Mallory couldn't prove an alibi. He was the worst rattled man I ever see, and as for blushin'--he got up a color like the lady heroine in a biff-bang drama. He acted as though he didn't know whether he was loopin' the loops or having a dream that was too good to be true. Once or twice he tried to unloosen some remarks; but Sis and d.i.c.ky was both talkin' to once and he never got a show. They was tellin' him how glad they was to see him again, and what a great man he was, and how Sis was comin' back to town next month for the rest of the season, and all that--when right in the middle of it the door opens and in comes Mr.

Robert.

Say, I felt like a noon extra in a bunch of six o'clock editions. I'd balled things up lovely, I had! Why, the only times a general office hand ever gets a chance to stand on the Persian rug in the boss's office is just before he gets the run or is boosted into a five-figure salary.

And here I has a twelve-dollar man usin' it like a public reception hall! It was what was goin' to happen to Mallory that gave me the shivers.

"Torchy," says Mr. Robert, "what's all this?"

"S-s-sh!" says I. "It's Old Home Day, and the lady is handin' out choc'late creams. Wait up; maybe it'll be your turn next."

"But, see here, I don't understand," says he. "Who are these persons, and why----"

"Ah, say!" says I. "Ain't you got any sportin' blood? Besides, I don't know the answer myself."

I could of kept that up just about one more round before I'd fell through a crack; but just as Mr. Robert was framin' up another conundrum d.i.c.ky turns around and spots him.

"Why, h.e.l.lo, Bob!" yells d.i.c.ky, as gentle as if he was hailin' someone across Broadway. "By Jove, though, I forgot all about you being in the Corrugated too! But of course you are. Sis and I just ran in a minute to look up Skid. Good old Skid! Great boy, eh, Bob?"

Mr. Robert takes a look over by the window at Mallory, who wasn't seein'

a thing but Sis and wasn't hearin' anything but what she was sayin'--and she was sayin' a lot.

"Is--is that Skid?" says Mr. Robert.

"Oh, come along now, Bob," says d.i.c.ky, pokin' him in the vest playful.

"You don't mean to say you don't know Skid Mallory, the Great Skid, best quarterback we ever turned out, the one that went through Harvard for forty-five yards, and that with a broken ankle? Don't know Skid? Why, say!"

"I take it all back," says Mr. Robert. "Of course I know him; but not so well as you do, d.i.c.ky. I wasn't one of the coaches, you know, and I haven't kept the run of the team for the last year or two. But I'm glad to see the Great Skid. How the deuce does he happen to be up here, though?"

"He-haw!" says d.i.c.ky. "That's rich, that is? Shows how much you know of Corrugated affairs, Bob. Why, man alive, Skid's one of the chaps that's runnin' your old gent's trust. This is his office you're in now."

"Really!" says Mr. Robert. He takes another look at Mallory, who's deaf and dumb and blind to everything but Sis, and then he turns for a good hard look at me.

I grins kind of foolish and nods. Then I jumps behind d.i.c.ky and begins to wigwag over his shoulder for Mr. Robert to keep it up. I didn't know whether he would or not. I wa'n't sure but what he'd think I'd turned batty, by the motions I was goin' through; but he's a sport, Mr. Robert is. He didn't know what was on the card; but he takes a chance.

So d.i.c.ky waltzes him over to the pair by the window, and makes Mr.

Robert and Mallory acquainted, and jollies 'em both, and all three of 'em talk football to Mallory, who blushes worse than ever and don't know which way to turn. They keep that up until d.i.c.ky pulls out his watch, grabs Sis by the arm, and hollers that they've got to make a break for the Washington Limited. Sis is shakin' good-by with both of 'em at once, when she thinks of somethin' funny.

"Oh, Mr. Robert!" says she. "I want to know which of you is who here, don't you know. Is it you that works for Skid, or Skid that works for you?"

"Chee!" thinks I. "That upsets the soup kettle."

Mr. Robert looks at Mallory, and Mallory looks at him. There was no breakin' away; for she has hold of a hand apiece. Both of 'em makes a start; but Mr. Robert gets the floor. "Why," says he, "I guess we're both working for the Corrugated, only one of us works a little harder than the other."

"Ah!" says Sis, givin' Mallory a smile that was worth payin' money to see. "I thought so."

The next minute they makes a dash for an elevator goin' down, and that part of it was over. We'd worked the bluff all the way through, and Sis has lugged off the idea that Mallory was at the top of the bunch.

But there was Mr. Robert, waitin' to talk Dutch to us.

Mallory he starts in to say that he's sorry for seemin' so cheeky; but that's about all he can say.

"Ah, cheese it!" says I, b.u.t.tin' in. "What do you know about it? It was me put up the game, and if Mr. Robert had loafed another half an hour at the club like he usually does, there wouldn't have been any mix up. Say, you leave this to me."

Mallory didn't want to leave it like that; but Mr. Robert was holdin'

the door open for him, so he couldn't do anything else. When we had it all to ourselves, the boss ranges me up in front of him for the court of inquiry session.

"Well?" says he, real solemn.

I takes all that in and gives him the wink. "Say," says I, "didn't I have my nerve with me, though?"

He kind of blinks at that; but it don't fetch him.

"Who's d.i.c.ky, your whisperin' friend?" says I.

"n.o.body much," says he. "His father's a Senator."

"Well, say, now," says I, "you didn't want me to chase a Senator's son and a real swell girl like Sis off into a place like the general office reception room, did you! And wouldn't it have been a nice break if I'd let out that we was smotherin' the Great Skid under a twelve-dollar job?"

"Was that why you had the impudence to appropriate my office?" says he.

"That was part of it," says I.

And that gives me an openin' to tell him the whole tale about Mallory, from the hall bedroom act to the way he'd been postin' himself.

"You think he's a valuable man, do you?" says Mr. Robert.

"Valuable!" says I. "Why, he's all the goods. What if he did learn to talk Greek once? He's forgettin' it, ain't he? And look at the way he stands up to trouble! Don't that show there's good stuff in him?"

"Well," says he, "what would you suggest?"

"Ah, say!" says I. "Couldn't you give a guess? Why, if I was you I'd fix it so that when Sis comes back to town she wouldn't find him on no kid's job. I'd give him a show to get his name painted on a door somewhere."

"Torchy," says he, punchin' the b.u.t.ton for his secretary, "I shouldn't wonder if we did."

CHAPTER IV

FROSTING THE PROFESS

Chee! but I'm gettin' to be useful! Course, I don't figure out no awful slump in Corrugated stocks if I should get pettish some day and tell 'em they'd got to find a new office boy. That ain't the kind of shredded thought I'm feedin' on. I fit into a lot of places besides the chair behind the bra.s.s gate. Why, I have to put on a sub. three or four times a week, while I'm spreadin' myself out all over the lot.

It all come of their makin' me special messenger to the boss; for since old Mr. Ellins has been laid up with toothache in his knee joints they've been chasin' me up to the Fift'-ave. ranch, with mail, and blank bonds to be signed, and such truck. And that's how I came to get so thick with Marjorie.

I was waitin' in the front hall, pipin' off the gorgerifousness, when some one pushes in through the draperies L. U. E. and I'm discovered.

And, say, she was a magnum, all right! You know the sort of pippins they pick out to hang up by a string in the fruit store window? Well, that was her style. Big? She'd fit close in a Morris chair! And she didn't look more'n eighteen or nineteen, either. For all her width, she was built on good lines, and if she'd been divided up right there'd been enough for a pair of as good lookers as you'd want to see.

"O-o-o-o!" says she as she comes in. "See who's here!"