THE TRUTH COMES OUT.
By herculean efforts, the arrest of Jim Phillips was kept as a close
secret. Bromlow, despite his conviction, which was honest enough, that
Jim was guilty, dared not oppose Brady too far, and was willing enough
that the matter should be kept quiet, moreover, for the sake of the bank
itself. But one of the few persons who heard about the arrest was
Barrows, who chuckled grimly. He expected that Dick Merriwell would also
be involved, and he felt that he could already spend the extra five
thousand dollars that Phelps had promised him.
“We’re not getting as much as we expected out of this,” he said to
Bascom. “But we can go back for the rest later. And, in the meantime,
Riggs is all right, still in the bank, and still able to serve us if we
want him again. Merriwell and Phillips are in a hole they’ll never be
able to crawl out of, and we’ve got ten thousand dollars.”
“Are you sure this money we’ve got is all right?” asked Bascom. “I
understand, of course, that the bank hasn’t got the numbers of the real
notes, but how about Merriwell himself? He may have the numbers?”
“Wouldn’t he have said so, to clear himself long before this?” asked
Barrows. “The thing has worked out better than I thought was possible.
That was why I took the chance of getting that money back to Riggs.
Otherwise, I’d have let him go, and made a quick jump out of here after
getting what I could for these notes. It’s a good thing our plan didn’t
work out, really. We’re better off than we expected to be.”
Barrows, complacent and self-satisfied, enjoyed his triumph over Harding
to the full. He strutted around the other gambler’s haunts, making a
lavish display of his money, and spending it liberally. His old friends,
who had shown signs of deserting him after the disaster that had
overtaken him in New London, returned at once, and Harding felt himself
discredited and ridiculous in the eyes of his friends. Barrows had
turned the tables neatly.
Even some of the politicians who backed Harding were inclined to laugh
at him.
“You seem to have raised a husky chap in this fellow Barrows,” said one
of them. “Poor work, Bill. You saved him from going under a year ago—and
now he’s making you look foolish. There’s nothing on him now.”
“If there is, let them do what they like to him,” growled Harding. “He’s
too fresh. He thinks he’s the whole cheese now, just because he’s
managed to get a stake. I bet there’s something crooked about the way he
got it, too. Give the bulls the tip to soak him if they get a chance,
will you?”
“Sure thing,” said the politician. “He’s nothing to me. But I guess he’s
got his tracks pretty well covered.”
“He hasn’t got sense enough,” said Harding. “He was up against it hard
after that break he made at New London, and he took any way he could to
make a stake.”
Even had Barrows known of this conversation, it would not have worried
him. Like Harding’s political friend, he thought that he was safe from
pursuit. He spent his money as he liked, without a thought of the
careless way in which he was changing hundred-dollar bills. And, less
than thirty-six hours after he had reached New York with Bascom, he was
offering one of his yellow bills in payment for a handful of cigars,
when a heavy hand fell on his shoulder, and a detective, well known to
him by sight, told him that he was under arrest.
“Quit your kidding!” said Barrows. “You can’t arrest me. You’ve got
nothing on me.”
“I’ve got a warrant, issued on the request of the New Haven police,”
said the detective, with a grin. “This is the time you’ve missed your
guess, Barrows. The warrant charges the robbery of five thousand dollars
from the Elm National Bank.”
Bascom escaped. But Barrows, despite his best efforts, was forced to
believe that there was no chance for him. His political influence had
disappeared—Harding had seen to that—and he found that it was useless to
fight his removal to Connecticut, where a jail sentence was sure to be
his portion. The New York police are excellent workers. When they are
free from political influence, against which, in the old days, they were
helpless, they are efficient and fearless. And in this case, the words
of Bromlow, meant to apply to Jim Phillips, were the death knell of his
hopes. Two thieves had fallen out, and it was time for honest men to
reap the rewards of their honesty.
The proceedings in New Haven were simple and direct. Dick Merriwell had
kept the numbers of all the bills that he had deposited in the New Haven
bank, a simple precaution not always taken even by business men when
they are handling large sums, but never neglected by him. And the
evidence that he gave was ample to show that the money he had deposited
was perfectly good. Suspicion, thus directed toward Riggs, showed the
extent of the plot. It was soon made plain that Riggs had falsified the
numbers of all the bills in the vaults of the bank, and it was plain
that it had been the intention of Barrows and his fellow plotters to
substitute counterfeit money for all of that huge sum. Thus detection of
the theft, one of the greatest ever planned, would have been delayed
long enough to put the stolen money into circulation all over the
country, and it would have been impossible to trace any of it, since the
bank had none of the numbers of the genuine bills.
Riggs, seeing the evidence piling up, confessed his original theft, and
his share in the greater conspiracy, and thus the New Haven police
secured evidence which resulted in the closing up of Marsten’s gambling
place and his swift departure for parts unknown. The New Haven police
had long hunted for evidence against him, but had never before been able
to get any that was worth anything in court. Foote, too, appalled at the
extent of the conspiracy thus revealed, confessed, and the notes signed
by him and held by Marsten, which had been abandoned in his hasty
flight, were destroyed.
In view of the valuable evidence he was able to give against Barrows,
Riggs got only a suspended sentence for his own robbery, and Brady’s
father, urged by his son and Dick Merriwell, saw that the teller
received a place where he would be removed from temptation to steal.
Barrows was sentenced to five years in prison, being convicted without
difficulty, since the complete collapse of his plans left him friendless
and powerless.
Jim Phillips was completely cleared when the watchman, after treatment
in the hospital, was again called upon to identify him, his story being
confirmed in every detail. The watchman told of Jim’s effort to release
him, and of as much of the fight as he had seen, and even Bromlow was
forced to admit that Jim’s baseball training had saved the bank.
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