Page:Top-Notch Magazine, May 1 1915 (IA tn 1915 05 01).pdf/20

 coat. He had rushed away just as he was, in skullcap and shirt sleeves.

Ruthven stepped to the door to watch him. Without let or stay, the traveling agent was galloping for the railroad station. People in the street stopped to watch him with wonder. Presently Harrington whisked around a corner and was lost to sight.

Ruthven came back into the office. "What do you know about that!" he cried.

Summerfield was lying limply across the counter, his face white and his eyes filled with foreboding. He roused up a little as he met Ruthven's bewildered gaze.

"What have I done?" he inquired wildly. "Anything that I shouldn't? What was it hit Harrington so hard? Boots for Barton! Hanged if I can see how"

Just at that moment Reeves drove up to the walk in front, tumbled out of his wagon, and rushed in. "Ten pounds!' he cried. "By thunder, that's what it weighed! Ask the baggage agent! I made him look at the scales to make sure. Wouldn't it rattle your spurs, Joe? What's Harrington tearing down the street for? He passed me, goin' like a comet. Is it anythin' about that Barton package?"

"I should imagine so," returned Summerfield wearily.

"What about it? Don't be so blamed close-mouthed."

"You'll have to ask Harrington, Al," was the reply. "He's the only one who knows what's in the wind."

HE baffling nature of the mystery caused a sudden silence to fall over the three in the express office. The moment was a breathless one for Al Reeves, and seemingly painful as well. He pulled off his cap and ran his fingers through his mop of fiery hair.

"Somebody wake me up," he murmured, "or I'm goin' to scream. Joe smoked a double-X brand of dope in this bloomin' roost, and I been ketchin' the fumes. Johnnie Hocus-pocus is givin' us a run for our auburn chip, and that's what. When I weighed that bunch o' trouble at the baggage room and found it had put on four pounds between here and the depot, everythin' got black. I felt like I wanted to run around in circles and gibber. Then—then" He broke off abruptly.

"Say," he went on, veering to another tack, "Lois McKenzie got in on Seventeen. Her father was at the station to meet her, and he gave a grip to somebody on the train. You'd have thought the girl had been gone a year from the fuss McKenzie made over her. She"

Tingle-ingle-ingle! The telephone bell rattled. Summerfield's hand, on the way to the receiver, poised uncertainly in the air.

"I'm getting so I hate to answer the phone," said he. "Never know whether I'm due for a josh or a jolt. What do you think it is this time?" The bell snapped another warning, wild and impatient. "Here goes!" muttered Summerfield, and took down the receiver. "Hello!"

A rush of words came along the wire. "On the jump, sir!" said the agent, and hung up.

"It's Harrington," he announced, hustling into his cage and throwing books and papers into the safe. "He's at the division superintendent's office." The agent talked as he worked. "Wants me to come down to the station and wait on the platform. Says if Ruthven's here he's to come, too, if he will. There's a ruction of some kind afoot. Al, you're to take charge of the office till I get back."

Slam went the safe door, and the