Adam's middle and said in a rasp, "Get
your arms up!"

Adam's face turned purple beyond the gleaming skull. His hands rose a
little and his fingers crisped. He drawled,

"Fact. I ought have looked under your duds, you----"

"Stick 'em up!" said the man.

Mrs. Egg saw Adam's arms tremble. His lower lip drew down. He wasn't
going to put his arms up. The man would kill him. She could not
breathe. She fell forward from the ice chest and knew nothing.

She roused with a sense of great cold and was sitting against the
shelves. Adam stopped rubbing her face with a lump of ice and grinned
at her.

He cried, "By gee, you did that quick, Mamma! Knocked the wind clear
out of him."

"Where is he, Dammy?"

"Dunno. Took his gun and let him get dressed. He's gone. Say, that was
slick!"

Mrs. Egg blushed and asked for a drink. Adam dropped the ice into a
mug of pear cider and squatted beside her with a shabby notebook.

"Here's somethin' for October 10, 1919." He read: "'Talked to a man
from Ilium to-day in Palace Bar. Myrtle married to John Egg. Four
children. Egg worth a wad. Dairy and cider business. Going to build
new Presbyterian church.' That's it, Mamma. He doped it all out from
the diary."

"The dirty dog!" said Mrs. Egg. She ached terribly and put her head on
Adam's shoulder.

"I'll put all the diaries up in the attic. Kind of good readin.' Say,
it's after two. You better go to bed."

In her dreams Mrs. Egg beheld a bronze menacing skeleton beside her
pillow. It whispered and rattled. She woke, gulping, in bright
sunlight, and the rattle changed to the noise of a motor halting on
the drive. She gave yesterday a fleet review, rubbing her blackened
elbows, but felt charitable toward Frisco Cooley by connotation; she
had once sat down on a collie pup. But her bedroom clock struck ten
times. Mrs. Egg groaned and rolled out of bed, reaching for a wrapper.
What had the cook given Adam for breakfast? She charged along the
upper hall into a smell of coffee, and heard Adam speaking below. His
sisters made some feeble united interjection.

The hero said sharply: "Of course he was a fake! Mamma knew he was,
all along, but she didn't want to let on she did in front of folks.
That ain't dignified. She just flattened him out and he went away
quiet. You girls always talk like Mamma hadn't as much sense as you.
She's kind of used up this morning. Wait till I give her her
breakfast, and I'll come talk to you."

A tray jin