Matt King, in a clump of bushes a quarter of a mile north of the
Malvern Country Club, watched the road and waited for his chum. He had
not much hope that McGlory would join him, for he believed that the
cowboy would be held a prisoner by the colonel.
What Matt was doing, in this particular matter, was all for his friend.
McGlory had become entangled with a gang of confidence men, who were
playing boldly for big stakes. Whether the dishonest game won out or
failed, Joe McGlory must have nothing to do with it. If he profited
by the crime he would be called on to suffer at the hands of the law;
and, even if the law never reached him, his conscience would make
him miserable all his life for the part he had played in such a huge
swindling scheme.
Matt, at any cost to himself, meant to keep McGlory clear of Billings
and his criminal work. What is a friend for if not to stand shoulder to
shoulder with a chum and save his good name? This touched upon one of
Matt’s principles--one of his rules of conduct long ago formulated and
steadily adhered to. And it was a code which had played a big part in
his many successes.
Minute after minute slipped away, and then Matt’s heart bounded as he
heard a crunch of footsteps around a turn in the wooded road. It might
be Uncle Tom who was coming, however, with a report of his failure to
deliver the message to McGlory. Peering through the bushes, hoping
against hope, Matt’s fears suddenly subsided and an expression of
thankfulness escaped his lips.
McGlory was coming!
Matt gave a low whistle. The cowboy answered it, and was soon at his
friend’s side, gripping his hands.
“Bully for you, old chap!” exclaimed McGlory. “I’d like to see the gang
that could lay _you_ by the heels when you make up your mind to get
away.”
“You saw Uncle Tom, then?”
“Sure, or I shouldn’t be here. Old Ebony-face thinks you’re about
the whole works, from the way he talks. A lot of queer things have
happened to-day, but the queerest is your meeting Uncle Tom in this
out-of-the-way corner of Long Island.”
“Wrong, Joe. The queerest--and the best--thing that’s happened is the
way we picked up that private report of Levitt’s. We have to thank the
crazy runabout for that.”
McGlory, although of a different opinion on that point since listening
to the colonel’s persuasions, did not allow Matt to think that he
disagreed with him.
“How did you make it?” the cowboy asked. “Uncle Tom didn’t tell me
much about that. Principally he worked his bazoo letting me know what
a great mascot he was, and how he used to pull luck your way down in
Arizona.”
Matt, briefly as he could, told about the pavilion in the rear of the
club grounds, and how Uncle Tom had sent his pursuers on the wrong
track.
McGlory laughed delightedly. He was playing a part with an important
point in view, and it was necessary to pull the wool over Matt’s eyes.
A despicable part it was, for one who had benefited at Matt’s hands
as had McGlory; but the cowboy was filled with the colonel’s specious
arguments and crafty explanations, and believed that, when the dust of
the affair had settled, and Matt knew everything, he would thank his
cowboy chum for preventing him from making a big mistake.
“The colonel is a schemer, Joe,” declared Matt.
“You bet your spurs he is,” chuckled McGlory. “That’s the way they
raise ’em out in Tucson. The only way to keep a fellow from getting
ahead of you is to get ahead of him first.”
Matt did not approve of these sentiments, nor of the hearty admiration
the cowboy seemed to have for them.
“Billings is scheming the best he knows how,” went on Matt, “to get
himself into trouble, Joe, and he’s figuring to drag you into it.”
“But you’re figuring the other way,” answered McGlory, “and I’ll back
your headwork against the colonel’s any old time. What are you planning
to do now?”
“I’ll have to know, first, what the situation is at the clubhouse as
regards yourself. How is that you happen to be at large?”
“Well, pard, the colonel couldn’t do anything with me, so he let me go.
You’ve got the report, you know.”
The cowboy was weaving a tangled web. The farther he went in his
deceptions the more he was obliged to misstate the facts.
“You can go and come around the clubhouse,” continued Matt, “without
being in any danger from the colonel and Levitt?”
“That’s the way of it.”
“Then our next move is to get back to Manhattan. And, of course, we’ll
have to use the runabout.”
“Why, Matt, we may run off the other end of Long Island if we try to
use that chug cart!”
“We’ve got to use it, just the same, and you’re the one to get it from
the garage. The quicker we start on the return trip the better.”
“You’re going to be at that meeting to-night?”
“We’re both going to be there. You’re to offer the private report in
evidence, and tell all about our adventures this morning. I guess that
will spike the colonel’s gun and block his little game of wholesale
robbery.”
“Then my fortune will go glimmering,” said Joe, but not with much
concern.
“Better to let a questionable fortune go glimmering, pard,” answered
Matt earnestly, “than to do a dishonest thing that would bother you
all your life. And perhaps,” he added solemnly, “it might get you into
jail.”
“Wow!” shivered the cowboy, feigning trepidation. “That’s an elegant
prospect--I don’t think.”
“What’s more,” went on Matt, driving his suspicions home, “the
colonel’s such a schemer that I doubt whether, if he should swindle the
syndicate out of a lot of money, he ever turned over a penny of it to
you or to any of the other original stockholders.”
This caused the cowboy an inward tremor. But he allowed the fear to
pass. Colonel Billings was his father’s friend--he had said so himself;
and the colonel felt a responsibility for his welfare--which is also
what the colonel had said himself. In the light of the colonel’s
persuasions the cowboy was taking his word in everything.
“Well,” remarked the cowboy, “the colonel is up against the real thing
now. He’s due for such a slam as he never had before. We’re the boys to
do it; eh, Matt?”
“We’ll make a stand for the right,” said Matt, “and work shoulder to
shoulder to win out. The colonel talks about a fortune. You and I can
make plenty of money, Joe. I think we have proved that. The motors are
mighty good friends to tie to, whether they’re hitched to submarines,
automobiles, or aëroplanes. We’ll pin our faith to the explosive
engine, and one of these days it will land us honestly in Easy Street.”
The colonel, McGlory remembered, had mentioned “Easy Street.” But
not as Matt had done it. The longer the cowboy talked with his chum
the more he hated himself for the part he was playing. If he talked
with Matt too long McGlory was sure his purpose would slip from him,
and that he would let out everything about the inner history of the
colonel’s manipulations of the “Pauper’s Dream.”
“I’d like to look inside that manila envelope once more, pard,” said
McGlory. “There’s a part of that private report I didn’t sabe, and I’d
like to read it over again.”
Matt King promptly drew the envelope from his pocket and passed it to
his chum.
“It’s evidence of the rascality of two men, Joe,” remarked Matt,
“and----”
McGlory sprang up quickly and stepped out into the road. He paused
there, flashing his eyes up and down. Apparently he was looking for
somebody or something, but really he was fighting with himself. He
had reached the point where he must play up his scheme for all it was
worth, or else turn his back on Billings and a fortune.
The cowboy felt sure he was about to do the right thing, but to put
himself in a wrong light with his beloved pard for only a few days was
proving a harder task than he had reckoned on. Abruptly he clinched his
resolve. Slipping the manila envelope into his pocket, he turned to
look at the apprehensive face of Matt among the bushes.
“What is it, Joe?” queried Matt. “Some one coming?”
“Some one going,” replied the cowboy, “and it’s me. You don’t
understand this, pard. Don’t think too hard of me until you know
everything.”
Thereupon McGlory whirled and took to his heels, racing in the
direction of the clubhouse.
Matt was so amazed he could not move or speak. What ailed McGlory? What
did he mean?
“Joe!” he shouted, starting up from the bushes.
But the cowboy was already around the turn in the road and lost to
Matt’s astounded eyes.
While Matt King stood there, his mind nearly a blank, staring down the
road and wondering, a sharp voice came from behind him.
“Quick on it, Kelly! Now’s your chance!”
It was Levitt’s voice. Matt turned, only to be confronted by the burly
individual from the club garage. In a flash the man grabbed him and
hurled him crashing to his back among the bushes.
“Steady, my lad!” threatened Kelly. “I don’t want ter be any rougher
with ye than I have ter, but orders is orders--an’ they say you’re a
thief.”