assable in places for a man on
foot."

"I provided for that," said the president, letting his ferrety eyes rest
for a moment upon the reluctant one. "You will find two buckboards with
their drivers at the MacMorrogh headquarters. Be good enough to order
them around, and we'll start at once. No; no protests, Mr. Ford. My
responsibilities are not to be shirked. Penfield will drive with me, and
you may take Mr. Frisbie with you, if you see fit. I understand he is
implicated with you in this matter."

Ford bridled angrily at the word.

"There is no implication about it, Mr. Colbrith. You continually refer
to it as if it were a crime."

"Ah! the word is yours, Mr. Ford. We shall see--we shall see. That is
all, for the present."

Ford was raging when he found Frisbie and gave the order for the
vehicles.

"He turned me out of his office state-room as if I had been a messenger
boy or tramp! Get those teams out, Dick, and give me a chance to cool
down. If my job is to last through this day--"

Frisbie laughed. "Go and dip your head in the Pannikin while you wait.
Or, better still, chew on this. It's a cipher message that Durgin has
just been sending for Penfield to Vice-President North. Wouldn't that
make you weep and howl?"

Ford was still puzzling over the meaningless code words when he took his
seat in the second of the two buckboards with Frisbie. The first
assistant waited until the horses had splashed through the shallows of
the river crossing; waited further until the president's vehicle had
gained a little start. Then he said: "Is it possible that you had
Penfield for a spy on you as long as you did without working out his
cipher code? Good Lord! I got that down before I did anything else--last
spring when you left me to run the Plug Mountain. Here's what he says to
North"--taking the code message and translating: "Ford suspects
something. Don't know how much. He and Miss Adair are putting their
heads together. She has authority of some kind from her brother.
President goes with Ford to examine abandoned route, as arranged. Will
wire result later.'"

"'As arranged,'" was Ford's wrathful comment.

"Apparently, everything is arranged for us. Some day, Dick, I'll lose my
temper, tie Penfield in a hard knot and throw him into the river! It's
like a chapter out of Lucretia Borgia!"

XIX

THE RELUCTANT WHEELS

It was possibly an hour after Penfield's cipher message reached the
Southwestern Pacific he