Page:Frank Packard - On the Iron at Big Cloud.djvu/313

 "D'ye see Taggart and Dutchy, Brett?" cried Thornley.

"Yes," said Brett, laughing. Then, more seriously: "Look here, you'd better patch it up with Dutchy. There's no use rubbing it in too hard. MacDonald, tell Blaney to put my car on Number Two when she comes in. I'm going east to-night."

The patching, however, was quite a different matter than talking about it.

The next morning the lunch-room door was ominously closed—and the staff went breakfastless. By listening at the keyhole, and from an occasional glimpse through the window, they knew that Dutchy was inside.

But to pleadings, threats, and door-kickings the occupant was, to all intents and purposes, oblivious. Things began to look serious for the staff and station hands who were wont to depend on Dutchy for their grub-stakes.

Thornley whistled softly and pulled at his pipe, his feet on the dispatcher's desk.

"He'll have to open up when Number Ninety-Seven pulls in," Thornley was saying, more by way of reassuring himself than of presenting any new view of the case to MacDonald. "The company won't stand for any inconvenience to the passengers—that is" he hastened to amend, "not of this kind. What? They've got a sort of lien on that joint, and if he waits for them to get after him he'll get into trouble. Wish Brett were back—he'd make him open up quick, I guess. What's the matter with Number