Page:Arthur Stringer--The House of Intrigue.djvu/61

Rh nary porch-climber is ever anxious to face that kind of dog-opera. Then when things shaped themselves so it looked like a round-up, he commandeered a gasoline launch and we did the Indian River by moonlight, with Bud dropping in on a nifty-looking house-boat on the way and gathering up a pocketful of rings before a trim little tender full of fox-trotters bumped up against one end of that boat while Bud himself slipped down over the other.

Then we doubled back and ambled on to Havana, where Bud reported the city to be a gold-mine for work like his, but where I suffered from intermittent chills and fever until an American doctor advised me to go north. So Bud gave up his gold-mine and carried me back to home country by way of New Orleans. Then we headed northward by way of St. Louis and Chicago, for Bud had worked out a new coup or two, to practise in the neighborhood of the Great Lakes.

One of his new plans, in which he had great faith, he intended to try out at Detroit, and then repeat at Buffalo, if all went well. His idea was to plant me in one of the Pullmans crossing the Line. Then, watching his chance, he was to board the train, pull on a gold-braided cap, and pose as an immigration official. He intended to come to me