Page:A Wild-Goose Chase - Balmer - 1915.djvu/59

Rh "What do you mean by that?" Latham demanded.

"You wouldn't go to Louisiana to find out whether or not that message might be genuine. You'd go down there determined to prove it wasn't—both of you."

"You're going, then?"

"No; I'm going to get to my real work right away. I'll have to send some one else."

"Who?"

"Any one you pay for that sort of work."

"Then if it's a fraud—as it is—you surely will pay for it."

"I'd be glad to."

"What are you saying?"

"Price—and you, Geoff—please don't bother about my being fooled or about that message being a fraud. I'm going to try to find out for my own satisfaction whether it is or not; but even if I found a man who admitted writing that message and preparing the trick and sending it to me in that way, still I'd pay him something. For that message, real or not, is going to make me do the only thing that can possibly make me satisfied afterward. I don't