Page:Arthur Stringer - The Hand of Peril.djvu/243

 "I thought you were goin' to let me get where it was quiet for a couple of hours," he complained.

The man in the Stetson hat had taken the topmost sheet from the pad, folded it up, and placed it in his wallet. He stood for a moment or two without speaking, his alert little eyes studying the other man's stooping shoulders. The silhouette of that somnolent figure seemed to reassure him.

"All right," he said as he crossed the room and unlocked the door that led into what seemed to be a narrow passageway to the left of the printing-room. "You can have my whole private office."

"Me for the hay!" announced Kestner. He got up slowly, yawned, and stepped towards the open door.

"It ain't exactly hay, son," amended his new-found host, "but I've put in a night or two myself on that bit of counter along the wall."

"It looks good to me," responded Kestner as he sleepily unlaced his square-toed shoes and slipped them off. Then he made a show of clambering heavily up on the counter-top. He yawned again as he covered his legs with a worn and paint-stained square of tarpaulin.

"Sleep tight," he heard the stranger call back to him as he closed the door—and the man on the counter suddenly lifted his head, for he felt sure of a touch of mockery in that apparently blithe-noted farewell.

Then a sensation not altogether conducive to quiet repose sped through Kestner's body. He had distinctly heard the sound of a key being turned in the