Page:Arthur Stringer--The House of Intrigue.djvu/66

56 mouth-piece in the profession. I'll pump brine over that governor until I wash a pardon out of his system!"

Bud only laughed, though there wasn't much happiness in that laugh.

"I'm here, honey-girl, and here I've got to stay. That's not what I'm worrying about. It's you I've got on my mind just now. And I want to do the right thing by you, kid."

"What can you do?" I asked, studying his heavy face.

"I'm going to try and square myself for hauling you down the way I did. I'm going to give you a chance at the other kind of living."

"I never kicked against this way of living," I told him, looking him straight in the eye. But there were certain things which I couldn't help remembering, although, at the moment, I was ashamed of it.

"That's just what's wrong," Bud told me. "We've both been blind to things you can't afford to side-step. And now, Baddie, you've got to get busy and have your eyes opened!"

He was so solemn that he frightened me. And I was busy wondering what he could be holding back on me.

"The first thing I want to do is get you over on