WHAT MORTLAKE DID.
"Look here," cried Roy, indignantly wiggling in the officer's strong
grasp, "can't you see that this is all a mistake? If you hadn't grabbed
me, I could have caught that impostor."
A great light seemed to break on Lieut. Bradbury.
"Why, bless my soul," he exclaimed, "that's so. I can see it all, now.
That chap who got away wore a gray suit, while yours is a blue serge,
isn't it?"
"It was, before I was thrown into that cellar," said Roy ruefully.
The moon was shining brightly now, and he saw that, in the semi-darkness,
it would have been easy to mistake his blue serge, dust-covered as it was,
for one of gray material.
"Tell me exactly what has happened," urged the officer. "I must confess I
am in a mental whirl over to-night's happenings."
Roy rapidly sketched the events leading up to his capture and
imprisonment, not forgetting to lay the blame on himself for being so
gullible as to be led into such a pitfall.
"Not a word more of self-blame, my boy," cried the young officer warmly.
"Older persons than you would have stumbled into such an artfully prepared
snare, baited as it was with the hope of catching Mortlake in a plot to
destroy your aeroplane. But now I'm going to tell you my experiences, and
we can see if they dovetail at any point."
But when Lieut. Bradbury concluded his narrative, they were still at sea
as to the main instigator of the plot. Of course, the finger of suspicion
pointed pretty plainly to Mortlake, but the rascal had covered his tracks
so cleverly that neither Roy nor the young officer felt prepared to
actually accuse him.
"But I can't see how an ordinary workman would have had either the brains
or the motive to direct such an ingenious scheme to discredit me in your
eyes," concluded Roy, as they finished discussing this phase of the
question.
"Nor I. But hark! Somebody's shouting. It must be Mortlake. Yes, it is.
Hull--o--a!"
"Hullo--a!" came back out of the night.
"Come, we will retrace our steps to the auto and meet him there," said the
lieutenant.
"I wonder if he'll have the face to brazen it out?" thought Roy, by which
it will be seen that his mind was pretty well made up as to the "power
behind" the night's work.
"Couldn't come near the fellow," puffed Mortlake, as they came up. "He ran
like a deer. But--great Christmas--you've had better luck, I see!"
For an instant, even in the semi-darkness, Roy saw the other's face grow
white as ashes.
"He thinks that Lieut. Bradbury has caught my impersonator," was the
thought that flashed through the boy's mind.
But the same sudden radiance that had betrayed Mortlake's agitation also
showed him that it was the real Roy Prescott he was facing. Instantly he
assumed a mask of the greatest apparent astonishment.
"Roy Prescott, I am really amazed that you should be implicated in such
a----"
"Save your breath, Mr. Mortlake," snapped out the lieutenant, and his
words came sharp as the crack of a whip; "this is the real Roy Prescott,
and he has been the victim of as foul a plot to blacken an honest lad's
name as ever came to my knowledge. The young ruffian who impersonated him
to-night has escaped."
"Escaped!" exclaimed Mortlake, but to Roy's quick ears, despite the
other's attempt to disguise his relief, it stood out boldly.
"Yes, escaped. Partly owing, I confess, to my overzealousness. There has
been foul play here somewhere, Mr. Mortlake."
The officer's voice was stern. His eye flashed ominously. Just then old
Mr. Harding came puffing up.
"Oh, so you got the boy, hey?" he cackled, but Mortlake shut him off with
a quick word.
"No. This is the real Roy Prescott. It seems that a trick has been put up
on us all. The lad we mistook for Roy Prescott was some one impersonating
him. This lad has been the victim of a vile plot. While we were watching
here for his supposed appearance and the revelation of his treachery, some
rascals had locked him in a cellar."
The lieutenant's words were hot and angry. He felt that he was facing two
clever rascals, whose cunning was too much for his straightforward
methods.
"You--you amaze me!" exclaimed old Mr. Harding, looking in the moonlight
like some hideous old ghoul. "What game of cross-purposes and crooked
answers is this?"
"That remains to be seen. I shall see to it that an investigation is made
and the guilty parties punished."
Was it fancy, or did Roy, for a second, see Mortlake quail and whiten?
But if the boy had seen such a thing, the next instant Mortlake was master
of himself.
"It seems to me to have been a plot put up by my workmen," he said. "If I
find it to be so, I shall discharge every one of them. Poor fellows, in
their mistaken loyalty to me, perhaps they thought that they were doing me
a good turn by trying to discredit my young friend--I am proud to call him
so--my young friend, Prescott."
For the first time, Roy was moved to speak.
"I hardly think that your workmen were responsible, Mr. Mortlake," he said
slowly and distinctly.
"You do not? Who, then?"
"I don't know, yet, but I shall, you can depend upon that."
"Really? How very clever we are. Smart as a steel trap, hey?" grated
out old Harding, rubbing his hands. "Smart as a steel trap, with teeth
that bite and hold, hey, hey, hey?"
"Instead of wasting time here, I propose that we at once go to the house
in which Roy was confined, and see if we can catch the rascals implicated
in this," said Lieut. Bradbury. "Can you guide us, my boy?"
"I think so, sir. It's not more than half an hour's tramp from here," said
Roy. "Let's be off at once, otherwise they may escape us."
"Ridiculous, in my opinion," said Mortlake decisively. "Depend upon it,
those ruffians have found out by now how cleverly the boy escaped them,
and have decamped. We had much better get back to town and notify the
police."
"I beg your pardon, but I differ from your opinion," said the naval
officer, looking at the other sharply. "Of course, if you don't want to
go----"
"Oh, it isn't that," Mortlake hastened to say. "I'm willing, but Mr.
Harding. He is old, and the night air----"
"Mr. Harding can remain with the automobile. There are plenty of wraps in
it. Come, Roy. Are you coming, Mr. Mortlake?"
"Yes, oh, yes. Mr. Harding, you will make yourself comfortable till we
return."
Having said this, Mortlake came lumbering after the other two, as eagerly
as if his whole soul was bent on capturing the two men who had been
carrying out his orders.
"I've got a revolver ready for them," he volunteered, as the party plunged
through the woods along the little track Roy had followed.
"Take care it doesn't go off prematurely and alarm them," said the
officer. "We don't want to let them slip through our fingers."
"Of course not; I'll be very careful," promised Mortlake.
They trudged on in silence. Suddenly Roy halted.
"We're near to the place now," he said.
"Advance cautiously in single file," ordered the lieutenant. "I'll go
first."
In Indian file, they crept up on the house. Its outlines could now be
seen, and in one window a ruddy glow from the lamp the two abductors of
Roy had kindled. Evidently they had not yet discovered his escape.
All at once Mortlake, who was last, stumbled on a root and fell forward;
as he did so, his revolver was discharged twice. The shots rang out loudly
in the still night.
Instantly the light was extinguished. The next instant two dark figures
could be seen racing from the house. Before Lieut. Bradbury could call on
them to halt, they vanished in the darkness and a patch of woods to the
north.
"What a misfortune!" exclaimed Mortlake contritely, picking himself up.
Lieutenant Bradbury could hardly restrain his anger.
"How on earth did you happen to do that, Mortlake?" he snapped. "Those two
shots alarmed those rascals, and now they're gone for good. It's most
annoying."
"I appreciate your chagrin, my dear Bradbury," rejoined Mortlake suavely,
"but accidents will happen, you know."
"Yes, and sometimes they happen most opportunely," was the sharp reply.
Mortlake said nothing. In silence they approached the house, but nothing
save the pack of greasy cards, was found there to indicate the identity of
its late occupants.
There was nothing to do but to return to the automobile. They found old
Mr. Harding awaiting them eagerly. He showed no emotion on learning that
Roy's captors had escaped just as their capture seemed certain.
On the drive back to Sandy Beach, the old banker and Mortlake occupied the
front seat, while Roy and Lieut. Bradbury sat in the tonneau. As they
skimmed along, Roy drew something from his pocket and showed it to the
officer. It was an object that glistened in the wavering moonlight.
"It's a woman's hair comb!" cried the officer in amazement, as he regarded
it.
"Hush, not so loud," warned Roy. "I picked it up where I had the struggle
with the other Roy Prescott. It may prove a valuable clue."