AN UNEXPECTED RETURN—CONCLUSION.
It is well said that strange happenings often bunch themselves, and so
it proved upon the present occasion.
As the train for Jersey City upon which Larry and the officer were
riding pulled into Elizabethport station, our hero caught sight of a
familiar figure lounging near the news stand.
“Well, I never!” he gasped. “Lank Possy!”
“Who is it?” questioned the officer.
“Lank Possy, the fellow who helped Sluggers at the tenement house fire.”
“You are sure?” asked the officer, who had heard our hero’s story in
detail.
“Positive.”
“Then he should be arrested.”
Just then a policeman hove into sight, and Larry ran out of the car and
called to him.
“Arrest that fellow!” he cried, and pointed at Lank Possy.
The bully of Ferryville was dumfounded on seeing Larry, but he quickly
recovered and started to run. But Larry was after him, and like a flash
he tripped the rascal up.
The Elizabethport policeman wanted to know what was the matter, and
Larry called the Perth Amboy officer to help explain matters.
Lank Possy begged hard to be let go, but Larry would not listen to it.
Possy was in tatters and looked like a tramp.
“I just came in from a tramp through Pennsylvania,” he said. “Ain’t had
a square meal in a month. What a fool I was to go wrong!” And he almost
began to blubber.
“Perhaps you can turn State’s evidence against Sluggers and the rest,”
suggested Larry, and in the end Lank Possy jumped at the chance. He
said he would go on to New York willingly, and the Perth Amboy officer
took him in charge.
As soon as the metropolis was gained, the party hurried to the police
station, and there Larry told his story again, and the Perth Amboy
officer told what he knew.
The police captain had heard of Larry’s gallant work as a fireman, and
listened to what was said with close attention.
“If your story is true, Martin Pollox is certainly a thorough villain,”
he said, when Larry had finished. “He must be arrested without delay.”
“That’s just what I want.”
“Do you want to go with the officers who make the arrests?”
“Yes. I want them to bring away those drawings which belong to my
father.”
“Very well, you shall go.”
Two experienced detectives were called in and matters were quickly
explained. Larry had had no sleep and no breakfast, but he did not
think of these things in the excitement.
When the party reached the Pollox mansion they found it apparently
closed up.
“It may be a bluff,” said Larry. “One of you had better go to the door
and ask to see Mr. Pollox on important business.”
“A good idea,” answered the leader of the detectives, and hurried on,
leaving Larry and the second officer crouching behind some stone steps
further up the block.
A servant answered the detective’s summons.
“Sorry, sir, but Mr. Pollox isn’t at home,” she said.
“And when will he be home?”
“I can’t say, sir.”
The servant closed the door again, and the detective joined Larry and
his fellow officer once more.
“We might——” he began, when Larry clutched his arm.
“Here he comes, down the street!” whispered our hero. “Check Sluggers
is with him. Make sure they don’t slip us. Sluggers can run like a
deer.”
They waited until the rascals were directly in front of the steps, and
then Larry confronted the pair.
“Stop!” he cried, and Martin Pollox and Sluggers fell back as if they
had seen a ghost.
“Yo—you!” gasped Pollox. “Whe—where did you—er—come from?”
“You know well enough, Martin Pollox,” answered Larry. “Officers, make
them both prisoners.”
“The game is busted!” muttered Sluggers, and started to run.
But one of the detectives was too quick for him. Then Pollox tried to
run also, but Larry and the second detective collared him.
“It is all a—a—mistake,” gasped Martin Pollox, when he was being
handcuffed.
“It’s too late to talk about mistakes now,” said Larry, coldly. “You
can think it over when you are doing time in prison.”
“Doing time in prison!” shrieked Martin Pollox. “No! no! Do not send me
to prison, I beg of you. I—I will make it all right! You shall have
all that is coming to you!”
He clutched Larry, and begged and pleaded, but our hero was obdurate.
“You have played the villain, Martin Pollox, and you must suffer the
consequences,” he said. “I hope you get the full limit of the law, for
you have not only committed crimes against my father and me, but you
were trying your best to cheat Mary Vern out of her inheritance.”
“I—I was crazy! I did not know what I was doing! Sluggers tempted
me!” went on the rascal, desperately.
“I tempted him!” roared Sluggers. “He tempted me—the sneak. If I had
my way I’d fix you!” And he raised his manacled hands threateningly.
The detectives would allow no more talking, and Pollox was marched to
his mansion.
Here a search was made, and not only the drawings, but a number of
important agreements were found, proving how Pollox had tried to cheat
Walter Barlow, and how he had had the man kidnapped and sent to Ponce,
and also how he had had old Caleb Backstay carried off.
“You’re in for a good term at Sing Sing,” said one of the detectives to
Pollox.
“I’ll turn State’s evidence,” put in Sluggers, eagerly.
“We won’t need you,” answered Larry, dryly. “We have got witnesses
enough. Lank Possy is under arrest.”
This was the last straw to break the camel’s back, and Check Sluggers
said no more.
An hour later found the evildoers behind the bars, and then Larry
started for home to tell his sister Kate of all the wonderful things
which had happened.
As he entered the kitchen he heard joyful talking in the parlor. Kate
was speaking.
“Won’t Larry be surprised,” she was saying. “He’ll think it too
wonderful for anything.”
Larry hurried into the parlor, and stopped near the doorway,
spellbound. There, in an easy chair, sat—yes, it was—his father!
“Father!” he fairly shouted, and at that word, Mr. Barlow leaped up.
“Is it really you?”
“Yes, Larry,” answered the parent, and embraced his son.
“How did you get here?” went on our hero. “I thought you were in Porto
Rico?”
“How did you learn he was in Porto Rico?” questioned Kate.
“It’s a long story. Pollox is under arrest, and so are Check Sluggers
and Captain Naxon.”
“Arrested!” cried both Kate and Walter Barlow.
“Yes, arrested, and from them I learned, father, that you were on a
plantation in Porto Rico, a place attached to an asylum.”
“I was there, but I watched my chances and escaped a month ago.”
“Of course, you were not insane?”
“No, Larry, but they tried to make me think so. It was an awful plot,
and if those rascals are under arrest it shall go hard with them,”
continued Mr. Barlow.
And then he told his story in detail, of how he had been robbed and
carried away, and how he had tried to get back or to send word home.
He had been on a plantation kept by a wicked Spaniard, but the Don was
dead, having been shot down by a Cuban he had flogged.
It was a joyful family party that gathered at the Barlow home that
night. Each one had to tell his story several times, and Kate had much
to tell, too. But the young housekeeper did not forget her duties, and
spread a feast for her father and brother which made their eyes glisten.
“You’re like your mother, Kate,” declared Mr. Barlow. “God bless you!”
A few words more, and I will bring my tale to a close.
In due course of time Martin Pollox and his companions in crime were
tried and found guilty of their various offenses. For what they had
done, Pollox was sent to prison for twelve years, and the others for
almost as long.
Lank Possy turned State’s evidence and was, consequently, not tried for
what he had done to aid Check Sluggers. But he overreached himself when
he thought the law would not touch him afterwards, for he was later
arrested for the Printing Works robbery, and for this was sentenced to
two years’ imprisonment.
During Martin Pollox’s trial it came out that he had become the
executor of Richard Vern’s will by fraud, and, consequently, his
executorship, so called, was set aside, and Mary had a new guardian
appointed, Fire Commissioner Kessenger, her father’s old friend.
The new guardian found Richard Vern’s memorandum book, and in this an
entry leaving our hero five hundred dollars for his bravery at the
hotel fire, so Larry received three hundred dollars in addition to what
Pollox had so grudgingly turned over to him.
Several years later Caleb Backstay was heard of at San Francisco, and
was assisted by both Mr. Barlow and Larry.
The patent elevator lift was found to be the sole property of Walter
Barlow, and this was afterward sold to an elevator company for twenty
thousand dollars. The elevator company also took hold of Larry’s patent
ladder, and inside of three years our hero received nearly fifteen
thousand dollars in royalties.
Mary Vern was glad enough to part company with Laura Pollox, who was
now practically a beggar, and who had to earn her living by going
out to sew among the very persons with whom she had once associated
socially. She made very little, and out of the goodness of her heart,
Mary helped her in many ways, but it is doubtful if Laura Pollox ever
appreciated this kindness.
Larry did not stop at one invention, but resigned his position as a
fireman and devoted all of his time to his patents, and inside of five
years was comfortably fixed for life. In the meantime Mary Vern and
he remained the warmest of friends, and nobody was surprised when the
invitations for their marriage came out.
“I thought so all along,” said Kate. “Well, Larry couldn’t do better,
and Mary couldn’t do better, either.”
It was a happy affair all around, and one long to be remembered, and
here we will leave them, wishing them the best of good luck.
Transcriber’s Notes.
1. Silently corrected simple spelling, grammar, and typographical
errors.
2. Retained anachronistic and non-standard spellings as printed.
3. Some of the illustrations have been moved to be closer to their
descriptions.
4. Transcriber’s Note: Italic text is denoted by _underscores_ and
bold text by =equal signs=.