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 "And I thought you might help me. Gad, what a mess!" he adds, slappin' the arms of his chair.

"Mess of what?" I says, torn between innocence and stupidity.

"I am glad we're not alone," snarls the Kid, after a long, bloodthirsty look, "or I'm sure I would assassinate you in cold blood! It is more than two years since I said good-by to my father. He left here proud in the assurance that I would uphold the best traditions of our family and make my name in the profession I had chosen—engineering. In all our correspondence I have avoided any reference to the fact that I am a pugilist, and from the amount of money I've been sending him he obviously thinks I'm a success, perhaps a nationally known authority on—"

"But the newspapers will be printin'—" I begins.

"Bosh!" says the Kid impatiently, "Kid Roberts will mean nothing to him. Besides, I doubt if he ever more than glances at a sporting page. He had written me three letters to the effect that he was coming back and, lacking a forward address, they were all held at the club here while we were in Europe. I just got them when I dropped in yesterday. Why, in his last letter he says he's coming to realize the culmination of his greatest hope, or words to that effect. Can't you see what that means? He's ready for his comeback! And to think—oh, don't sit there looking at me like a fool. Can't you suggest something?"

"Why not come clean with the old man and be done with it, Kid?" I says, after a minute. "They's worse things than bein' a leather pusher. You made a name for yourself, you got a bank roll, and you're level.