Page:The Breath of Scandal (1922).djvu/137

 there he would come to gloat when he considered it safe. At first Gregg looked in at Kilkerry's only a couple of times a day and, between visits, made a few perfunctory calls on possible prospects for refrigeration systems; occasionally he dropped into the gymnasium of an expugilist, a middleweight, who struck hard and taunted his pupils to hit harder. Gregg had boxed a little in college and when in the army; but he was not wasting time brushing up on boxing now. He wanted only the swing of a hit and to regain the knack of taking a blow.

When he became more of a regular at Kilkerry's, he noticed another stranger who was in the process of regularizing himself, also,—a heavy man, tall as Gregg and twice as thick through. He bought just a bit too freely for others, and talked not quite enough, Gregg thought; but nobody else seemed suspicious of the fellow who made himself known by the name of Hershy.

Happening not to be at Kilkerry's when Russell reported, Gregg came into the back room about seven o'clock one evening to find them all together—Simmons and seven or eight of the other regulars, Hershy, who was buying just then, and a big, black-haired, black-browed man who must be Russell. Sybil Russell had chosen physically powerful men, Gregg thought, when he looked over this man who was big as Hale and much younger and with large, strong hands showing black hair on the wrists. Hershy was handing him raw, yellow whiskey and already Russell was drunk; Simmons was spluttering drunk. Hershy was pretending to be drunk.

They had reached the stage in which they were proclaiming Russell as a great moral agent: