“I see. And you want to know if Loring will let you do it, eh? Well, I can tell you that he won’t. Not for any reason you’ve told me, Barry.” Their eyes met. Barry’s fell and he shuffled his feet. “I don’t see how he can make me play if I don’t want to,” he muttered. “If you don’t want to play,” replied the other, dryly, “I don’t think he will try to make you.” “Well, then――” “But the fact that Allen doesn’t want you to wouldn’t matter so much to him.” “Allen?” Barry tried to sound puzzled. “I didn’t say anything about Clyde,” he protested. “You don’t have to, young Ananias. I happen to have been in Billy Bassett’s window when you came out of Dawson about an hour ago. So you’d better come clean and tell me just what it’s all about.” Barry considered a moment. Then he grinned sheepishly. “Think you’re a regular Sherlock Holmes, don’t you?” he asked. “Never mind about that,” returned the other, soberly. “Just tell me one thing, Barry. Does Clyde know where you hid the body?” “What do you mean?” “You know well enough what I mean,” answered Peaches, viewing the other severely. “He’s got something on you. I don’t have to be a detec-a-tive to know that. You’re afraid to turn around without being sure beforehand that Allen approves of it. I’m no more curious than the next guy, but――gosh!――this has got my goat! I’ve been wanting for weeks to ask you, only I didn’t have the nerve. Now you’ve got to come across with the whole dastardly tale. What claim has Allen got on you?” “I don’t suppose,” answered Barry, slowly, “you’d call it a claim exactly. It’s only that――well, you see, Peaches, I’m under a big obligation to him, and that’s why I kinda feel that it’s up to me to――to oblige him when I can.” “What sort of an obligation?” demanded Peaches. “Well, he――he saved my life.” “Saved your life!” Peaches whistled his surprise. “_Allen_ did? What do you know about that? How did he do it, for Pete’s sake?” “It was summer before last, in Maine. His folks and mine have cottages at Orchard Bluff. We were in swimming one day and I got sort of far out. The tide’s kind of tricky there sometimes. There’s a current that sets along the beach and swings out around Frenchman’s Head. I didn’t realize I was so far from the beach at first, and when I did and started back I couldn’t make much headway. I guess I got sort of scared and nervous, and probably I didn’t get much of a stroke. Anyway, I wasn’t making shore at all; just going down toward the Head. Clyde and two other chaps were there, near the beach, and Clyde happened to miss me and saw what was happening. So he swam out and――and helped me in.” “I see,” said Peaches. “Allen must be a good swimmer. Better than you, is he?” “Why, I don’t know. I――I guess we’re about alike. Only, you see, I was more tired that time.” “Couldn’t have kept afloat much longer? Ready to give up when he arrived?”