"But what the--who the--what the hell right 've you--?" Morphew stammered.
"Well!" Crane chuckled, "I don't know. Kind of thought I'd drop in and see how your little frame-up was working. Got the hottest kind of a tip half an hour ago . . . Give you three guesses where it came from." One of his eyebrows climbed his forehead on a slant, giving his face a diabolically whimsical cast; his thin-lipped mouth widened in an unkind smile. "Never mind guessing, Morphy, spare the old intellect the strain. Here she comes now . . ."
A vision of elfin fantasy, with a fur-trimmed opera-wrap of crimson and gold brocade negligently draped over her déshabillé, who quite frankly hadn't stopped to dress, Folly McFee airily sauntered in from the veranda and paused and posed, reviewing the tableau with glances of mischievous amusement.
"Why, Morphy!" in affected solicitude she cried--"whatever has happened? You look fussed to a perfect frazzle . . ."
"Best little side-kick any guy ever worked with," Crane quite seriously affirmed. "Take it from me, Morph old boy, I'll look a long ways before I find another little lady like that, who won't even stick at letting her name be linked with the name of a mongrel like you, just to get the low-down on your naughty little ways and shoot the information along to yours truly."
A shove, seemingly playful and effortless, nevertheless shook the balance of that hulking body; Morphew staggered back a step or two, regained physical equilibrium with some effort, and braced himself like a badgered brute in a bull-pen, feet wide apart, head swaying low upon hunched and rocking shoulders. Rage and chagrin lent wattled cheeks the complexion of flesh sorely bruised, his lower lip was pendulous, his hooded light eyes, their whites newly shot with congested blood, were wickedly agleam.
Lanyard, watchful, ready for anything now that Crane had deprived Morphew of his pistol, told himself he had never seen a man more nearly out of his mind with fury, had never encountered at close quarters an animal more dangerous.
"But will you kindly look who's here!" Crane's happy drawl was hailing--"as I live, old Hank Mallison, the spring-heeled yegg, none other!"
Only his mild-mannered colleague had no attention to spare for the spectacle of Mallison, like a spectre in a pantomime, slowly and laboriously, with the help of hands that clutched the desk, hoisting himself into view.