Chapter 16

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_ CHAPTER XVI

All those who saw the flying car stood and stared after it. Hank Simpson, who was on his way over from the Little River railroad station with a load of merchandise, heard the roar, and sprang from his wagon-seat. He ran to his horses' heads. But no sooner had he seized the bits of the frightened animals than he let go. He recognized the girl who sped past him. He clambered back into his wagon and whipped his team into a dead run. He drew rein on the racing horses before a group of gaping men in front of the general store.

"Did you see anything down yon way, Hank?" asked Jud Johnson.

"See!" exclaimed Hank, rubbing the dust from his eyes. "See! Good God! Boys, that damn thing was running away! Hear me? It was running like hell! What are you gaping fools standing here for, looking like a passel of brainless idiots! 'Phone!" he screamed.

"'Phone what? Who to?" asked Jud with exasperating calm.

"Everything! Everybody!" was the doubly illuminating reply. "She'll be killed! Do you hear me?"

"We'd have to be deaf as nails not to hear you," said Jud as he spat a mouthful of tobacco juice against the front wheel of the wagon. "All the 'phoning in creation won't stop her. If she ain't of a mind to pull that thing up to a halt from the inside, it ain't likely that a fellow could do it by getting in its path and yelling whoa, even if he'd holler as loud as you've been doing at us. Why didn't you try it when you see her coming?"

"But they've got to stop it! The constables----"

"How?"

"How'd you suppose I know? Get out of my way and let me get at the 'phone!"

"You ain't going to do nothing of the kind," replied Jud as he stepped in front of the belligerent Hank. "There's some reason for driving like that. I don't know what's up, but the first feller to interfere with her joy ride is going to get hurt. I was in the cellar of her dad's place doing an odd job of plumbing for him when she come to me, and said: 'Jud, I'm going for a drive.' I 'lowed that was real nice, wondering why she'd be telling me that. 'I may have to drive pretty fast, and I want you to telephone ahead as far as you can to have the road clear. Tell the policemen my name, and ask that they don't stop me.'"

"But her dad----"

"Her dad ain't home. He went over Riverhead way more than an hour ago."

"But, Jud----"

"Dry up that butting, Hank, or we'll lead you out in the alley behind your store and feed you tin cans."

Hank climbed back to his wagon-seat, and Jud, noticing the determined expression in the storekeeper's eyes, deputized two men to keep watch of him while he went inside and did some telephoning.

Elizabeth Fox reached the city limits without being molested. She then looked at her watch, and slowed down her car. She kept the speedometer needle wavering within the speed law till she set her brakes before the building where the law firm of Starr and Jordan maintained their offices. Harold was so surprised to see his sister that he gave her the name of the Trust Company for which she asked before he realized what he was doing. She glanced at the clock, hastily scribbled the address on a card, and ran from the room. Harold stood still in dumb amazement. He walked to the window and looked down into the street below. He recognized her red motor-car as it glided through the traffic at an alarming rate. A mild oath escaped him as it dawned upon him that the name of the bank was that of the firm through which the interest payments had been made on the Phillips loan. What on earth could she be up to?

It was far past the noon hour when Elizabeth returned. The office was empty, the force having gone home for the Saturday half-holiday. She turned from the locked door, but it flew open, and Harold called to her.

"I thought you'd come back, Sis. In fact, I meant to tell you that I wanted you to take dinner with me, but you blew in and out so suddenly that I didn't have time to collect my thoughts. What are you up to, anyway?"

"Oh, nothing much."

"How did you learn of this Phillips affair? I take it that that was what all your hurry was about."

She only laughed in reply, her eyes dancing.

"I didn't know that you were on the inside of this, and I don't know yet how much you really know."

"I know a lot."

"How did you find out?"

"Everybody has told me a little, and I have been piecing it together for several days. But can't we sit down, or go out to lunch? I'm really very tired, now that it's over, and awfully hungry."

"How did you know that I had the name and address of the firm which has been paying Father the interest on the Phillips loan?"

"Why, you told me."

"In my sleep?"

"Indeed, no. You were quite awake."

"Sis, have you been eavesdropping?"

"Harold Fox! The very idea!" she said indignantly. "I don't like you one bit for saying that. No, sir, I have not."

"I honestly didn't think it of you, but I couldn't imagine any other way you could get the notion in your head."

"You never told me a word till to-day."

"You didn't know that I had that name in my possession till you blew in here and asked for it?"

"Not really and truly, I didn't. But I took a chance. And you are such a poor actor that I was certain you'd tell me. Of course, I knew that you went over to Australia to find out about the man."

"The treats are certainly on me."

"Make it a good big lunch, please," she said smiling and starting for the door.

"Wait, Bets. What did you do over there at the George Henry Trust Company?"

"Must I tell, just now?"

"Of course not, but I'd like to know if you care to tell. It may save me from something very unpleasant."

"You mean you will force me to tell?"

"Mercy me! No. I am better acquainted with you than to try a thing like that."

"Will you keep a secret, without giving away one little word of it?"

"A client's counsel seldom repeats a confidential business transaction."

"I paid the two years of interest just a few minutes before that horrid old mortgage was due, so Uncle Josiah would not have to lose his place."

"Gosh!" was the inelegant reply. "You're a brick!"

His brow puckered.

"Won't that save him?" she asked with concern.

"Sure. But how did you know that Uncle Josiah was a party to this mix-up?"

"Father told me that."

"You should have been the lawyer of this family. I never saw any one like you for finding things out." Still apparently worried, he added: "But your check will give you away. What if that happens to fall into Dad's hands?"

"I didn't use my check. I went to our bank first, and drew out all my money. I didn't have enough left to put back, so I--well, I didn't put it back."

"What under heaven did you do with it?"

"I went down to an East River fish wharf, and----"

"Took a corner on fish?"

"Harold, don't think me foolish. Uncle Josiah had sold his boat, thinking to pay Father off and save his place. I----"

"You bought back the old fellow's boat!"

She nodded.

Harold did not laugh. Instead, he turned toward his desk and busily fumbled papers. When he spoke there was a note of tenderness in his voice. "You're the best little sport in seventeen States."

"Well, that doesn't keep me from starving."

"You didn't come for anything else?"

"No, except that I did want to talk with you. We can do that while we eat."

"I'd rather you would ask me any questions before we go out. State secrets have been known to leak out from restaurant tables."

"Tell me where this Adoniah Phillips lives."

"Whew! You don't pick the easy ones, do you? You certainly go right after what you want, Bets. But why do you ask?"

"Because I want to know."

"You'll have to think up a better reason than that."

"If he is one of your clients, why don't you make him pay that interest?"

"Lawyers may advise, but they can't drive unless they hold the reins of litigation."

"You are just as exasperating as all lawyers," she said with a show of impatience. "Do you know that your client has fallen heir to a very large fortune? And do you know that he could pay the principal as well as the interest?"

"Good Lord, Sis! You're a wonder! How on earth did you ferret all this mess out?"

"That doesn't matter. The thing that matters is what Father and that Phillips person are trying to do to Uncle Josiah. We must stop them. If you know the truth about the transaction between Father and Mr. Phillips you have no right to allow this thing to go on."

Harold's eyes narrowed. "Trying to trap me again, Bets?"

"Of course I'm not. I'm just trying to get you to look at things from Uncle Josiah's position."

"How many of the facts do you know about this case?" asked Harold in deep seriousness.

"I know enough to form pretty good conclusions of the injustice of the whole thing."

"Do you think you know everything?"

"No-o, not when you look at me like that," she said, surprised by the earnestness of his voice and manner.

"Has any one beside Father talked with you?"

She hesitated, then slowly shook her head. "You must not ask me that."

"Have you talked with Mr. McGowan?"

"I can't tell you," she answered, quickly checking the look of surprise that leaped into her eyes at the unexpected question.

"I don't know just how far Mr. McGowan's information may have led him into this matter, but I have feared all along that he is not half so ignorant as he appears. Come in here, Bets," he requested, pushing open a door to an inner office. "I have some things I want to show you."

"Mercy, Bud! How mysterious you can be!"

"An ounce of precaution is worth a pound of lawsuits, and I don't want the slightest possibility of a leak," he said as he locked the door.

"My sakes! I had no idea you could be so serious. Is this the way you act with all your clients? I'd think you'd frighten them all away. You almost do me. It reminds me of the way you would lock me up in the hall closet to scare me when we were children."

"For once in my life I am serious, Sis. We are no longer children, and this is far from play. I wish to God it were nothing more than that!"

"Why, Harold!"

"Bets, you've got a close tongue and loads of good sense. I've carried this thing just about as long as I can without breaking under it. I've got to let off steam. You know I've tried to be on the square since my little fling, and even then I was straight, but Dad has never believed it. I'm tempted now to go wrong, and----"

"Why on earth are you talking like this? Has some one been accusing you of doing wrong? Oh, Harold! You didn't fall into trouble after all over in Australia, did you?"

"No, nor in love either," he replied, trying to smile.

Elizabeth blushed.

"I see that doesn't apply to all our family."

"I don't think you're nice to say that. And I don't care----"

"Why, Bets, are you really in love with him?"

"You have no right to jest about such things."

"I'm not jesting, honestly. I've never been so far from it in my whole life. I don't blame you for liking that minister."

"Then, you were not making fun?"

"No! I've had all the fun-making knocked out of me."

"Harold," she said, coming nearer, "I've made him hate me."

"Hate you? There isn't a man living who could do that. No one was ever blessed with a more wonderful sister than I've been."

Elizabeth stared at her brother. Never had she heard him make such a sentimental statement. He had turned from her, and was looking into the street below. With a sharp swing he faced about.

"Come, tell me all you know about Phillips and the estate."

"I guess I really don't know very much more than I've told you. I know the man is a half-brother of Uncle Josiah, and that he mortgaged the old homestead to Father, and that he married some trader's daughter in Australia, and that the trader died, leaving a large fortune. That's all."

"Read those," said Harold, handing her some papers which he had brought with him from his own desk. "And keep your nerve. There are more."

Elizabeth read the papers through. One was the original document of the trader's will; the other was an Australian Government paper, exonerating Mr. Adoniah Phillips. A postscript to the will stated that Mr. Phillips had left Australia for America.

"I knew all that," said the girl as she returned the papers. "But they do help to make matters clearer. I wasn't really certain he had come over here. Have you found him?"

"No. I've never seen the man. What is more, not one penny of that vast estate has yet come into the possession of Adoniah Phillips."

"Why, Harold! Do you mean to tell me that you know where this man is, and that you have not looked him up? You say he has not received his inheritance? What are you trying to tell me?"

"I know what I'm saying. Neither he nor his heir has received one cent."

"And yet you know where they are?"

"I didn't say I knew of their whereabouts. But I will say that I know where to find the heir, a son."

"You should go to him at once, then, and give him the opportunity to pay off that mortgage on Uncle Josiah's home."

"Yes, I can do that. But it isn't so simple. Right there is where I've struck the snag that has nearly driven me insane. How to do it----"

"How? A lawyer saying a thing like that? Just go to him and explain how it all came about. If he is half a man he will do what is right without any litigation. That is so very simple that I wonder at you."

"Read that," he said, drawing from an inside pocket another paper, and handing it to her.

In the upper right-hand corner was an Australian stamp.

At the end of the first line the letters began to dance before her eyes, and to crowd into one another. Elizabeth turned to her brother, wild-eyed.

"Harold, this is false! Tell me it is false!"

"I wish to God it were, Bets. But you must keep your feelings under better control if you are to help me out of this miserable state of affairs."

"You know it is false!" she implored. "I shall tell everybody it's a lie! No one can know him and believe that."

"You must remember that this all happened years ago, before you and I were born."

"But, his life now! Oh, Harold, you don't believe this! Tell me it isn't true!"

"I've been almost sweating blood over it since I discovered the truth. I've tried to find some other explanation or solution, but there is none other. Father is guilty of the crime for which Adoniah Phillips was made to suffer. I don't know how they got hold of his true name, for he was going under an assumed one over there. But they did, and the worst of it is, the old trader's wife is here in the city right now. She is on Father's track. I've been staving her off, but she smells a rat in the fact that I bear his name, and I can't hold her much longer from locating him."

"No! No! You shall not tell me that Father is a criminal! You must take back that awful word about him!"

Harold groaned, and settled back into his chair. The girl fell back into hers, and covered her face with trembling hands. She sprang suddenly to her feet and to her brother's side.

"Father was never in Australia! He made his money trading in Africa. We've heard him say that many times, and I believe him. I shall not believe those papers. They are blackmail."

"Then, I must go on alone. My temptation was to cover this up, but, Bets, I can't. I had hoped that you'd go through it with me, for it's going to be a mighty dirty mess to clean up. But if you persist in believing Father's story instead of mine----"

"I do believe you, too! But can't there be some mistake?"

"If there had been the slightest chance I should have discovered it before now, but there isn't. It is God's truth. All these years Father has been safe only because Adoniah Phillips refused years ago to disclose his identity. It's awful, Sis, but true."

"It's too awful to be true! It seems like a horrible dream."

"You have no idea what agony it has cost me. Do you think you can go through it with me?"

"I'll try, Harold. But, oh, it's hard!"

"Yes."

"Don't you think that Father might clear the whole matter up if we should tell him all we know? Maybe he could explain things----"

"That was the first thought that occurred to me. But the longer I worked on the case, and the more I discovered of the truth, the more impossible I saw that to be. I'm not so sure that we'd want him to save his skin, anyway. He ought to face the music for his wrong just the same as any other man."

Elizabeth did not once take her gaze from her brother's face, while she spoke slowly and distinctly: "Father will not be afraid to face the truth, even though it may mean financial ruin. He is brave, and he is honest now. I shall tell him all."

"Don't be too hasty, Bets. I admire your spunk. But answer me this: did it strike you as strange the way Father acted that night when I announced my contemplated trip to Australia to look up Phillips?"

She nodded ever so slightly.

"And did it strike you as strange the way he treated Mr. McGowan when he offered to help him to his room?"

"But why do you bring Mr. McGowan into this?"

"Bets, if I had known one grain of the truth that night I'd have flatly refused the appointment to this case at the risk of losing my position in the firm. Father was afraid that night. Here is one more paper I wish you to read. I had it copied in Washington last week."

Elizabeth unfolded the paper, and read: "Be it known that one Adoniah Phillips, after due application, and upon his own request, for reasons herein stated, is authorized to change his name to----"

The paper fell to the floor. The room began to swim. The furniture violently rocked. Elizabeth reached out and clutched her brother's arm.

"Mack McGowan!" she whispered faintly. "Oh, what am I saying? Why am I saying that name? What has happened to me?"

"Poor little girl! I thought my little sister was stronger than that. I've been a fool for letting you read all those papers after the strain you've been through."

"Mack McGowan!" she repeated. She seized the paper which her brother had lifted from the floor. "Oh, it's in that paper, and it's his name! Harold, what does it mean?"

"You must brace up, Beth. The man you are in love with is the son of Adoniah Phillips. He bears his father's new name."

She was suddenly weary. She felt just one desire: to get back home. She took Harold's arm and led him toward the door.

"I want to go home, and I need you to drive the car." _

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