The Argosy, Vol. 90 No. 1 — page 134: what you’re looking at

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

128 THE first time since she had seen it in the barber- shop when he summoned Mr. Stakes for the purpose of purchasing the hotel, or pre- tending to purchase it, a quick expression of crafty shrewdness come over him; one animated by a swift decision for action. For a moment, however, he held himself in. PH be jiggered,” he said slowly. “ Let me get this sftaight. Do you mean that the real Harlingoods tried to put that over on me, tried to rent their house and them- selves as servants?” “ That’s it?” ‘““And the secretary, Mr. Lenox’s name is—what?”’ ‘* Arthur Harlingood.”’ ““And Mrs. Mapes?” “Ts Miss Fane Harlingood.” He stopped for a short chuckle as if he did not have time for it, but reaJly could not help it. ‘“And Mrs. Riggs, I suppose, is Mrs. Harlingood, and Squire, Mr. Harlingood?” “ That is right,” Una was a bit frightened now. A look of intentness which was almost ugly came to his face. She thought she had made the last appeal and he would go now. But he stood as if chained to the floor, raised his two manacled fists and shook them at the door out of which the others had lately gone. CHAPTER XXVI. THE CRIMINAL REFUSES TO ESCAPE. BY this time Welling’s coat was mended. He hastened into the St. Opposite and soon was In communication with police headquarters. He told them he had appre- hended a man he believed to be Joe Con- nors, the con man, gave them what he thought was the house and street number of the Harlingood mansion, and added that they might reach him, if need be, by tele- phone there; adding that the number could be obtained from the book. This done, he started back the way he had come. Meanwhile Fane had ransacked the house for him. Eventually she discovered ARGOSY. N the open window of the living-room, and could only imagine that he had gone that way. She did not dare venture after him, though she went so far as to go onto the street and look up and down. This was at the moment when he had disappeared into the hotel. Accordingly, she returned to her room to tell her father and mother. Arthur was also there, and in a frame of mind quite different from the jaunty one in which he had returned home from the St. Opposite earlier in the afternoon. Indeed he was so fagged with a realiza- tion of what he had done that his mother did not have the heart to say a harsh word to him, though, as Fane observed this, she could not help wondering to herself if her mother would have been so lenient if her daughter and not her son had been guilty of bringing such disgrace upon them. The four members of the family held a consultation of war. It was quickly agreed that that horrible man must be got out of the house immediately. If Welling could not be located, let him be chucked out forthwith. And what could Una be doing, talking alone with him? It was then that Arthur thought best to tell what he knew of the ostensible purchase of the hotel and of Una’s employment, at a ridiculously impossible salary, in a ridicu- lously impossible position of manager. Mrs. Harlingood snorted at this and went so far as to express the thought that possibly Una was down there now plotting with him against them. Fane objected to this strenuously, and Mr. Harlingood weakly. The mother then suggested that perhaps Una had informed him of the defenseless condition of ‘the Harlingoods in the begin- “ning, but Arthur cleared her of that sus- picion, in all justice explaining, in his effort to evade as much of the blame as possible, that the bold forger had learned of them through the manager, Mr. Herter. Mrs. Harlingood finally- uttered the de- cision of the four in declaring that they must one and all return to the library and get the odious person out of the house in some manner. There was safety in num- bers and she urged that they all come. oO comiicbooks CO