I took her to a restaurant, and prescribed a plate of soup and a glass of wine.  Then I said with emphasis: 

“Now, look here, Mrs. Panel!  I want you to rest, while I hunt up Mr. Panel.  When I find him I’ll bring him to you.”

“An’ s’pose he won’t come?”

“He will come.”

“No, he won’t; not till he’s done what he’s set his mind to do.  Was you aimin’ to hunt fer Jaspar up an’ down this town?”

“Certainly.  It’s not as big as you think.”

“’Pears to me it’d be a better plan to keep an eye on the other feller.”

With a woman’s instinct she had hit the mark.

“Perhaps it would,” I admitted.

“I noticed one or two things,” she continued earnestly.  “Near the office is an empty lot with trees and bushes.  I’d as lief rest there as here ef it’s the same to you.  Then you kin look around for Jaspar, if ye’ve a mind to.”

“And if I find him?”

“Watch him, as I shall watch the other feller.”

“And then——­”

“The rest is in the dear Lord’s hands.”

She adjusted the thick veil which Southern Californian women wear to keep the thick dust from their faces, and together we returned to Leveson’s office.  Passing the door, I could hear the typewriters still clicking.  Mrs. Panel sat down under a tree in the empty lot, and for the first time since we had met that day spoke in her natural tones.

“I come away without feeding the chickens,” she said.

I looked at my watch; it was nearly six.  One hour of daylight remained.  Leveson, I happened to know, was in the habit of dining about half-past six.  He often returned to the office after dinner.  Between the Hotel Paloma, which lay just outside the town and the office ran a regular service of street cars.  Leveson was the last man in the world to walk when he could drive.  It seemed reasonably certain that Jaspar, failing to see Leveson at the office, would try to speak to him at the hotel.  From my knowledge of the man’s temperament and character, I was certain that he would not shoot down his enemy without warning.  So I walked up to the hotel feeling easier in my mind.  The clerk, whom I knew well, assigned me a room.  I saw several men in the hall, but not Uncle Jap.

“Does Mr. Leveson dine about half-past six?” I asked.

The clerk raised his brows.

“That’s queer,” he said.  “You’re the second man to ask that question within an hour.  Old man Panel asked the same thing.”

“And what did you tell him?”

“Mr. Leveson don’t dine till seven.  He goes to the church first.”

If the man had said that Leveson went to Heaven I could not have been more surprised.  Then I remembered what I had read in the local papers.  I had not seen the church yet.  I had not wished to see it, knowing that every stone in it was paid for with the sweat—­as Uncle Jap had put it—­of other men’s souls.