The Dugdale Millions — page 295: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

He DECISIVE BLOW, 285 them to appear before Mr. Hetlow with such indubi. table proof as would not only put an end to any suse picion he might have but put him into a condition of mind to say to that solicitor, when he did arrive, that there was nothing to be gained by struggling against the plain facts. “In short,” he said, ‘‘ we will gain nothing by wait- ing but to prolong the effort and permit suspicion to harden into belief.” In this he was supported by both Ransom and Bob. When, however, the news was brought to them that the men placed at Springhill by Ransom had at- tempted the life of Mason there was consternation. Ransom was bitterly blamed by the other three for having attempted -a plan, which, even if successful, could have done no more than to have gotten out of the way a man who was giving them trouble by reason of his determined suspicions and his efforts to prove them, and who, being killed, would have had his place supplied by someone else, with even a stronger motive for arriving at knowledge. But having failed, it was even worse, and Mason would now have added to his former suspicions the conviction that the attempt upon his life was because he had entertained such Suspicions. Ransom denied energetically that he had given such instructions to his men, and declared that they had exceeded them. He said the part that they were to play was wholly that of spies. While there was no expression on the part of anyone present indicating that they doubted his word, nevertheless all of them were filled with disbelief. It was Bob who now urged immediate action. “Whatever truth there was in Moore’s argument before,” he said, “it is doubly true now. I must sub- mit those proofs at once. To delay now would be to confirm ail the suspicions they may have. To go --ore now, right on the heels of this affair, would carry Comicboolk<s C@© 3