While he was in that state of mind, trying to excuse defection, he told
himself, as he trudged to and fro, that he was not a fit man for Flagg.
Nevertheless he cursed himself for being so weak. He had read stories of
woman's subjugation of the famous and the strong and had wondered what
sort of lunacy had overtaken such men. Here he was making an invalid's
tantrums an excuse to give up his work and dangle at the skirts of an
unknown girl; and he knew it was because of the mystery of her real
identity and because his jealousy was afire on account of an uncertainty
which was now aggravated by her refusal to marry him.
Latisan had not been in the village ten minutes that afternoon before
Gossip Dempsey had giggled and told him he'd better keep sharp watch on
his girl, because the jewelry man was everlastingly after her like a
puppy chasing the butcher's cart; the simile was not nice, but Latisan
was impressed by its suggestion of assiduity.
In the tumult of his thought, grudgingly conscious that he was ashamed
of the real reason for giving up his work, Latisan evasively decided
that the thing was now up to Echford Flagg. He had warned Flagg man
fashion. He had given his word to Flagg as to what would happen if Flagg
persisted in treating him like a lackey. Flagg had persisted. Latisan
had kept his word. He could not retreat from that stand; he could not
crawl back to Flagg and still maintain the self-respect that a drive
master must have in the fight that was ahead.
Therefore, Latisan decided to stay in Adonia and let Flagg make
overtures; for their future relations the drive master would be able to
lay down some rules to govern Flagg's language and conduct. Under that
decision persisted the nagging consciousness that he wanted to be with
the girl instead of on the drive and he was more and more ashamed of the
new weakness in his character. And he was also ashamed of the feeling
that he wanted to find out more about her. In the past his manliness had
despised prying and peering. He had been able to bluster loyally to old
Dick; he was more truthful to himself. What was she, anyway? He would
not admit that he had been so completely tipped upside down in all his
hale resolves, aims, and objects by a mere nonentity who looked no
higher than a job as waitress at Brophy's tavern.
Then he went into the tavern out of the darkness and blinked at the
landlord, who called him to the desk and gave a letter into his hands.
It was sealed, but there was no stamp on it.
"Ordered by Mrs. Everett to hand it to you," reported Brophy, sourly.
"She wanted to see you last time you were down, but it slipped my mind
to tell you."
Latisan read the note. The lady of the parlor entreated him to come to
her on a matter of business, no matter how late the hour might be. He
tore up the paper on his way to the fireplace and tossed the bits on the
embers.
"Same room for me?" he asked Brophy.
"Yes, but Mrs. Everett said for me----"
"Damn Mrs. Everett! I'm going to bed."
It consoled him a little, as he walked upstairs, to reflect that he was
not dominated by all the women in the world, even if he was in the way
of making himself a fool over one.