Mark Mason's Victory Part 19

"Yet you pretended a little while since that you and your mother had hard work to get along."

"Business is looking up."

Edgar got out at Twenty-Third Street. Mark kept on till he reached Forty-Seventh Street. He walked toward Seventh Avenue, and finally stood in front of the house in which the customer for the diamond rings was staying. It was a plain three-story residence with nothing peculiar about it. Mark rang the bell, little suspecting what was in store for him.

A boy of about seventeen, shabbily dressed, answered the bell.

"Is Mrs. Montgomery at home?" asked Mark, referring to a card.

"I guess so," answered the boy.

"I should like to see her."

"All right! I'll go up and ask."

The boy left Mark standing in the doorway, and went up-stairs.

He returned in a very short time.

"You're to come up," he said.

Mark followed him up the staircase and into a back room. It was scantily furnished. There was a lounge on one side of the room, and a cabinet bed on the other. These, with three chairs and a bureau, const.i.tuted the furniture.

"Just step in here," said the boy, "and I'll call Mrs. Montgomery."

Mark took a seat on the sofa and awaited the arrival of the lady.

He did not have long to wait. The door opened, but the lady he expected did not appear. Instead, a young man entered whom Mark instantly recognized as the person who had left the Fifth Avenue stage under suspicious circ.u.mstances on the day when the old lady was robbed of her pocketbook.

Mark started and wondered if the recognition was mutual. It did not appear to be.

"You're the jeweler's boy, I believe?" said the newcomer languidly.

"I came from Henry Swan."

"Exactly, and you have brought two diamond rings with you?"

"Yes."

"All right! You can show them to me."

Mark's suspicions were aroused and he felt that he had need of all his shrewdness. He was very glad now that the diamonds were paste and the rings of little value.

"Excuse me," he said, "but I was told to deliver the rings to Mrs.

Philip Montgomery.

"Yes, that's all right. Mrs. Montgomery is my aunt."

"I should like to see her," persisted Mark.

"Come, boy, you're too fresh. It'll be all the same if you hand the rings to me."

"I don't think so. Isn't Mrs. Montgomery at home?"

"Yes, but she has a severe headache and cannot see you at present."

"Then perhaps I had better call again."

"No you don't. I am a gentleman and won't permit you to insult me."

"What do you want to do?"

"To take the rings up to my aunt. If she likes them, or either of them, she will send you down a check."

Mark reflected a moment. Remembering that the rings were not valuable, he decided to show them.

"Here are the rings!" he said, producing them from his pocket.

The young man opened the small caskets, and his eyes lighted up with satisfaction when he saw the glittering rings.

"What is the price?" he asked, looking up.

"That ring is three hundred and fifty dollars, the other is four hundred."

"Seven hundred and fifty together."

"Yes."

"I will show them to my aunt. Perhaps she may decide to keep both."

"You won't be long?" asked Mark, as the young man left the room.

"No, I'll be back as soon as my aunt decides."

Left alone Mark began to think over the situation. His recognition of his unprincipled acquaintance of the Fifth Avenue stage convinced him that some fraudulent scheme was being carried out. Mrs. Montgomery was probably a confederate of the young man who had just left the room.

"Is he going up-stairs or down?" thought Mark.

He listened, and thought he heard the front door open and shut. It occurred to him to open the door of the chamber and look down-stairs.

He started to do this, but to his surprise found that the door was fastened in some way. He had not heard a key turned in the lock.

Possibly there was an outside bolt.

"What object can they have in keeping me a prisoner?" he asked.

Should he ring the bell and summon a servant? If he did so, he would have to leave the house in a state of uncertainty. No! he decided to wait and let further events throw a light on the mystery.

Meanwhile the young man who had possessed himself of the rings left the house, for it was he who had descended the stairs and gone out into the street. He bent his steps to the nearest p.a.w.nshop on Eighth Avenue, and taking out one of the boxes, said in a nonchalant voice: