Page:Arthur Stringer - Gun Runner.djvu/187

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THE PYRRHIC VICTOR
171

plain that Ganley had regained his self-control, that he could no longer be counted on to act with the unthinking directness of the outraged savage he had seemed.

"There's a very simple way to settle this problem," McKinnon suggested. "We'll lock this cabin, so nothing in it can be interfered with. The three of us will step into your cabin. You'll then go through your belongings, these documents and papers of yours, and I'll check them off as you do so, one by one. It will be easy enough to tell then if anything is missing."

The proposal aroused no enthusiasm in Ganley.

"This is not the hour o' night I care to go into the general-auditing business," was his reply.

"Nor altogether the hour of night for keeping a young lady out of her bed!"

Ganley peered at the speaker for several seconds before replying.

"I like to see you being nice and considerate," he said at last, with his mild and studied laugh. "And I imagine you enjoy being judge and jury in a case like this. And I also imagine, just because this woman's flashed her lamps at you a couple o' times, that you've got an idea that she's all right and I'm all wrong. You've both concluded that this little talk-fest