Page:Frank Packard - On the Iron at Big Cloud.djvu/138

 face set with a very blank and bewildered expression. He read it again, and again once more. Then he went to the door and looked out.

A construction train was on the line a little below him, and a gang of men, not his nor Pietro Maraschino's men, were busily at work. As he gazed, his face puckered. The problem that had so obsessed him on his return journey from the birthday celebration the night before was a problem no longer.

"I was drunk," said he, with conviction. "I must have been."

He went back to the letter and studied it again, scratching his head.

"Something," he muttered, "has happened. What it is, I dunno. I was drunk, an' I'm not fired. I was drunk, an' I'm promoted. I was drunk, an' I'm paid well for it, very well. I was drunk—an' I'll keep my mouth shut."

Which was exactly the advice Kelly took pains to give him half an hour later, when Number One crawled down to the Canon and halted for a few minutes opposite the dismantled box-car, while the construction train put the last few touches to its work.