The daily Alaskan., 1910-03-18

aA ID taken the final and extremely z-55; distasteful plunge and had llEg come to the office of the Ad- vance, waited for Brand to make the opening remarks about the particular object of his visit,
 Brand was waiting for the judge to do the same. lt was the newspaper man who spoke first, after the two had seated themselves. He was auX- ious to get the matter over with as quickly as possible, for he well knew that in spite of al his precautions af- fairs in a newspaper office are so un- certain that an Interruption of an uu- expected nature might occur to ruin the entire plan.
 "NIr. Dupuy was here a short time ago" he vcntured
 Judge Bartelmy proceeded to eN- plain the appearance of the lawyer lob byist in the affair. While it was plain to Brand that the judge had sent Du- puy as a go-bcuween SO that 1t would be impossible to connect Bartelmy with the payment of any money as a bribe the jurlst did not propose to ac- knowledge that such had been his laud- able purpose. He gave an entirely diff fcrent reason.
 'Yes. l know" he said. "He found me at the opera with my daughter. hoped, Mir. Brand, that by allowing me to act through him you would spare me this last humiliation"
 "Would 1t not be safer for you if no third party knew of your transaction with me-" suggested Brand.
 The judge piticd the colossal igno' rance of this amateur in trickery, Did not he know that in the superior spheres of crooked practices 1t became necessary to employ third persons on many occasions to put through mat. tcrs of this sort? And he was a news paper man of years of experience too. No. this peculiar young man would never finish supplying the judge with surprises: of that Bartelmy was posi- tive. Perhaps it might be in order to observe at this point that, while Brand of course could not know that these thoughts were passing through his visitors mind. he at the same time would have been ready to confess that he was going to provide several more surprises for the jurist, But there are different varieties of surprises.
 "Dupuy is iu my confidence the judge pronounced with an air of final ity.
 Hes not in mHc," responded the managing editor.
 You're mistaken in him. know him intimately"
 "Oh. the pity of it," exclaimed Brand, that you should be intimately ac- guainted with such a man as Dupuy"
 Bartelmy could not restrain a sarcas- tic smile at the editors sheer at Dupuy,
 MT. Brand" he said quickly your moral reflections at this juncture i'm part certain quaint humor to the sit uatlon."
 'I am afraid that is the trouble with me. My humor is nearly always unin- tenuoual." Brand sighed as though sorry for himself.
 The judge began to show signs of nervousness.
 "Weu, shall we get on with it?' the editor asked him.
 "Yes. I must rejoin my daughter. She's waiting for me at the opera. She was very anxious that I should not come here tonight. It was curious her persistency in the matter"
 Brand drew his chair closer to the desk-closer to the telephone.
 "Let us get to business" he said.
 The judge went on talking about his daughter
 "She displays an unusual, I should say an extraordinary, curiosity as to my mission here," he said. My daugh- ter would have made a great cross eX- aminer if she had been man.