"He gets his orders, too--just as if they were really necessary! About the twelfth he lies down to sleep. Why, it's so simple it's real art! I'll just hold Bolton back until those rounds. I'll make him take it slow--and then send him in to clean up! Dennison is shy a match right this minute for The Red; they're all a little doubtful about him. The Pilgrim will be the only logical man in the world to send against him--that is, according to your sporting columns. And Dennison, of course, being on the inside, knows he is really nothing but a dub--knows it is simply a plain open and shut proposition. That is to say--he _thinks_ he knows!" Jesse Hogarty paused and the corners of his lips twitched back to show his teeth, but not in laughter. "It's the same little frame-up that he sent against Boots and me," he finished. "He ought to be satisfied, hadn't he? And I'll have him on the street the next morning--I'll put him where he'll be glad to borrow a dollar to buy his breakfast with!" For a long time they stared back into each other's face: Hogarty taut at the table side, Morehouse slouched deep in his chair. The latter was the first to break that pregnant silence. He was nodding his head in thoughtful finality when he lifted himself to his feet. "You've got me," he stated. "You've got me snared! Not that I give two hoots about what happens to Dennison, mind! I don't--although I must admit that the prospect of his starving to death is a lovely one to contemplate. And I'd die happy, I think, if I could see The Red trimmed, and trimmed with conscientious thoroughness. But those aren't my reasons for going hands with you in this assassination. "I know a hunch when I see one. I ought to, for I've spent the contents of my little yellow envelope often enough trying to make one come true. And I'm in with you, Flash, till the returns are all in from the last district, but it's because I know that there is something more than either of us dream of behind that boy's wanting to meet Conway. He has something on his mind; he wants something, and wants it real bad. And I like him--I liked him right from the beginning--so I'll stick around and help. Maybe I'll find out what it is that's been bothering him, too, before I get through. But I wish I wasn't of such an inquiring turn of mind. It keeps one too stirred up." He stopped to grin comically. "Any objection, now that I've sworn allegiance, Flash, if I go out and present myself?" Hogarty's whole tense body began to relax, his lean face softened and his eyes lost much of their hardness and glitter as he shook his head in negation. "That's a little detail of the campaign which I had already assigned to you," he replied, and the inflection of his voice was perfect. "Not that I have any fears of his going the way of his forefathers, however, because I haven't. And if my assurance on that point perplexes you, you might ask him to have one drink and watch his eyes when he refuses you.