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 it whole—everything that attractive young woman said?"

It cost McKinnon an effort to hold himself in, but the only line of procedure in warfare such as this, he had learned, was the indirect one.

"I don't believe everything I hear," was his answer, as he assumed an equally indifferent position.

"I guess most stories 've got their two sides," remarked Ganley, largely.

"This woman, though, claims you're nothing more than a gun-runner," the younger man carelessly reminded him.

"Well, I am," suddenly declared Ganley, with his little deep-set eyes squarely on the other man's. "Can't there be two sides to gun-running?"

"The law side and the outlaw side, I suppose," suggested McKinnon.

Ganley stared at him, a little heavily, a little impatiently, as the beetling iron-grey eyebrows worked ruminatively up and down.

"Look here, son, I want you to understand this situation! These bodega-hugging, labour-loathing fire-eaters down here have got to have their theatricals. And you've got to have some body set the stage and supply the coloured lights