"
"Jerry Mitchell!"
"Who, as you know, got fired yesterday. Jerry was to have done
the rough work of the job. But, being fired, he was no longer
available. I, therefore, offered to take his place. So here I
am."
"You're going to kidnap that boy?"
"No. You are."
"Me!"
"Precisely. You are going to play a benefit performance of your
world-famed success, Chicago Ed. Let me explain further. Owing to
circumstances which I need not go into, Ogden has found out that
I am really Jimmy Crocker, so he refuses to have anything more to
do with me. I had deceived him into believing that I was a
professional kidnapper, and he came to me and offered to let me
kidnap him if I would go fifty-fifty with him in the ransom!"
"Gosh!"
"Yes, he's an intelligent child, full of that sort of bright
ideas. Well, now he has found that I am not all his fancy painted
me, he wouldn't come away with me; and I want you to understudy
me while the going is good. In the fifth reel, which will be
released to-night after the household has retired to rest, you
will be featured. It's got to be tonight, because it has just
occurred to me that Ogden, knowing that Lord Wisbeach is a crook,
may go to him with the same proposal that he made to me."
"Lord Wisbeach a crook!"
"Of the worst description. He is here to steal that explosive
stuff of Willie Partridge's. But as I have blocked that play, he
may turn his attention to Ogden.
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