as any other. I got a friend – ” He stopped short. “You don’t aim to sell the gold-brick to him, do you?”
Mr. Critz’s eyes opened wide behind their spectacles.
“Land’s sakes, no!” he said.
“Well, I got a friend may be willing to help out,” said Mr. Gubb. “What’d he have to do?”
“You or him,” said Mr. Critz, “would be the ‘come-on,’ and pretend to buy the brick. And you or him would pretend to help me to sell it. Maybe you better have the brick, because you can look stupid, and the feller that’s got the brick has got to look that.”
“I can look anyway a’most,” said Mr. Gubb with pride.
“Do tell!” said Mr. Critz, and so it was arranged that the first rehearsal of the gold-brick game should take place the next evening, but as Mr. Gubb turned away Mr. Critz deftly slipped something into the student detective’s coat pocket.
It was toward noon the next day that Mr. Critz, peering over his spectacles and avoiding as best he could the pails of paste, entered the parlor of the vacant house where Mr. Gubb was at work.
“I just come around,” said Mr. Critz, rather reluctantly, “to say you better not say nothing to your friend. I guess that deal’s off.”
“Pshaw, now!” said Mr. Gubb. “You don’t mean so!”
“I don’t mean nothing in the way of aspersions, you mind,” said Mr. Critz with reluctance, “but I guess we better call it off. Of course, so far as I know, you are all right – ”
“I don’t know what you’re gettin’ at,” said Mr. Gubb. “Why don’t you say it?”
“Well, I been buncoed so often,” said Mr. Critz. “Seem’s like any one can get money from me any time and any way, and I got to thinkin’ it over. I don’t know anything about you, do I? And here I am, going to give you a gold-brick that cost me fifteen hundred dollars, and let you go out and wait until I come for it with your friend, and – well, what’s to stop you from just goin’ away with that brick and never comin’ back?”
Mr. Gubb looked at Mr. Critz blankly.
“I’ve went and told my friend,” he said. “He’s all ready to start in.”
“I hate it, to have to say it,” said Mr. Critz, “but when I come to count over them bills I lent you to cap the shell game with, there was a five-dollar one short.”
“I know,” said Gubb, turning red. “And if you go over there to my coat, you’ll find it in my pocket, all ready to hand back to you. I don’t know how I come to keep it in my pocket. Must ha’ missed it, when I handed you back the rest.”
“Well, I had a notion it was that way,” said Mr. Critz kindly. “You look like you was honest, Mr. Gubb. But a thousand-dollar gold-brick, that any bank will pay a hundred dollars for – I got to get out of this way of trustin’ everybody – ”
Mr. Critz was evidently distressed.
“If ’twas anybody else but you,” he said with an effort, “I’d make him put up a hundred dollars to cover the cost of a brick like that whilst he had it. There! I’ve said it, and I guess you’re mad!”
“I ain’t mad,” protested Mr. Gubb, “’long as you’re goin’ to pay me and Pete, and it’s business; I ain’t so set against puttin’ up what the brick is worth.”
Mr. Critz heaved a deep sigh of relief.
“You don’t know how good that makes me feel,” he said. “I was almost losin’ what faith in mankind I had left.”
Mr. Gubb ate his frugal evening meals at the Pie Wagon, on Willow Street, just off Main, where, by day, Pie-Wagon Pete dispensed light viands; and Pie-Wagon Pete was the friend he had invited to share Mr. Critz’s generosity. The seal of secrecy had been put on Pie-Wagon Pete’s lips before Mr. Gubb offered him the opportunity to accept or decline; and when Mr. Gubb stopped for his evening meal, Pie-Wagon Pete – now off duty – was waiting for him. The story of Mr. Critz and his amateur con’ business had amused Pie-Wagon Pete. He could hardly believe such utter innocence existed. Perhaps he did not believe it existed, for he had come from the city, and he had had shady companions before he landed in Riverbank. He was a sharp-eyed, red-headed fellow, with a hard fist, and a scar across his face, and when Mr. Gubb had told him of Mr. Critz and his affairs, he had seen an opportunity to shear a country lamb.
“How goes it for to-night, Philo?” he asked Mr. Gubb, taking the stool next to Mr. Gubb, while the night man drew a cup of coffee.
“Quite well,” said Mr. Gubb. “Everything is arranged satisfactory. I’m to be on the old house-boat by the wharf-house on the levee at nine, with it.” He glanced at the night man’s back and lowered his voice. “And Mr. Critz will bring you there.”
“Nine, eh?” said Pie-Wagon. “I meet him at your room, do I?”
“You meet him at the Riverbank Hotel at eight-forty-five,” said Mr. Gubb. “Like it was the real thing. I’m goin’ over to my room now, and give him the money – ”
“What money?” asked Pie-Wagon Pete quickly.
“Well, you see,” said Mr. Gubb, “he sort of hated to trust the – trust it out of his hands without a deposit. It’s the only one he has. So I thought I’d put up a hundred dollars. He’s all right – ”
“Oh, sure!” said Pie-Wagon. “A hundred dollars, eh?”
He looked at Mr. Gubb, who was eating a piece of apple pie hand-to-mouth fashion, and studied him in a new light.
“One hundred dollars, eh?” he repeated thoughtfully. “You give him a hundred-dollar deposit now and he meets you at nine, and me at eight-forty-five, and the train leaves for Chicago at eight-forty-three, halfway between the house-boat and the hotel! Say, Gubby, what does this old guy look like?”
Mr. Gubb, albeit with a tongue unused to description, delineated Mr. Critz as best he could, and as he proceeded, Pie-Wagon Pete became interested.
“Pinkish, and bald? Top of his head like a hard-boiled egg? He ain’t got a scar across his face? The dickens he has! Short and plump, and a reg’lar old nice grandpa? Blue eyes? Say, did he have a coughin’ spell and choke red in the face? Well, sir, for a brand-new detective, you’ve done well. Listen, Jim: Gubby’s got the Hard-Boiled Egg!”
The night man almost dropped his cup of coffee.
“Go ’way!” he said. “Old Hard-Boiled? Himself?”
“That’s right! And caught him with the goods. Say, listen, Gubby!”
For five minutes Pie-Wagon Pete talked, while Mr. Gubb sat with his mouth wide open.
“See?” said Pie-Wagon at last. “And don’t you mention me at all. Don’t mention no one. Just say to the Chief: ‘And havin’ trailed him this far, Mr. Wittaker, and arranged to have him took with the goods, it’s up to you?’ See? And as soon as you say that, have him send a couple of bulls with you, and if they can do it, they’ll nab Old Hard-Boiled just as he takes your cash. And Old Sleuth and Sherlock Holmes won’t be in it with you when to-morrow mornin’s papers come
