THE BULLY IS HUMBLED
Many a man would have been startled by such a direct accusation, but J.
Rutherford Brown had been in a similar position before and was not to
be scared thus easily. He turned slowly, put his feet on the floor and
gazed coldly at Hockley.
“Young man, you are mistaken,” he said. “And if you dare to repeat your
words you will be sorry.”
“But I say--” went on the youth, and then the look in the eyes of the
man made him pause. It was a merciless, crafty face that peered into
his own and it made Hockley shiver in spite of himself.
“We had several fair and square games of cards,” went on the man from
Montana. “And you lost your money. Don’t be a calf to cry over it. If
you are in hard luck say so, and I’ll--well, I’ll lend you ten dollars.”
As he concluded J. Rutherford Brown calmly took from his hip pocket a
big roll of bills--a large portion of them Hockley’s bills--and drew
forth one of the denomination mentioned.
“Do you want this?” he asked, extending the bill between the tips of
his fingers.
“Ye--yes,” stammered the youth, and took it. “But--but----”
“I don’t want to talk over the affair of yesterday,” interrupted the
man. “If you will remember, I lost something before the luck turned. If
you had quit the game then, I should not have squealed. Besides that, I
took you away, so that you would not get into trouble while you slept.
I spent ten dollars for carriage fare, but we will let that pass.”
Having thus delivered himself, J. Rutherford Brown hoisted his feet to
the table once more and resumed the reading of his newspaper. Hockley
looked at him in amazement not unmixed with consternation. He had never
before met such a fellow as this. He did not know how to proceed, and
walked away revolving the situation in his mind.
The more he thought it over, the more Hockley became convinced that
he could do little or nothing. Of course, if it came to the pinch, J.
Rutherford Brown would deny everything, and as there were no witnesses
to what had occurred, legal proof would be hard to obtain.
“I’ve been a chump,” he muttered as he walked out of the hotel. “A
downright chump.”
As there seemed nothing else to do, he turned his footsteps in the
direction of the hotel at which the professor and the other boys were
stopping. His heart felt like lead in his bosom and he could not for
the life of him conjure up what to say. He knew that excuses would be
unavailing, that Professor Strong would insist upon making a rigid
investigation.
As he turned a corner leading to the hotel he came face to face with
Professor Strong, who was walking with another man, a native hired to
show the party the sights.
“Jacob Hockley,” cried the professor. “Where have you been? We have
been hunting everywhere for you.”
“It’s a long story, sir,” answered Hockley, meekly. “And if you please,
I’d like to get breakfast before I tell it.”
“So you have had nothing to eat? Then come to the hotel by all means.
But where have you been?”
“Out of town, a good many miles, I guess.”
“Out of town?”
“Yes, sir. And I’ve lost the most of my money,” went on the lank youth,
desperately.
“How did you lose that?” And now Professor Strong’s face grew stern.
Hockley felt a certain quaking within him. It would never do to say
that he had been playing cards--worse, that he had been gambling.
Professor Strong had read the young travelers more than one lecture on
evils of this sort.
“I--I got in a crowd and somehow I either lost the money or it was
taken from me,” stammered the bully. “But please don’t tell the
others,” he went on. “They’ll only have the laugh on me.”
“Just give me the details,” said Professor Strong, briefly, and then
Hockley had to invent a long tale of how he had gone carriage riding
down to the seashore and how, while he was getting a lunch at a
restaurant, there had been a horse runaway and he had gone out to see
the excitement.
“There was more of a crowd than I thought,” he continued. “I was shoved
around by a policeman and a number of natives. I had been counting my
money and when the excitement began I rammed it in my hip pocket. When
I went back to the eating place the money was gone.”
“And what made you remain away all night?”
“It was growing dark when the runaway happened and I thought I could
find the money this morning. But I didn’t find anything.”
“Humph! How about your watch and that ring you are in the habit of
wearing?”
Hockley felt a certain cold chill steal over him. In his haste to
smooth matters over he had forgotten about the watch and the ring.
“They--er--they got lost too,” he said, lamely, his face growing very
red.
“Quite likely,” was Professor Strong’s comment. “Come with me. We will
get to the bottom of this later on--after you have had something to
eat.”
Hockley was hungry, but eating breakfast came very hard to him that
morning. As soon as he had finished Professor Strong plied him with
questions, and at last he broke down and confessed all--how he had
received the money order from home and how he had started out to have
a little quiet fun, as he called it. And then, when the professor
insisted that he take him to the spot where the runaway had occurred,
he had to admit that there had been no runaway but that he had fallen
into the hands of a sharper, and that the sharper now had all the money
excepting ten dollars and the amount spent for the dinner.
“I am sure he drugged me,” said Hockley, weakly. “He wouldn’t have
gotten the money from me if he hadn’t.”
“I will see the man,” returned Professor Strong, shortly, and insisted
that the youth show the way to where J. Rutherford Brown might be found.
The man from Montana stood upon the hotel steps, just preparatory to
going on a hunt for another victim. He was smoking a black-looking
cigar. He felt particularly elated, for between Hockley and a victim
picked up two days before he had come into the possession of over three
hundred dollars. To be sure, this was no fortune, especially to one
supposed to own valuable gold mines in the West, but to J. Rutherford
Brown, who had often had less than a dollar in his pockets, it was a
considerable sum.
“Don’t think I’ll stay here much longer,” he mused, as he puffed away.
“That boy or that man from Philadelphia may turn up and make trouble.
Guess I’ll go back to San Juan.”
“There is the fellow!” cried Hockley, to Professor Strong. “The man
with the checked suit, who is smoking.”
The professor took a good look and then he smiled grimly to himself. “I
fancy we are in luck,” he said, briefly. “I know this fellow.”
“You do?” ejaculated Hockley. “Who is he?”
Professor Strong did not answer, but going up to the man from Montana
clapped him on the arm.
“So we meet again, Henry Umbler,” he said.
The man who had called himself J. Rutherford Brown gave a start and his
face changed color. Then he recovered and endeavored to put on a bold
front.
“You are mistaken, sir. My name is not Umbler,” he said.
“We won’t argue the point, Umbler. I want you to pay back to this young
man the money you took from him.”
“Don’t know him, sir. You are making a mistake.”
“Are you sure of this fellow?” questioned Professor Strong of Hockley.
“Yes, sir,” was the prompt answer.
“Then, Umbler, you must give up the money, every cent of it. Please to
remember that you are in United States territory now--not in Brazil,
where you were when last we met. I fancy some stockholders of the
International Star Rubber Company would be glad to get their hands on
Henry Umbler, one of the promoters of that get-rich-quick concern.”
“I tell you I am not Henry Umbler,” insisted the man from Montana.
“Very well then. We’ll go to police headquarters and settle this
affair.”
“What do you want?”
“I want this young man’s money, his watch and his ring returned to him.”
“What is he to you?”
“I brought him down here to see the sights,--and I am bound to see that
he is not swindled. Give him back his money and other things and I will
not prosecute you, but if you refuse, I’ll see to it that he not only
gets his money but that you go back to the West, where you belong.”
At this plain talk the face of the swindler became a study. At last he
turned and faced Hockley.
“We had a fair game,” he growled. “You’re a baby to squeal, nothing but
a baby. But if you want the money you can have it.”
He brought a roll of bills out of his pocket, and began to count out a
sum equal to that the youth had possessed. With this, and the watch and
ring, in his hand he looked again at Professor Strong.
“If I give him this does that close the whole affair?” he asked.
“Yes, so far is I am concerned,” answered Amos Strong.
“Then here you are, baby,” went on the man from Montana, and thrust the
money and other things into Hockley’s willing hand. “Don’t ever try to
be a sport again. You’re only fit to be let loose in a kindergarten.”
And then he walked away, puffing at his black cigar more furiously than
ever.
“Who is he?” questioned Hockley, as he put the money away, after
counting it.
“He is a Western sharp,” replied the professor. “Years ago he was mixed
up in a stock company that proved to be little better than a swindle.
I had some shares in it but managed to get my money back. I tried to
help others in the company, but they wouldn’t listen to my plan and
went ahead on their own account and lost. I met Umbler in Brazil once
and tried to get more money out of him, for the other stockholders, but
he laughed at me, for at that time it would have been a hard matter
to have a man transported from Brazil to the United States on such a
charge as I could make.”
“I--I am much obliged for getting the money back, sir.”
“It was rare good luck, Jacob, nothing else, and now you have it again
I want you to turn it over to me.”
“But, sir----.”
“I will not argue the matter.” Professor Strong’s voice grew stern once
more. “You can either give the money to me, or pack your trunk and go
home. And if you get into any more such scrapes I shall notify your
father and send you home anyway. I want no more gambling and no more
‘seeing the sights’ on your own account. You have got to turn over a
new leaf.”
For half an hour Amos Strong “laid down the law” to Hockley and at the
end of that time the bully felt very humble indeed. He did not wish to
be sent home, and he promised faithfully to do better in the future;
and there the affair was dropped.