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By Root 613 0

onto the list at all; Proust of course was hopeless. So, by the time I fiddled with the citizenry’s literary taste to more or less satisfaction, the messenger would be there waiting to rush my compilation to the Daily Post. Messengers raced across Butte, jumping on and off the trolleys and trotting the edge of the sidewalks as they carried typed instructions back and forth between the downtown headquarters and the mine offices, workers’ cashed paychecks from stores to banks, small goods from the department store to the wealthier homes, and so on. Our stretch of street was served by a gnomelike courier named Skinner. Old enough to be thoroughly bald, Skinner nonetheless had the pared build of a jockey and was never motionless, on one foot and then the other as he waited to be handed whatever was to be delivered. I had learned to let him jitter there in the doorway; the man apparently was not constructed to sit in a chair.

I was nearly done typing up that week’s list from Miss Runyon’s checkout slips when Skinner, waiting restlessly as usual, blurted:

“Where you from, pal?”

“Mmm? Chicago.”

“Small world. Me, too.” I stiffened. “Maxwell Street and Halsted, know it?” he said from the side of his mouth, sending a deeper chill through me. The toughest neighborhood of the toughest section of that hardknuckled city. Was this going to be a repeat of Tolliver and Eel Eyes? Another message of the threatening sort from the Anaconda Company? Panic began to set in as I realized I was in my shirtsleeves, with my suitcoat—and its protective cargo of brass knuckles—on a hanger across the room. A disturbing look on him, the wiry man now bounced toward me on fleet feet as I grabbed for an inkwell, anything, in self-defense. Practically atop my desk as he leaned in face-to-face with me, Skinner demanded:

“Cubs or White Sox?”

I relaxed somewhat; baseball rivalry was not necessarily lethal. But it is surprising how an old grudge can hold up. In a ring constructed over the infield of the White Sox stadium, Comiskey Park, Casper on a cool clear Columbus Day had defeated Kid Agnelli—knockout, third round—before twenty-five thousand paying customers, and the owner of the White Sox and the ballpark, Charles Comiskey, had shorted us on the purse. Not for nothing was he known in Chicago sporting circles as Cheap Charlie. I would root against him and his team if they were the last baseball nine on earth. “My allegiance is to the Cubs,” I put it more temperately to Skinner. “I once saw Tinker to Evers to Chance produce four double plays in one game. Masterful.”

Skinner hooted. “The Cubs ain’t what they used to be. The Sox got the real players these days, they’re going to the Series, you watch.”

“I shall.” Sealing the book list in a gummed envelope, I handed it to him indicatively. “Now, do you suppose this missive could possibly find its way to the Daily Post?”

No sooner had the messenger scampered off than Sandison filled the doorway. Bypassing his desk, he lumbered over to the stained-glass window and peered out through one of the whorls like a boy at a knothole, a sign that something was on his mind. Something on his desk that he did not want to face.

“Sandy, you seem perturbed,” I said diplomatically.

“I’ve just been with the trustees. They raked me over the coals about the library budget. Wanted to know where every damn penny goes.” Turning from the window, he shook his head, the wool of his beard quivering. “They have a reason, I suppose. Few months ago, the city treasurer took off with everything he could lay his hands on.”

“Bad?”

“Enough that the elected fools downtown see an embezzler under every bed now. Damn it, I thought it was hard to keep track of a few thousand cows—that was nothing compared to running this outfit.” He passed a hefty hand over his cowlick as if trying to clear his head from there on in. “Spending that much time on numbers drives me up the wall. I don’t see why the idiot trustees can’t just trust a man.”

I remember it exactly. Opportunity was in the air of that office, distinct as ozone. Idly piling paperwork