Ted Strong's Motor Car Part 37

Beneath the table was a sc.r.a.p of green.

It was a bank bill, and, drawing it forth, Ted found it to be a fifty-dollar note issue'd by the First National Bank of Green River, Nebraska. A valuable clew, this.

When he had searched the body of the dead man, and found several letters and a small memorandum book, he left the room and locked it.

"Notify the coroner," said he to the constable, "and give him this key.

If he wants me as a witness in his inquest, he will find me at the Stratford Hotel, in St. Louis."

The constable promised to carry out Ted's instructions.

"Where is that boy Scrub?" asked Ted.

"Here I am," said the boy, emerging from the crowd.

"Who knows anything about this boy?" Ted asked.

"He's just a loose kid," said the constable. "His father died when he was young, and his mother left him a few years ago. Since then no one has claimed him."

"Then I will. Do you want to come with me?" Ted asked the boy. "I will give you a good home and clothes, teach you something, and make a useful man of you. Is he a good boy?"

Ted turned to the men about him.

"Yes, Scrub is a good boy, only he never ain't had no chance," seemed to be the universal verdict.

"Say the word, Scrub. Do you want to come with me?"

"You bet," said Scrub fervently.

"Good! Come along! We'll be getting back to St. Louis."

"But yuh can't get back to-night. The last train has gone."

"Never mind. I'll get there somehow. Some one lend me a lantern for a few minutes."

Ted was given one, and he went out into the yard and outhouses to search for the red motor car. He could not find it anywhere.

"Did any of you folks see a red automobile going down the road any time to-day?" he asked.

"Yes, there's a red machine down in the lane running over to the Rock Road," said one of the men. "But I reckon it's bust."

"Come on, Scrub, we'll take a look at it," said Ted, Leading off with the man who had seen the car, and followed by the whole crowd, Ted made his way to the lane.

Standing in the middle of it was the red car with its No. 118 swaying from the rear axle in the wind.

Evidently Checkers had started away in it, using it as a swift means of escape, but it had stopped, and, as he could go no farther in it, he had abandoned it in the road.

Ted examined the machinery carefully, but could find nothing wrong with it until he discovered that it had exhausted its supply of gasoline.

But he learned that the grocer at the village, half a mile away, had gasoline for sale, and two young fellows volunteered to go after some while Ted overhauled the car.

In half an hour he was ready to start. He made Scrub get into the seat, and, shaking hands with the constable and shouting a merry good-by to the others, he started for St. Louis.

It was past midnight when he drew up in front of the Stratford Hotel, hungry and tired. Scrub was fast asleep, and, taking him in his arms, Ted entered the hotel.

As he stepped inside, the clerk stared at him as if he had seen a ghost.

"How's everything?" asked Ted of the clerk.

"Great Scott, where did you come from?" asked, the clerk, and added hastily: "Better hurry upstairs to your room. Everybody is crazy about your disappearance."

Ted went up in the elevator with the boy still sleeping in his arms.

There was a light in his room and a confused murmur of voices.

Without the formality of a knock he opened the door and entered. As he appeared in the doorway there was silence for a moment, then such a bedlam of shouts and laughter burst forth that every one on the floor was aroused.

"It's Ted! It's Ted!" they shouted, and crowded around him.

The place was full of them. Across the room he saw the s.h.i.+ning face of Stella, smiling a welcome at him. Ben and Kit, Carl, Clay, and all of them were there, and sitting at the table was the chief of detectives.

"h.e.l.lo! Holding a post-mortem over me?" asked Ted.

"It comes pretty near that," said Bud. "Dog-gone you, what do you mean by goin' erway an' hidin' out on us that way? What in ther name o' Sam Hill an' Billy Patterson hev yer picked up now?" Bud was looking curiously at the bundle of rags in Ted's arms, for the boy still slept.

"This is a new pard," said Ted. "If it hadn't been for this kid you'd probably never seen me again."

"Erlucerdate," demanded Bud.

"Not until some one goes out to the nearest restaurant and orders up a stack of grub for Scrub and me. I haven't had anything to eat or drink for thirty-six hours, and I'm almost all in, and this kid has been living on apples and water for a couple of weeks. Now, hustle somebody and let me put this kid on the bed---my back's nearly broke--or maybe it's my stomach, they're so close together now I can't tell which it is that hurts."

While Ted was laying the boy on the bed he woke up, and, finding himself in a strange place, and a finer room than he had ever been in before, surrounded by a lot of rather boisterous young men, he leaped to the floor and started to the door. But Ted caught him by the arm and drew him back.

"What's the matter with you, you young savage?" said Ted.

"Oh, I'm all right now," said the boy. "When I woke up I got rattled, I guess, but as long as you're here it's all right."

The food came up now borne by two waiters and piloted by Kit. There were oysters and steak and potatoes and biscuit and a lot of what Missouri folk call "fixin's," and a big pot of coffee.

Scrub's eyes stood out like doork.n.o.bs as he viewed this wonderful array of things to eat. The table was cleared, the waiters set out the food, and the boys stood back to give Ted and the boy "room to swell," as Bud expressed it. The way they tucked into the good things was a caution.

After their hunger was satisfied and the waiters had restored order to the table, Ted began the story of his adventures since he had let Bud out of the automobile. As he talked, Stella wooed the small boy to her side, and listened to the story with her arm around his shoulder, and long before it was done Scrub was her wors.h.i.+per forever.

Chief Desmond listened with close attention, and when Ted finished and exhibited the bill of the Green River Bank, which he examined carefully, he said:

"Mr. Strong, you've beaten us all to it. I will go out to-morrow--I mean to-day, for it's one o'clock now--and view the body myself. If it is, as seems almost certain to be, Dude Wilc.o.x, one of the most dangerous men in the West is gone, but he has left behind for us to fight, and you to find, the man Checkers. This bill is your clew to the gang, but it is a counterfeit. As I have the thing figured out, the gang knew that forty thousand dollars was going to be s.h.i.+pped, but for some reason or other they dared not hold up the train out there, and telegraphed the gang in St. Louis to get it. Dude was at the head of the bunch here, and as it was a one-man game so near to St. Louis, Dude was elected to pull it off, which he did to the queen's taste. Perhaps the bill you have is the only counterfeit in the lot. Perhaps not. That is for you to work out."

"But how he managed to get away with the swag I haven't managed to figure out yet," said Ted.

"Of course, I don't know either, but deducing facts from what I know of the gang's methods, and from long experience with gentlemen of the road, I would say that the members of the gang who were killed in their rendezvous in Pine Street by my unfortunate men were awaiting the arrival of Dude with the swag. Checkers had secret knowledge that you had been put on their trail, and when he saw you pick up that red car in East St. Louis he was sure that you knew about the robbery and that you were on to Dude."