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[Illustration: “Mine--mine ... and I must leave it all--must leave it
all--soon! Oh, so soon! God!” [_Page 7._]]
THE LAKE MYSTERY
by
MARVIN DANA
Author of
_The Woman of Orchids_, _A Puritan Witch_,
_Within the Law_, etc.
Frontispiece by J. Allen St. John
[Illustration]
Chicago
A. C. McClurg & Co.
1923
Copyright
Marvin Dana
1922-1923
Published September, 1923
Copyrighted in Great Britain
Printed in the United States of America
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
Prologue 1
I Adventurers’ Pact 15
II The Secretary 28
III The Assembling 38
IV Eve of Battle 48
V The Search Begins 62
VI The Sixth Sense 79
VII Haphazard Questing 94
VIII In the Recess 108
IX The Gold Song 121
X In the Wood 131
XI The Shot 147
XII The Secret Vault 166
XIII The Clue 177
XIV The Episode of the Launch 195
XV The Chart 203
XVI The Hold 219
XVII Masters Again 230
XVIII Dux Facti Femina 239
XIX In the Cavern 257
XX The Events of a Night 268
XXI The First Pit 288
XXII The Other Passage 303
XXIII The Blast 318
XXIV Entombed 332
XXV To the Chimney 345
XXVI In the Dark 359
THE LAKE MYSTERY
PROLOGUE
THE MISER
The Dresden clock on the mantel struck twelve in soft, slow, golden
notes. As the gentle echoes died away, Horace Abernethey, sitting
huddled in a morris chair before the fire of logs, stirred feebly.
Presently, he sat erect, moving clumsily, with the laboriousness
of senility. But there was nothing of the aged in the glances of
his keen, dark eyes, which shone forth brightly from out the pallid
parchment of his face. His intent gaze darted first toward the clock,
to verify the hour of which the gong had given warning; it went next
to the closed window on the right of the fireplace, over which the
shades had not been drawn. The unsheltered panes were spangled with
raindrops, and, as he watched, a new gust beat its tattoo on the
glass. The old man drew down the tip of his thin, beaklike nose in
a curious movement of disgust, then stroked petulantly the white
cascade of beard that flowed to his bosom.
“Curse such weather!” He snarled, in a voice querulous and shrill
with years. He stood up with sudden alertness, surprising after his
first awkward slowness; a brisk gesture of the head threw back from
his face the luxuriant white curls of hair. “But, in spite of it, I
must go again, and so make an end of the job--else--death might take
me unawares.”
Abernethey glanced aimlessly about the long, low-ceiled room, now
lighted only by the glow from the fire. After a little, he advanced
to the center, where a concert-grand piano dominated the scene. In a
moment more, he had lighted the tall lamp that stood at hand. A sheet
of music in manuscript was lying on the rack. He seized this, and
scanned it eagerly, muttering the while.
“Curious it should work out so,” he exclaimed, at last; “curious, and
infernally clever, too!” He seated himself before the instrument,
still holding communion with his thoughts. “Yes, it will
do--capitally--and it has the spirit of the thing. It chants the
curse.”
Suddenly, as he ceased speaking, the old man lifted his arms in a
quick, graceful movement. The long, clawlike fingers, supple still,
fell vehemently on the keys, in a clamor of melancholy music. There
was only a single strain of melody--that written on the page before
him; but he played it again and again, as if obsessed by its weird
rhythm, played it blatantly, tenderly, with reluctant slowness,
with masterful swiftness. And, as he went on and on, he abandoned
the simplicity of the written score. In its stead, he multiplied
harmonies, superimposed innumerable variations. The musical rapture
revealed the decrepit old man as a virtuoso. The treatment of the
theme showed him to be at once the scholar and the creature of vivid
emotional imagination, while the physical interpretation of the
dreaming that drove him on displayed a technique astonishing in one
so burdened with years.
But ever, throughout the wildest extravagances of his fancy’s flight,
there was no failure of that first morbid rhythm, of that first
monotonous melody in minor set on the sheet before him.
This was the score on which he built the ordered sequence of his
improvisations:
[Music]
The player ended with a harsh clangor from the keys, and whirled
about on the stool to stare intently toward the wall opposite the
fireplace. Now, his pallid face in the glimpse that showed above the
beard, was faintly flushed from the bodily strain of playing. But the
fire burning in the dark eyes proved that the emotion within still
maintained its vigor undiminished. Springing up, he drew his tall,
thin form to its full height, and stood thus motionless for a long
minute, gazing fixedly at the wall before him. Then, again with the
swift movement of the head by which the white curls were thrown back
from his brow, he strode forward, and came to a stand facing the
naked wainscoting of the wall.
In the long, barren room, devoid of other ornament, this paneling was
of itself sufficient to command attention. Beyond a few scattered
chairs, a solitary table with its lamp, the irons of the fireplace,
a cabinet for music, the piano and the high lamp standing beside it,
there was nothing in the place, not even so much as draperies to
mask the ugliness of the window-shades. Such scarcity of furnishing
was emphasized by the size of the apartment, which was fifty feet
in length and half as wide. Doubtless, the occupant had preferred
the space thus free from aught that might in any wise hamper the
resonance of the music. Be that as it may, the ornateness of the
wainscoting was made conspicuous, since only the piano offered
another interest. Of black walnut, it ran to a height of at least
seven feet out of the ten that measured the wall, and, extending
around the four sides of the room, gave to the aspect of the place a
quality of melancholy so extreme as to be almost funereal--an effect
in no way lessened on closer observation, since the deep carving was
merely a conventional labyrinth of scrolls.
The manner in which Abernethey scanned the wall opposite him was too
intent to be explained by any ordinary concern with woodwork long
familiar. Moreover, his eyes were glowing fiercely; the talonlike
fingers writhed curiously where they hung at his sides; the shaggy
white brows were drawn low; from time to time, the tip of the thin
nose was thrust downward in the movement peculiar to him. It was
plain that he was in the grip of profound feeling, though he stood
mute before a stark space of wall.
The old man bestirred himself abruptly. His right arm was raised with
swift grace; the dexterous fingers played for a moment silently, yet
firmly, on the crowded traceries of the carving. A flurry of wind
brought the rain clattering noisily against the window-panes, but the
musician gave no heed; the clock rang softly from a single stroke of
the gong, but his ears had no care for the hour. He was muttering to
himself now, brokenly, despairingly, the while his fingers wandered
over the intricate design of the paneling:
“Mine--mine ... and I must leave it all--must leave it all--soon! Oh,
so soon! God! The torture of it ... mine--all mine! Ah!”
Without warning sound the panel on which his hand rested had swung
outward, until it stood like a door, wide-open. An ejaculation of
eagerness burst from Abernethey’s lips, as he peered within the
opening thus revealed through the wall. A large plate of polished
steel glimmered in the dim light that came from the lamp beside the
piano. A figured knob in the center of this plate proclaimed the fact
that here was a cunningly contrived safety-vault.
The old man’s arm again reached forth with that astonishing quickness
which characterized his every movement. Now, the agile fingers seized
the knob of the safe door, twirling it with practised certainty of
touch. Presently, the methodical adjustment complete, he tugged
briskly on the knob, and the door swung outward. An exclamation of
delight burst from Abernethey’s lips; his form grew suddenly tense.
With febrile haste, he put both hands to the lighter inner doors,
and pulled them open. A small electric torch lay ready to hand just
within, on which he seized. Immediately, its soft radiance revealed
the whole interior of the recess.
The space was well filled with canvas bags, of the sort commonly
used to contain specie. Their appearance there, thus hidden and
protected, left no doubt of the fact that they were the old man’s
chief treasure. For that matter, there was nothing else inside the
vault, not even ledgers, or papers of any sort whatever. It was quite
evident that Abernethey had no hesitation in trusting his other
valuables to less-secret places of security. Here, he concealed with
such elaborate precaution only actual coin. And now, secure from all
observation at midnight in this remote region, where the isolation of
time and place were intensified by the downpour of the tempest, the
aged musician gave free rein to his consuming passion, stripped from
his nature the last mask of hypocrisy, gloated and adored at beck of
that devil who was his master.
Abernethey nimbly caught up two of the bags, and bore them to the
table that stood against the wall to the right of the vault, where
he set them down with a softness of movement which was like a caress
in its tenderness. Then, he sank into a chair beside the table,
and began untying the cord that held shut the mouth of one of the
bags. It was only a matter of seconds until the sack gaped open--he
paused now, to stare about the room with furtive, fearful eyes. His
scrutiny was directed principally toward the windows: his lips were
drawn in a snarl as he realized that the shades had not been pulled
down. He sprang to his feet, and darted to the nearest, where he
arranged the shade to his satisfaction, mumbling and mouthing the
while. Afterward, he made a round of the room, very swiftly, yet
using all care to render himself secure from observation by anyone
without. A glance at the doors having shown him that all these were
shut fast, he at last strode back to the table, where the money-bags
awaited him. The chair was drawn close; into it, Abernethey sagged
heavily, as if in sudden relaxation from the taut energy that had
urged him on hitherto. For a half-minute, he sat crouched over the
table in an attitude of utter weariness, almost of collapse. But
abruptly, he aroused himself from the clutch of lethargy. Once again,
he held himself upright; again, his eyes searched the room craftily,
alight with emotional fires. Finally, his arms rose swiftly, swooped
forward and downward, until the talonlike fingers closed on the
bags, which he drew tight to his breast where it pressed against
the table. In this posture, which was like an embrace, he remained
moment after moment, tense, alert, movelessly alive in every fibre
of him. Then, putting term to the rapturous pause the old man sighed
faintly, as one who, with infinite reluctance, awakes from ecstasy.
He sat rigid, and pushed the two bags a slight distance from the
edge of the table. For another little interval, he stared at them,
half-doubtfully, in the manner of one returning slowly to reality
after the illusions of a dream. A second sigh was breathed from his
lips, not blissful now, but weighted with bleak despair. Presently,
he tossed his head impatiently, and began fumbling with the string of
the second bag. This yielded speedily, as had that of the first. In
another instant, he had poured forth the contents of the two sacks;
on the table before him lay twin heaps of gold.
Afterward, for more than an hour, the miser gave full play to
his vice. Before the smoldering fires of the metal, he worshiped
devoutly, abjectly. His soul prostrated itself in adoration beneath
the golden glory that he so loved and reverenced. At times, he
plunged his fingers within the heaps, listening raptly to the
clinking song of the coins as they were moved haphazard by the
contact; at times, he sat dumb, crooning softly, as if these bits of
metal had been sentient things to hark to his hymn of praise. Other
vagaries were his, innumerable follies, nameless abasements before
this, his most sacred shrine.
Of a sudden, Abernethey sprang to his feet. Leaving the glittering
piles on the table, he hurried to the piano, where he seated himself
with face turned toward the altar of his worship. The supple fingers
touched the keys anew; the melancholy air which he had played before
sounded once again. But now, it was rendered simply, without extremes
of emotion on the part of its interpreter, without variations in its
harmonic forms. Instead, the old man played it slowly and gently
throughout, repeating it monotonously many times. The morbid rhythm
stood forth ghastly in its naked, sordid truth. It came as a hopeless
confession of despair, the ultimate fact in the vice that was his
master.
Abernethey went back to the table, stacked coins until he had the
measure of a bagful, and thus divided the gold, which was then
returned to the sacks. Next, he brought forth other bags from the
vault, until the table was covered. This done, he went out of the
room, to reappear after a minute, wearing an old soft hat and a
rain-coat with capacious pockets, in which he stored, one by one, the
bags of gold.
“Two more trips will do it,” he muttered to himself, as he turned to
close and lock the vault. “I must dictate that letter tonight.” Under
the touch of his hand, the section of wainscoting swung back into
its place. There was not even the suggestion of a crevice to hint of
the hiding-place behind the carved wood; the miser turned, and went
hastily from the room.
* * * * *
The Dresden clock on the mantel had just sounded the hour of four
with its golden notes when Abernethey reentered. The water ran in
a stream from his hat; all around him on the floor, as he came
to a stand inside the door, drops from the rain-coat formed a
growing pool. With a gesture of weariness, he cast off the hat,
then freed himself from the coat, which he threw down on the floor
with a carelessness which of itself was sufficient evidence that
the treasure of gold was no longer there. He went forward to the
fireplace, where he sank down into the morris chair, huddling without
movement, as one exhausted. It was half an hour before he had rested
enough for further exertion. Then, clumsily and with many groans,
he stood up, and once more left the room. He returned soon with a
phonograph and a box of rolls, which he set on the table. After he
had arranged the machine, he began to dictate a letter into the
receiver. His words came distinctly, swiftly, without ever any trace
of hesitation. As soon as the first roll had been filled with the
record, he paused to insert another, and then straightway continued
with similar precision. When, at last, the miser made an end, he had
used many rolls, and the first gleam of dawn was beating weakly on
the drawn shades of the room.
CHAPTER I
ADVENTURERS’ PACT
Saxe Temple regarded with pardonable pride the supper-table laid for
four in the parlor of his bachelor apartment. Then, as a knock made
known the first arrival, he went to the door, and opened it eagerly.
At sight of the tall, soldier-like figure standing on the threshold,
his face lighted.
“Roy Morton, by all that’s good!” he cried.
“Hello Saxe, old man,” came the answer, in a musical monotone
surprisingly gentle from one so stalwart. “Got your letter, and here
I am. Incidentally, I’m tickled to death over the idea of some real
excitement. I haven’t had any since a jolly fight in Mexico with a
detective, who thought I was an absconder from the States, and tried
to hustle me across the border.” Morton thrust out a rather heavy
chin, so that in a twinkling his face grew threatening, savage;
his kindly blue eyes paled, the lids drew closer. “I had colored
souvenirs of his earnestness scattered all over my anatomy for a
fortnight. But I didn’t have to have a doctor to patch me up, and he
did, so I was satisfied. In fact, I got the doctor for him as soon as
he apologized for his mistake.” Morton chuckled at the memory. His
face was again all amiability.
Saxe laughed. “You still wear a chip on your shoulder in order to
entice somebody into a scrap,” he said.
“Nonsense!” Morton exclaimed, huffily. “You ought to know that I
don’t want anything violent. I always try to steer clear of trouble.
It’s only when something comes up that a man must resent for the sake
of his self-respect that I ever resort to brute force. Why, I----”
Saxe ruthlessly interrupted:
“Oh, certainly, you’re a man of peace, all right! Only--ah, here’s
one of them.”
Saxe sprang to his feet, and hurried to the door, on which an
imperative knocking sounded. As he turned the knob, the newcomer
pushed his way into the room unceremoniously, a man as tall as
Morton, but whose six feet of height bulked much larger by reason
of the massive build and large head, thatched shaggily with thick,
iron-gray hair. The face showed rugged ugliness, emphasized by muddy
skin. His voice was wheezy from climbing the stairs.
“Well, and what’s it all about? What and why? Filibustering?
Abduction? Sunken treasure? Count me in on the scheming, strategy,
conspiring, plotting. But leave me out when it comes to donning
the diving-suit, or engaging in the merry sword-play at the head
of the stairs, or any aviation. Well, well, it’s like old times to
be together.” He had shaken hands with the two men while speaking,
serenely disregarding their verbal greetings, for his huge voice
boomed over theirs. “No cigarette,” he concluded, waving away the
offered box, as he sank down beside Morton on the couch. “I prefer
a man’s smoke.” He drew forth, prepared and lighted an especially
fat and black cigar. “The doctor says I smoke too much,” he added,
comfortably, after inhaling a startling volume of the smoke.
Saxe smiled unsympathetically.
“It’s eating so much and taking no exercise that makes you puffy.”
Billy Walker snorted indignantly.
“I only eat enough to keep this absurdly large carcass of mine
properly stoked,” he declared. “Of course, I don’t take violent
exercise. I want my strength for brain-work. You can’t use the same
vital force in two ways. If I wanted to be intellectually foolish
like you and Roy, why, I’d consume my energy in keeping hard as
nails. I, however, prefer intelligence to biceps--where’s Dave?”
“That’s the answer,” Saxe exclaimed, as a knock again sounded.
A moment later, David Thwing, the third and last guest, was in the
room. He was the only short member of the group, but he was broad
across the shoulders, with a stocky form that promised unusual
strength. He might have been good-looking, but for the fact that his
nose had once been disastrously smashed and never rightly repaired.
Its present outline was as choppy as the Channel seas in a gale. It
gave to his face a suggestion of the prize-ring.
Now that the party was complete, Saxe bade his guests take their
places at the table.
“No explanations till we’re done with the meal,” he announced, in
answer to the questions of his friends.
It was only when the table had been cleared of all save decanters
and glasses and smoking materials, that he at last stood up to
address his friends. A certain formality in his manner arrested their
attention, and they regarded him with a sudden increase of curiosity.
“It’s now six years since we left the university,” Saxe began. “In
the last year, we made a boyish pact. We agreed to answer the call of
anyone of us who became embarked in adventure of a sort to require
the assistance from the others. So I have summoned you in accordance
with the terms of our agreement; you see, I really have a sort of
adventure to offer you, though perhaps you’ll think I’m a bit selfish
in the matter, for the profit will be all mine. Roy, however, has
made money enough so that he doesn’t need any more, and Billy always
did have more than he could spend, with his foolish ideas of just
learning things, instead of living them. Dave is reasonably poor,
but, too, he’s reasonably honest, and so he’s better off without
the temptations of great wealth. I’ve come to the conclusion, after
careful reflection, that I’m the only one of the quartette who
actually is in want of money. My tastes are luxurious, and, too, I
have ambitious projects in the direction of operas that I wish to
write. I can’t give myself to such serious work while I have to turn
all my energies into musical pot-boilers to soothe the savage breast
of the wolf at the door.”
“The metaphor is mixed,” Billy Walker grumbled. “The purpose of
pot-boilers is to soothe the stomach, not the breast. But what could
be expected of a composer essaying oratory?”
Saxe accepted the criticism without rancor.
“Anyhow, I’ll let that stand by way of introduction,” he continued.
“The pith of the matter is this: I’ve had some money left to me, a
tidy sum in fact.”
Instantly, there came a chorus of congratulations from his friends.
But the host waved his hand for silence, while he shook his head
lugubriously.
“I’m not exactly ready for congratulations yet,” he declared, when
they had fallen silent again. “It’s true, I’ve had some money left to
me, but the deuce of it is, I don’t know where the money is.”
Exclamations burst forth anew, eager questionings.
“The simplest way of explaining the whole affair,” Saxe went on, “is
to make it known to you in the form in which it was made known to me:
“The morning of the day on which I wrote to you, I received a letter.
That letter was the first warning I had of this possible adventure.
Now, I’ll read the letter to you, and then you’ll have the same
knowledge of the whole matter as I have. By way of preface, I need
only say that the writer of the letter has since died, and I have
been formally notified by his lawyer concerning the old man’s will,
in exact accordance with the terms of the letter he wrote me.”
The young man took from his breast-pocket a typewritten letter, and
proceeded to read it aloud. From the first word to the last, the
auditors sat silent, almost without movement, save now and then for
the relighting of cigar or cigarette.
The letter ran as follows:
Saxe Temple, Esq.,
New York City.
Dear Sir:
It will doubtless astonish you at the outset to receive a letter
of this length from one who is a complete stranger to you. It
will astonish you still more when you learn the contents of this
communication. I shall, however, set forth the facts in such wise
as may enable you to grasp them understandingly. For your opinion
concerning them or me I care little. I am, in fact, making use of
you as a sort of sop to conscience on finding myself face to face
with death.
All that you need to know is this:
I am a musician. All the love of my life has been given to
music--with two exceptions, of which I shall write later on in
this letter. As to the music, I have loved it as an amateur, for
I was of independent means with no need to mix in the sordid
struggle for money. I have never written for production. I have
been content for the most part merely to study, to apprehend as
best I might the work of the masters. What I have myself composed
has been of a wholly desultory sort, fragments of fragmentary
ideas. I have fashioned now and then the _motif_ of a theme. I have
scientifically worked out by an application of mathematical laws,
based on ratios of vibration, certain new things in the way of
harmony. All these I have left to you unconditionally. I dare hope
and believe that you will be able to make some use of the material.
If you do so, pray spare yourself the pains of giving me any
credit--if your honesty be over-nice--or worrying your conscience
if you chance to be dishonest. I have no idea that I shall be
messing around anywhere in your environment after I am once dead,
and the world’s praise can be less than nothing to me after I have
gone from earth. But because you are a musician and, as I have come
to believe, an earnest one, I have decided to make you heir to my
musical legacies certainly--to my money perhaps. I’ll explain the
“perhaps” presently.
But first I must tell you of the love that rivaled my love for
music. This was for your mother. On that account my thoughts have
been directed to you with special force. On that account this
letter to you and all this letter implies.
Your mother as a girl possessed a wonderful natural voice and, too,
the soul of a musician. It so chanced that she and I were neighbors
and we met often socially. I was only a few years older than she,
and I was already skilled in music, for I had devoted myself to
the study of it from childhood. I recognized the supreme worth of
her voice at the first hearing. I fell in love with your mother
then--as a man with a woman, yes--even more as a musician in love,
with a glorious instrument of music. It soon became evident that
while she liked me, she could not love me as a wife should love
her husband. I realized the truth, and though I suffered as an
emotional temperament must suffer in such case, I did not despair.
The musician in me triumphed over the man for I rejoiced in the
glorious gift that she would manifest to the world. So I merged my
passion for the woman in the enthusiasm of the _maestro_ for his
pupil. I offered myself as her teacher and she accepted me in that
capacity. For two years I taught her. Under my training, her method
became perfect. Her soul, too, grew, so that she had sympathy and
understanding.
Then, just when she was all prepared for her triumph and my own,
she fell in love with your father. She married him. In spite of
all my prayers, my reproaches, my supplications, she abandoned
her career for love’s sake. Her husband was opposed to his wife’s
appearing in public as a singer. She yielded to his wishes without
remonstrance. I believe she was happy in her way because she loved
your father sincerely, and she counted no sacrifice too great for
love.
You, as a musician, can apprehend perhaps the suffering I underwent
in consequence of this disappointment. It sickened me of my
fellows--made me a recluse. It was in my life of retirement that
I developed my third love--that of the miser for gold. I secretly
transformed all my possessions into gold, which I kept in a secret
safe here in my house. Oh, the hours of night during which I have
worshiped before the shining heaps! But enough has been written
at one time and another over the raptures of the miser, a rapture
without justification in reason, yet more masterful than any other.
I shall not weary you with explanation or excuse. The statement of
the fact alone is sufficient.
Now at last I find myself the victim of a disease that must end my
life course within a few days, perhaps hours. It becomes necessary
then for me to dispose of my wealth. I am without relations with
the exception of a distant cousin and her daughter, who are already
well-to-do. To this daughter I have left my house here and the land
that goes with it--a thousand acres--which has some value today and
will have more very soon, as the region is being opened up.
For the bulk of my wealth, which as I have said is in gold, I
have selected you as a possible heir, but you must do your part.
I have thus chosen you because I dare hope that by it you may be
helped in accomplishing something of worth in the art of music and
so atone in some measure for the loss occasioned by your mother’s
abandonment of her career. The condition which I have imposed on
this legacy is merely to test you as to your perseverance and your
intelligence. In the event of your failure, half of the money will
go to the girl, and the other half to the founding of a musicians’
home.
After my death you will be notified by my lawyer, who has my
will duly drawn in accordance with the conditions I here roughly
explain. At once then, you will come to this place and here
conduct a search for my treasure-chest, which contains three
hundred thousand dollars in gold. If you discover this within
a month from the day of my death, this treasure shall be yours
absolutely. If you fail in the quest the seals of my description
of the hiding-place, which has been deposited with my lawyer, will
be opened and the treasure secured, to be divided between my young
kinswoman, Margaret West, and the establishing and endowing of a
home for disabled musicians.
Because you are the son of your mother whom I loved, and because
you are a musician of promise, I have thus chosen you as my
possible heir. If you are as acute as I think, you will easily
discover the necessary clues to the hiding-place of the gold. In
the hunt you have full liberty to use any means you wish, with the
privilege of residing in the house here with your helpers--if you
employ them--during the length of the time allowed you.
Yours truly,
HORACE ABERNETHEY.
As he finished the reading, Saxe folded the sheets, and replaced the
letter in his pocket. Then, he sank back into his chair, and surveyed
his friends quizzically.
“Well?” he demanded.
David Thwing beamed happily through the heavy lenses of his
eyeglasses, as he spoke:
“And so you want us to go with you, and of course we will.” He gazed
benignantly on his fellow guests, then opened his mouth, and trolled
in a musical baritone, “A hunting we will go!” Roy swung into the
measure with a nicety of accord in the tenor that told of old-time
practice. Saxe added his bass, and the song rang out in an harmonious
prophecy of success.
As the refrain ceased, Billy Walker expressed himself whimsically:
“This comes as a great relief to me,” he explained, grinning
cheerfully. “I’m all tied up with commission for erudite essays I’ve
promised to write. I’ve been unable to figure any way in which I
could fulfill my obligations. Now, by cutting the whole thing, the
difficulty will be removed. I shall simply disappear with you. Saxe,
old boy, I thank you. When do we start?”
“And you, Dave?” the host questioned eagerly, though this friend had
already given consent for the three.
“I haven’t a blessed thing to do,” was the contented answer. “Apart
from the pleasant thrill incident to this questing for hidden
treasure, your wish for my assistance gives me a new feeling of
self-respect, due to the fact of having something in the nature of
business to attend to. When do we start?”
Roy Morton nodded amiably, as Saxe turned in his direction.
“Of course,” he declared. “When do we start?”
“You’re trumps, all of you,” the host declared, gratefully. “I knew
I could depend on you, but to have your assurance takes a weight off
my mind all the same. I’d feel infernally helpless, alone on the job.
With you chaps standing by, I know we’ll win out. As for starting,
well, time is important--there’s a bit less than a month now left
to us. I’ve looked up trains. There’s a good one that starts in the
afternoon. I know it’s awfully short notice, but, if you could manage
to make it tomorrow, why--” he halted doubtfully, to stare at his
friends.
“Tomorrow it is!” boomed Billy Walker; and the others echoed
agreement.