Page:Cruise of the Jasper B (1916).djvu/157

 of an understanding between them concerning this delightful pastime. It was too much. Cleggett, with an oath—and never stopping to reflect that it was perhaps just the sort of action which Pierre hoped to provoke—grasped his cane with the intention of laying it across the fellow's shoulders half a dozen times, come what might, and leaving the place.

But at that instant the door from the office opened and the man whom he knew only as Loge entered the room.

Loge paused at the right of Cleggett, and then marched directly across the room and sat down opposite the commander of the Jasper B. at the same table. He was wearing the cutaway frock coat, and as he swung his big frame into the seat one of his coat tails caught in the chair back and was lifted.

Cleggett saw the steel butt of an army revolver. Loge perceived by his face that he had seen it, and laughed.

"I've been wanting to talk to you," he said, leaning across the table and showing his yellow teeth in a smile which he perhaps intended to be ingratiating.