Page:O'Higgins--The Adventures of Detective Barney.djvu/88

 offices of the girl at the coat rack, went to meet the head-waiter with all his encumbrances of hat, rain-coat and umbrella. He had evidently a somewhat countrified reluctance to trust his things out of his sight.

The multiplicity of instructions which Barney had to remember weighed him down to deliberate and cautious movement. He went slowly to the telephone; it took him some time to get the Babbing bureau; he gave his message to Snider hesitatingly, cautiously, in veiled terms, for fear some one might overhear him; and he was almost back to the dining-room before he recollected that he was to get a Tribune, Consequently, Babbing, in his spectacles, seated at a side-table, back to back with the suspected Sullivan, was concluding his order to the waiter when Barney joined them; and it was evident that there had been some difficulty over the menu. “Now, oatmeal porridge; mind that!” Babbing said. “Real oatmeal. No cattle mashes or health mushes for me. Sit here, boy.” He put