browns.

"Eh?" says he. "You're from Runyon, are you? Well, I wired him to stop
off on his way through and have luncheon with me at the Union League.
Know anything about that, do you?"

"Mr. Runyon regrets very much," says the young gent, "that he will be
unable to accept your kind invitation. He is on his way to Newport, you
know, and----"

"Yes, I understand all that," breaks in Old Hickory. "Daughter's
wedding. But that isn't until next week, and while he was in town I
thought we might have a little chat and settle a few things."

"Quite so," says the symphony. "Precisely why he sent me up, sir--to
talk over anything you might care to discuss."

"With you!" snorts Old Hickory. "Who the brocaded buckboards are you?"

"Mr. Runyon's secretary, sir," says the young gent. "Bixby's the name,
sir, as you will see by the card, and----"

"Ha!" growls old Hickory. "So that's Marc Runyon's answer to me, is it?
Sends his secretary! Very well; you may talk with _my_ secretary.
Torchy!"

"Right here!" says I, slidin' to the front.

"Take this person somewhere," says Mr. Ellins, jerkin' his thumb at
Bixby; "instruct him what to tell his master about how we regard that
terminal hold-up; then dust him off carefully and lead him to the
elevator."

"Got you!" says I, salutin'.

You might think that would have jolted Mr. Bixby. But no. He gets the
door shut in his face without even blinkin' or gettin' pink under the
eyes. Don't even indulge in any shoulder shrugs or other signs of
muffled emotion. He just turns to me calm and remarks businesslike:

"At your service, sir."

Now, say, this lubricated diplomacy act ain't my long suit as a general
thing, but I couldn't figure a percentage in puttin' over any more rough
stuff on Bixby. It rolled off him too easy. Course, it might be all
right for Mr. Ellins to get messy or blow a gasket if he wanted to; but
I couldn't see that it was gettin' us anywhere. He hadn't planned this
luncheon affair just for the sake of being sociable--I knew that much.
The big idea was to get next to Marcus T. Runyon and thresh out a
certain proposition on a face-to-face basis. And if he chucked that
overboard because of a whim, we stood to lose.

It was up to me now, though. Maybe I couldn't be as smooth as this Bixby
party, but I could make a stab along that line. It would be good
practice, anyhow. So I tows him over to my corner, and arranges him easy
in an armchair.

"As between private se