CHAPTER X – THURSDAY NIGHT – THE GINGHAM DRESS
WELL,” said Wilson, “what do you think?”
“We ‘ll do our thinking later. Take these men and search the place. Smiley and I will wait here.”
“You don’t expect them to find anything, do you?” asked Dick, when the others had gone.
“Can’t say. We’ve lost the men, but we may get some evidence.”
“Where do you think they are?”
“Where could they be but in Canada?”
Dick was silent.
“Say, Smiley, I like the way you’re acting in this business. If anything on earth will make it any brighter for you, it is what you are doing now. You might even go a step farther if you should feel like it any time. It’s plain that McGlory and Spencer are pretty deep in, and if you would come out and tell all you know, it might help you a lot.”
“I have told all I know.”
“Oh, of course, – that’s just as you like.”
They were silent again for a few moments. Then Dick spoke up. “You feel pretty sure about their being in Canada, don’t you?”
“Have you thought of anything else?”
“Yes. Where is the other revenue cutter now?”
“The Porter? At Buffalo, I think, – or Cleveland, or Detroit.”
“And she’s about twice as fast as the Foote, isn’t she?”
“Just about.”
“Well, now, supposing they weren’t sure but what she would be sent up here too? It was as likely as not.”
“It should have been done.”
“Then wouldn’t they have been fools to have put right out again to cross the Lake – with one steamer coming down on ‘em through the Straits and another coming up from Detroit?”
“Fools or not, they did it. We know that much.”
“Do we?”
“Don’t we!”
“I don’t see it.”
“Don’t you see what they’ve done? They have left your schooner here and gone off in Spencer’s.
“Who has?”
“Look here, Smiley, you are on the wrong side of this case. You ought to be working for the government.”
“I may be before I get through with it. You see what I’m driving at, don’t you?”
“About yourself?”
“Hang myself. About Spencer.”
“And McGlory?”
“No, not McGlory. Just Spencer.”
“Why not McGlory?”
“Just this – ”
Wilson approached. “There’s nobody here, Bill.”
“Wait over there a minute, Bert, with the boys. Go on, Smiley.”
“McGlory is a sailor; Spencer isn’t. McGlory would feel safer on a boat; Spencer knows these woods like a book. Do you follow?”
“Go on.”
“Now, I’m just as sure as that I’m sitting here, that when it came to a crisis like this, those two would disagree.”
“And you ought to know them.”
“I know McGlory. He isn’t the kind that takes orders from anybody, drunk or sober. And from the look I had at old Spencer, I don’t think he is either. He looked to me like a cool hand. Quiet, you know, with a sort of cold eye. It doesn’t sound like Spencer to put out into the Lake with revenue cutters closing in all around him.”
“But does it sound like McGlory?”
“Exactly. He’s bull headed.”
“Then you think the other schooner was here?”
“More than likely.”
“And McGlory took it and Spencer didn’t?”
“That’s getting near it.”
“And who wrote that note?”
“I don’t know. I never saw Spencer’s writing, and McGlory’s only once or twice. It’s written rough, but it looks familiar, somehow.”
“McGlory’s work then, likely?”
“Maybe.”
“But what object would Spencer have in staying behind? Where could he go?”
“He could get out of Michigan and down to Mexico without one chance in a hundred of being caught – not unless you had men on every train in the United States.”
“You mean he would make for a railway?”
“Yes.”
“But he would have to go to Alpena to do it.”
“Not a bit. He needn’t go anywhere near the coast. There’s a town called Hewittson, on the Central Road, about fifty miles back in the woods, southwest of here. It’s the terminal of a branch line, and it’s the nearest point.”
“Even then he would have to go through Detroit or Michigan City, where we have men.”
“No, he wouldn’t. He could get over to the Grand Rapids and Indiana with a few changes and without passing through a single big town. When he once got down there in Indiana, you would have a pretty vigorous time catching him.”
Beveridge mused. “This is all very interesting, Smiley, but it is hardly enough to act on.”
“Isn’t it, though? What earthly good could you do on the water that Captain Sullivan couldn’t do just as well without you? There he is with his men, and he ought to do what you tell him.”
“I don’t know about that,” said Beveridge, with a smile.
“Anyhow,” Dick went on eagerly, “the old Foote isn’t going to make any more miles an hour for having you on board.”
“There’s something in that. You seem to be keen on this business.”
“Keen! Good Lord, man! don’t you see the position I’m in? Don’t you see that my only chance is to help you run this down and get at the facts? Honest, I don’t see what you could lose by taking a flier overland to Hewittson. It’s just one more chance opened up for you, and you ought to take it.”
“How did you happen to know so much about these railroads up here?”
“You didn’t suppose I had my eyes shut when I was looking at that chart the other day, did you?”
“It seems to me you took in a lot in a thundering short time.”
“Of course I did. It is my business to take in a lot when I look at a chart.”
“Well, this is interesting, Smiley. I ‘ll think it over. Come on, boys.”
The sailors rowed them back to the steamer; and the special agent was promptly closeted with Captain Sullivan. He laid out the whole situation, suggesting that the Captain keep a close watch on the Burnt Cove region and that he leave a launch at Spencer’s. The fugitives had left nearly all they had, even to clothing, behind, and it was conceivable that they might return.
“I wish,” he added, as he rose to go, “that I could call on the county authorities. Wilson and I may have our hands full if we meet them.”
“You think you’d better not?”
“Hardly. It is even chances that they are mixed up in the business some way. Spencer has known them longer than we have.”
He left the Captain’s stateroom, and found Smiley waiting for him by the wheel-house. “There’s one thing I didn’t say when we were talking,” began the prisoner, looking with some hesitation at the agent.
“What’s that, Smiley? Speak up. I’m starting now.”
“You’re going to try it, then?”
“Yes.”
“Will you take Pink and me with you?”
Beveridge straightened up and flashed a keen, inquiring glance through Dick’s eyes, down to the bottom of his soul. Dick met it squarely.
“By Jove!” said Beveridge.
Not a word said Smiley.
“By Jove! I ‘ll do it!”
Dick turned away, limp.
“Smiley!”
He turned back.
“Where’s Harper?”
“Down below.”
“Bring him to my stateroom. Be quick about it.”
A very few moments more, and Dick and Harper knocked at the special agent’s door.
“Come in.”
They entered, and found Beveridge and Wilson together. Beveridge closed the door, and there the four men stood, crowded together in the narrow space. Beveridge gave them another of his sharp glances, then he drew from his coat pockets two revolvers and held them out, one in each hand.
Dick and Pink looked speechless.
“Well, take ‘em. You boys are to help me see this thing through, now.”
“Do you – do you mean that?”
“I don’t joke with pistols.”
Without more words each reached out. Dick thrust his into his hip pocket; but Pink opened his and looked at the loaded cylinder.
“Now, boys,” said Beveridge, “we’re off.” Wilson descended first to the launch, and Dick was about to follow when Captain Sullivan hurried up and caught his arm. “Here, here! This won’t do!”
Dick turned, and started to speak; then, seeing that Beveridge was approaching, he waited.
“That’s all right, Captain,” called the special agent; “let him go.”
“Let him go!”
Beveridge drew the Captain aside.
“You aren’t going to take him ashore with you?”
“Yes, both of ‘em.”
Anger was struggling with disgust in the Captain’s face. “You’d better hand ‘em revolvers and be done with it.”
“I’ve done that already.”
“Oh, you have!”
“Yes, sir. And I don’t mind telling you that, guilty or not, there aren’t two men I’d feel safer with in the Southern Peninsula.”
“Oh, there ain’t!” A feeble reply, but the old Captain was beyond words. “Very well,” was all he could get out, “very well!”
With that they parted; and the boat, with the strangely selected party aboard, made for the shore.
“Now, Smiley,” said Beveridge, when the boat had left them on the sand, “how about our direction?”
“Exactly southwest from here. I suppose we shall have to make for Hewittson in a straight line, and see if we can’t get there first.” A sort of road led off in a southwesterly direction, and this they followed for an hour. Then it swung off to the left, and they plunged into the forest, from now on to be guided only by the compass. The afternoon wore along. For two hours, three hours, four hours, they tramped through the forest, which now opened out into a vista of brown carpet and cool shade, now ran to a blackened jungle of stumps and undergrowth; but always underfoot was the sand, no longer white but yellow and of a dustlike quality. It gave under the foot at every step; it rose about them and got into their throats and finally into their tempers.
“Say, Smiley,” called Wilson. He had swung his coat over his shoulder; his face was streaked with sweat and dirt; the spring was gone from his stride. “Say, Smiley, where are those streams you were talking about?”
“Give it up.”
“This is a pretty place you’re getting us into.”
“Shut up, Bert!” said Beveridge. “You tend to business, and quit talking.”
“Who’s talking? Can’t I ask a civil question?”
“From the sound, I guess you can’t.”
“You’re saying a word too much there, Bill Beveridge!”
Beveridge stopped short and wheeled around. He had tied the sleeves of his coat through one suspender so that it hung about his knees and flapped when he walked. His waistcoat was open, his collar was melted to a rag; altogether he was nearly as tired and hot as his assistant.
“What do you say to sitting down a minute?” suggested Smiley, diplomatically.
But Wilson returned to the attack. “How long are you going to keep on this way, Bill?”
The obstinate quality in Wilson’s voice roused a counter-obstinacy in Beveridge. He decided not to reply.
“Maybe the sand’s getting into his ears so he can’t hear well,” said Wilson, addressing Harper as nearly as anybody. But Pink, rather than get into the controversy, went off a little way to a spruce tree and fell to cutting off a piece of the gum.
“It’s just as you like, Bill,” pursued Wilson. “Of course, it ain’t any of my business, – but I just thought I’d tell you we passed that big clump of pines over there about two hours and a half ago.”
In spite of him, Beveridge’s eyes sought the spot indicated.
“I don’t care, you understand, Bill. I ‘ll go where I’m ordered. But if you will go on trusting that compass of yours, don’t you think maybe we’d better be thinking about saving up what sandwiches we’ve got left? These Michigan woods ain’t a very cheerful spot to spend the fall, unless you’ve planned that way, you know, – brought tents and things, and maybe a little canned stuff.”
“Oh, go to – !” muttered Beveridge, without turning.
“What’s that you said?” Wilson was on his feet.
Here Smiley broke in with the suggestion that they try marking trees.
And for an hour they were tearing their shirts to strips, and sighting forward from tree to tree; then the early twilight began to settle on the forest. They spoke of it no more, but pushed on feverishly under the leadership of Beveridge, whose spirits, which had reached low-water mark in the difference with Wilson, were flowing again. From rapid walking they took to running; still the twilight deepened. Finally the uneven ground and the deep shadows led them into scratches and tumbles, and they were obliged to stop.
“Bill,” said Wilson, “look over there.”
“Where?”
“That tree – runs up six feet or so, and shoots off over the ground, and then turns square up again.”
“Yes. What about it?” A queer sound was creeping into the special agent’s voice.
“Don’t you remember – about three o’clock – the tree we passed? Harper said it was exactly like a figure four, because of the broken part that stuck up above the branch, – and you said – ”
“Well, but – ”
“Just take a good look at it.”
Beveridge stepped a little way forward and looked and looked.
“Well?”
Beveridge was silent. His eyes left the tree only to fix themselves on the ground.
“What do you think, Bill?”
Instead of replying, the special agent turned abruptly and walked away through the brush. He soon disappeared, but his assistant could hear him thrashing along. In a few moments he returned, and without a word set about building a fire. They all lent a hand, and soon were sitting around the blaze, moody and silent.
“Say, boys,” – it was Smiley speaking up, – “I have an idea. Let me take your compass a minute, Beveridge.”
There was no reply. Smiley thought he had not been understood. “Let’s have your compass, Beveridge.”
Then the special agent looked up. “If you can find it, you’re welcome to it,” he said. “Why, you haven’t lost it?”
“If you’ve got to know, I’ve thrown it.”
“The – you have!”
A moment’s silence. Somewhere off in the wilderness a twig crackled, and they all started. Harper’s scalp tingled during the long stillness that followed the sound.
“What did you do that for?” asked Smiley. “Because we’re sitting at this moment within a hundred feet of where we sat at three o’clock this afternoon.”
After this the silence grew unbearable. “I don’t know how you fellows feel,” said Wilson, “but I’m thirsty clear down to my toes. If there’s any water around here, I’m going to find it.” He drew a blazing pine knot from the fire and started off.
“Look out you don’t set the woods afire,” growled Beveridge.
For five minutes – long minutes – the three sat there and waited. Then they heard him approaching, and saw his light flickering between the trees. He came into the firelight, and paused, looking from one to another with a curious expression. It almost seemed that he was veiling a smile.
“Come this way,” he finally said. And they got up and filed after him. He led them a short fifty yards, and paused. They stood on the edge of a clearing. A few rods away they saw a story-and-a-half farm-house, with a light in the kitchen window. Farther off loomed the outline of a large barn. They stumbled on, and found midway between the two buildings a well with a bucket worked by a crank and chain.
They could not speak; they looked at one another and grinned foolishly. Then Beveridge reached for the crank, but Dick caught his arm.
“Hold on there, Bill,” he said fervently, drawing a small flask from his hip pocket, “you wouldn’t spoil a thirst like this with water?”
“You don’t mean to say that you’ve had this in your clothes all along?” said Beveridge.
“Yes. I thought from the way things were going we might need it more to-morrow than to-day.”
There was a general smacking of lips as the flask went around. Then they paused and looked at the house.
“Well,” observed Beveridge, “I’m not sure that I want to be told where we are – but here goes!” And he walked slowly toward the kitchen door, sweeping his eyes about the farmyard and taking in all that could be seen in the darkness. At his knock there was a noise in the kitchen, – the sound of a chair scraping, – and the door was opened a very little way.
“How are you?” began the special agent.
The farmer, for it was he who blocked the doorway, merely looked suspiciously out.
“We’re a camping party, Mr. – Mr. – ”
“Lindquist’s my name.” His voice was thin and peevish, a fit voice for such a thin, small man.
“ – Mr. Lindquist, and we seem to have lost our way. Can you take us in and give us a little something to eat?”
“Why, I don’t know’s I could. How many is there of you?”
“Four.”
“You say you’re campers?”
“That’s what we are.”
“Is your tent near by?”
“Blest if we know. If we did, we shouldn’t be here.”
It was plain to the three of them, standing back in the dark, that Beveridge, for reasons of his own, was moving very cautiously, and equally plain that the little man had some reason for being cautious too. It was hard to think that any honest farmer, living so lonely a life, would be so downright inhospitable.
“And you say you want something to
“Well, now,” – there was no trace of impatience in the special agent’s voice, – “that’s just as you like. We don’t want to impose on you; and of course we’re more than willing to pay for what we get.”
“Well, I dunno. I s’pose you might come in. Maybe we’ve got a little bread and milk.”
The kitchen was not a large room. The floor was bare, as were the walls, saving a few county-fair advertisements in the form of colored lithographs. A thin, colorless, dulleyed little woman was seated beside a pine table, sewing by the light of a kerosene lamp. The third member of the family, a boy of fourteen, did not appear until a moment later. When the sound of the opening door reached his ears, he was lying flat on his bed, chin propped on hands, feverishly boring through a small volume in a flashy paper binding.
Beveridge, as they all found seats, was taking in the farmer, noting his shifting eyes, and his clothes, which were nothing more than a suit of torn overalls.
“Diana,” said Lindquist, “you might give these young men some bread and milk.”
His wife laid aside her sewing without a word, and went to the pantry.
“Now,” began Beveridge, “I suppose we ought to find out where we are.”
“What’s that?”
“Where are we, Mr. Lindquist? What’s the nearest town?”
“The nearest town, you said?”
“Yes.”
“Why, Ramsey, I guess, or – ”
“Or – what?”
“Or – Spencer’s place.”
“That’s what I was afraid of.” Beveridge turned to his companions, adding, “You see, we’ve got back near the lake.”
At the sound of strange voices, the boy came down the stairs and stood in a corner, gazing at the strangers, and holding his book behind him.
“How far off is the Lake, Mr. Lindquist?”
“How – what’s that you say?”
“How far off is the Lake?”
“What Lake?”
“Lake Huron, of course.”
“Lake Huron? – Oh, twenty, – twenty-two mile.”
“That’s another story!” exclaimed Wilson. But Beveridge, evidently fearing his assistant’s tongue, gave him a look that quieted him. The faces of the four travellers all showed relief.
The bread and milk were ready now, and they fell to, joking and laughing as heartily as if their only care had been a camp outfit somewhere in the woods; but all the time the three were watching Beveridge, awaiting his next move. It came, finally, when the last crumb of bread had disappeared and the plates had been pushed back.
“Now, Mr. Lindquist,” said Beveridge, “it’s getting on pretty late in the evening, and we’re tired. Can’t you put us up for the night? Not in the house – I’d hardly ask that – but out in the barn, say?” As he spoke he laid a two-dollar bill on the table and pushed it over close to the farmer’s hand.
“Well, I dunno.” For a moment the bill lay there between their two hands, then Lindquist’s nervous fingers slowly closed over it. “I suppose you could sleep out there.”
“That’s first-rate. We ‘ll go right out if you don’t mind. You needn’t bother about coming. Just let your boy there bring a lantern and show us where to go.”
Lindquist did not take to this. “Axel,” he said, “you go up to bed. Mind, now!” Then he lighted the lantern and led the way to the barn. When he had left them, tumbled about on the fragrant hay, Smiley spoke up. “Well, Beveridge, what next?”
“Didn’t he lock the door just then?”
“Yes,” said Harper, “I’m sure I heard it. I ‘ll go and see.”
Slowly he descended, and felt his way across the floor, returning with the report that the door was fast.
“Now, boys, I ‘ll tell you,” said Beveridge. “We ‘ll take a little rest. It’s all right as long as one of us is awake. Before the night’s over we’ve got to get hold of that boy, but we won’t make a disturbance yet.”
“Oh,” cried Dick, a flood of light breaking in on his understanding, “it’s the boy you’re after.”
“Yes, it’s the boy, of course. I’ve had to sit down a good many times in my life and thank the Lord for my luck, but this beats it all.”
“Are you sure, though, that they went through here?”
“Am I sure? Could you look at the old man and ask me that? What I’d like to know is how far off they are just now.”
“Lindquist doesn’t look as if he’d tell.”
“Oh, no; he won’t tell.”
“Would it do any good to make him?”
“Put on a little pressure, you mean?”
“Yes.”
“I don’t think so. He’d lie to me, and we wouldn’t have any way of knowing the difference. The boy is our game.”
“Why not get him now? We could break out of here easy enough.”
“No, Smiley, you’re a little off the track there. He must tell us on the sly. Don’t you see, he’s a good deal more afraid of his father than he is of us. If we aren’t careful, we ‘ll have him lying too.”
“Have you thought of the old lady?”
“Yes, but I’m doubtful there. She is afraid of him too. It’s more than likely that she was kept pretty much out of the way. Anyhow, her ideas would be confused.”
“But sitting up here in the haymow isn’t going to bring us any nearer to the boy.”
“Isn’t it?”
“I don’t see how.”
“Did you notice the book he was reading?”
“No, what book? I didn’t see any book.”
“I guess maybe you were right, Smiley, about your eyes being trained for sea work. Now, I ‘ll tell you what. This little rest may be the only one we’re entitled to for a day or so, and I wish you fellows would curl right up and go to sleep. I’m going to stay awake for a while. Harper, over there, is the only sensible one in the lot. He’s been asleep for ten minutes.”
“No, he ain’t,” drawled a sleepy voice.
“I can’t get comfortable,” growled Wilson. “How is a man going to sleep with this hay sticking into your ears and tickling you?”
“Next time I take you out, Bert,” said Beveridge, “I ‘ll bring along a pneumatic mattress and a portable bath-tub and a Pullman nigger to carry your things.”
“That’s all right, Bill. Wait till you try it yourself. There are spiders in the hay, millions of ‘em, – and if there’s anything I hate, it’s spiders.”
“Here,” said Harper, “take some o’ my pillow. I ain’t having no difficulty.” He threw over a roll of cloth, which Wilson, after some feeling about, found.
“Hold on, Harper, this isn’t your coat?”
“No, it’s part of a bundle of rags I found here.”
“What’s that!” Beveridge exclaimed. “A bundle of rags?”
“Feels like part of an old dress,” said Wilson.
“Give it here, Bert. I ‘ll take what you’ve got too, Harper.” With the cloth under his arm Beveridge found the ladder and made his way to the floor below. Then he lighted a match.
The others crawled to the edge of the mow and looked down into the cavernous, dimly lighted space.
“Look out you don’t set us afire, Bill.”
“Come down here, Smiley, and see what you make of this.”
It was not necessary to summon Dick twice. He swung off, hung an instant by his hands, dropped to the floor, and bent with the special agent over what seemed to be the waist and skirt of a gingham dress. The examination grew so interesting that Harper and Wilson came down the ladder and peered over Dick’s shoulders.
“You see,” said Beveridge, – “here, wait till I light another match. Take this box, Bert, will you, and keep the light going? You see, it isn’t an old dress at all. It’s rather new, in fact. Mrs. Lindquist would never have thrown it away – never in the world. Now what in the devil – what’s that, Smiley?”
“I didn’t say anything. I was just thinking – ”
“Well – what?”
“I don’t know that I could swear to it, but – you see, you can’t tell the color very well in this light.”
“Oh, it’s blue, plain enough.”
“You’re sure?”
“Perfectly.”
“Looks nearer green to me. But if it’s blue, I’ve seen it before.”
“Where?”
“The day I was at Spencer’s. There was a girl there, the old man’s sister-in-law, and she wore this dress.”
“Are you perfectly sure, Smiley?”
“Well – dresses aren’t in my line, but – yes, I’m sure. I noticed it because her eyes were blue too – and there was this white figure in it. Her name is Estelle. She waited on table, and – ”
“Go on – don’t stop.”
“Wait up,” said Wilson. “If you’ve got it identified, I’m going to quit burning up these matches. There are only about half a dozen left.”
“All right. Put it out.” And they talked on in the dark, seated, Dick and Beveridge on the tongue of a hay-wagon, Wilson on an inverted bucket, Harper on the floor.
“Why, she waited on table; and then McGlory disappeared and I had to go after him, and I found him talking to her – ”
“Hold on!” Beveridge broke in. “You say you found her and McGlory together?”
“Yes. I guess we’re thinking of the same thing. From the way they both acted, I rather guess it’s an understood thing. It wasn’t as if he had met her there by chance, not a bit of it. And I’ve been thinking since, it seems more than likely that she would go wherever he went.”
“That’s right!” Beveridge exclaimed. “I’m sure of it. I know a little something about it myself.”
“You do?”
“Yes. This McGlory has left a wife behind him in Chicago.”
“Madge, you mean?”
“Yes. The main reason he took up the offer to go out with you, Smiley, was so he could get up here and see this – what’s her name? – Estelle.”
“So there is more than a fighting chance that where she is you ‘ll find him.”
“Exactly.”
“And that means that he has been here to-day.”
“Right again.”
“Then who sailed the schooner for Canada?”
Harper, leaning forward in the dark and straining to catch every syllable of the low-pitched conversation, here gave a low gasp of sheer excitement. There had been moments – hours, even – during the day when the object of this desperate chase had seemed a far-off, imaginary thing beside the real discomforts of the tramp through the pines. But now, in this sombre place, they were plunged into the mystery of the flight, and he had been the unwitting means of deepening the mystery.
“That sort of mixes us up, Beveridge,” said Smiley.
“Never mind.” Beveridge’s voice was exultant. “We’re hot on the trail now. This taking to the woods is about the neatest thing I ever did.”
“You’re right there, Bill,” Wilson chimed in.
Until now Dick had supposed that the land chase had been entirely his own notion, but he said nothing.
“Look here, Bill,” – it was Wilson breaking the silence, – “there isn’t any use of our trying to sleep to-night. Let’s break out and run this thing down.”
“How are you going to know your way in the middle of the night?”
“Make ‘em show us.”
“Suppose you can’t make them?”
“I know – you’re still thinking about that boy. But we are no nearer him than we were an hour ago.”
“Listen a minute!”
They sat motionless. There was no sound; nothing but the heavy stillness of the night.
Wilson whispered, “Think you heard something?”
“S-sh!”
A key turned softly in the lock. Then the door opened a little way, and against the sky they could see a head. Wilson drew his revolver. Beveridge heard the hammer click, and said quietly, “Don’t be a fool, Bert. Put that thing back in your pocket.”
“Are you’s in there?” came a voice from the door.
“Yes. Come along.”
The door opened wider to admit the owner of the voice, then closed. A moment later a lantern was lighted and held up before the grinning, excited face of the farmer’s son.
“Come on, Alex. What do you want?”
The boy slowly approached until he stood before them; then he set the lantern on the floor, where it cast long shadows.
“What is it, my boy?”
Axel looked knowingly at them. “Say,” he whispered, “I know what you’s are. You’re detectives.”
“Oh, we are, are we? What makes you think that?”
“You’re detectives. I know.”
“Sit down, and talk it over. Do you smoke?”
“Can I smoke? Well, I should say I can. You just watch me.” He accepted a cigar, his first, and lighted it. “Don’t let on to Pa, will you? He’d give me – ” Unable to call up a strong enough word, the boy concluded with a grin.
“That’s all right. We know how it is ourselves. Your father has enough to worry him just about now, anyhow. Didn’t he have but the one suit of clothes?”
“Well, there was his old everyday suit, but that got tore so bad Ma said she couldn’t mend it, and there wasn’t only his Sunday suit and his work clothes left.”
“You don’t mean that he had to fight with those fellows?”
“Oh, no, – that was a long time ago. Say, this cigar is the real thing.”
“It ought to be good. It’s a fifteen-cent-straight.”
“You don’t say so!”
“I ‘ll tell you one thing, Alex.”
“My name’s Axel.”
“I ‘ll tell you one thing. Your father has made a bad mistake in allowing himself to get mixed up with these people. He is with the wrong crowd. I’m the only one that could help him out.”
The boy began to be frightened. “Oh, he ain’t mixed up in it!”
“He isn’t?”
“No. He never seen ‘em before.”
“What does he want to act this way for, then?”
“Well, you see – ”
“Now look here, my boy. The sooner we understand each other, the better. Your father has got himself into a dangerous situation. He can’t deceive me. I know all about it. Does he think he could keep me in here any longer than I want to stay by locking the door? I’m half minded to arrest him for this. He can’t do that sort o’ thing to me!”
Axel was downright frightened now. He held his cigar so long that it went out. Wilson struck a match, and lighted it for him.
“I suppose you would like me to believe that he was forced to give up his clothes?”
“Oh, he was! The fellow with the black hair – ”
“McGlory?”
“Seems to me they called him Joe.”
“That’s the same man. Go on.”
“Why, he pulled a gun, and marched Pa out here to the barn. Ma ran upstairs crying. And the lady, she was crying, too. And the dark fellow, he made the lady climb up where you was, on the hay – ”
“Yes, I know,” Beveridge interrupted, indicating the dress.
“And then he held the gun while Pa took off his Sunday suit that he’d put on because he thought they was going to be visitors, and he threw it up to the lady, and she put it on. One of the suspenders was busted, and she didn’t know how it worked, and she cried, and then Pa had to holler up how he’d fixed it with a string and you twisted the string around twice and then tied it. And then the dark fellow, he made me run in and get Pa his overhauls.”