M and B 3 3rd Edition Dean Croushore Solutions Manual
M and B 3 3rd Edition Dean Croushore Solutions Manual
M and B 3 3rd Edition Dean Croushore Solutions Manual
M and B 3 3rd Edition Dean Croushore Solutions Manual
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18. closed his lips and made no response.
But a little later, while John Hubbard was at luncheon and he was
left alone in the office, he proceeded to examine some of these
criticized accounts, and was almost paralyzed upon discovering how
his books appeared to compromise him.
There were evidences that some one had been critically examining
them, for there were frequent marginal notes, while the balance
seemed to show that he had been cleverly and systematically
robbing his employer for a long time.
With a very white face and sternly compressed lips, Gerald took a
powerful magnifying-glass and brought it to bear along the various
columns of figures.
“I thought so!” he hoarsely muttered, at last, “they have been
tampered with! Some of my threes and sixes have been changed to
eights; my ones, in numberless instances, have been made into
twos, fours, and sevens, but so skilfully that no one would believe
me if I should assert it—I could never prove that he did it. Great
Heaven! and it has been going on for many months. This was what
he had in mind when he crushed my rose and warned me to beware
of a similar fate.”
Gerald was sick at heart as he realized that he was standing upon
the brink of a fearful precipice and was powerless to help himself—
how he had become entangled in a skilfully contrived net from which
there seemed to be no possible way of escape.
If Mr. Brewster had been well he would have appealed at once to
him, stated his suspicions, and tried to point out the changes he had
discovered in the figures, but in the man’s present precarious
condition he dared not trouble him with the matter, even if he were
allowed an interview with him.
A week passed, and then, to his great joy, he received a note from
Mr. Brewster asking him to call upon him at a certain hour the
following Saturday, as he had a special commission for him.
19. He presented himself at the Brewster mansion promptly at the hour
mentioned in the note, and was at once conducted to his employer’s
presence.
He was greatly shocked at the change in the man—not having seen
him since his attack—for he had grown very thin, and seemed to
have aged many years. Mr. Brewster greeted him very kindly, and
seemed heartily glad to see him, but almost immediately broached
the business concerning which he had desired to see him.
“Gerald, I have a secret commission with which I wish to entrust
you,” he began, a grave look settling over his face. “I know that I
can trust you absolutely, and that is why I have chosen you in
preference to any one else.”
“Thank you, sir,” Gerald replied, with a glowing face, his sorely
wounded heart greatly comforted by this assurance.
“You have been inside the bank vault?”
“Yes, sir, often; you have frequently sent me to the drawer which
contains your private documents.”
“Yes—yes, I know, and —— But before I go on I want you to give
me your word of honor that no one shall ever learn from you the
secret I am about to commit to you,” said the banker.
“Certainly, sir, I will promise that I will never betray any confidence
that you repose in me,” Gerald responded.
“That is enough,” he said. “Now, behind that drawer, which contains
those private papers, there is a small, secret vault, which I had built
there to store certain valuables during my absence from town. No
one save the man who made it, and I, know that it is there; no one
would suspect it, for, on removing the drawer, there seems to be
nothing but the brick wall behind it. On the contrary, there is an iron
plate, or panel, painted to resemble bricks. At the bottom of this
panel there is a small slot. You will insert in this a tiny key which I
shall give you; turn it half-around, and the panel will spring outward.
You can then swing it upward, when you will discover behind it two
20. boxes, take them out, being careful to relock the panel, and bring
them to me.”
“Yes, sir; I shall be very glad to do as you wish,” Gerald remarked.
“But how will I be able to get into the vault and remove the boxes
without the knowledge of others?”
“I have keys that will admit you to it, and you must go to the bank
when no one else is there,” said the banker, with a slight frown, as if
he did not exactly relish this part of the commission. “To-morrow will
be Sunday, and you had best go as soon after you have had your
breakfast as you can; then come directly to me. Be careful not to
excite the suspicion of any one whom you may meet, for one of the
boxes contains valuable jewels that belonged to Mrs. Brewster. I
want them for Allison; the other holds nothing of special value to
any one except myself.”
Mr. Brewster had become very white during this last statement, and
Gerald feared he was talking too much for his strength.
“Here are my keys,” he continued, after a moment, and, taking a
bunch from a drawer in the table beside him, “this one unlocks the
outer door, this the inner; the brass one opens the gate of the iron
fence; the heavy one will admit you to the vault; this unlocks my
private drawer, and the little, flat one the panel that conceals the
secret vault. Quite a lesson to learn, isn’t it?” he added, with a slight
smile; “but I think you will have no difficulty in remembering how to
use them.”
“No, sir; four of them I know already, so that leaves only those
belonging to your drawer and the secret vault to be distinguished,
and that is easily done,” Gerald replied, as he examined each key
attentively.
“Very well, then, I shall look for you here again some time to-
morrow forenoon. I want to get those boxes into my possession as
soon as possible,” Mr. Brewster observed, with a faint but impatient
sigh.
21. “I will try to be here some time between ten and eleven o’clock,”
Gerald returned, then added, losing some of his color: “And now, Mr.
Brewster, if you are not too tired, I have something to tell you about
my work.”
“I am not too tired, go ahead,” said the man; whereupon Gerald
gave him a brief account of the conversation that had recently
passed between himself and John Hubbard, and what he had
discovered afterward in connection with his work.
Mr. Brewster listened to him with growing astonishment, never once
removing his eyes from the young man’s face during his recital.
“These are very strange statements, Gerald—very grave statements,”
he remarked, with some sternness, as he concluded.
“They are, indeed, sir, and they involve my honor, my reputation,
and, unless my past dealings with you and my assurance are
sufficient guarantee to you of my integrity, the evidence is there to
prove that I have been doing very crooked business in your office.
The balances are all right, apparently, but the entries, if examined,
would seem to be conclusive testimony that I have been
systematically robbing you. Mr. Brewster, I firmly believe that those
figures have been skilfully changed for the sole purpose of ruining
me.”
“By whom?”
“That, of course, I cannot say positively, but I have long known that
Mr. Hubbard dislikes me,” was the somewhat reluctant reply.
“Do you mean to imply that John Hubbard would doctor the
accounts to injure you?” exclaimed Mr. Brewster, with a start.
“I have no right to assert that he would, for I cannot prove it; but
some one has done it, and he is the only one who, to my
knowledge, has had access to the books. I can only say I know he
hates me, and—I also say, Mr. Brewster”—and the honest fellow
here straightened himself with conscious integrity, and lifted an
22. unfaltering look to his employer—“that I have never made a false
entry upon one of your books.”
Neither was conscious of the presence of a third person in the room
as the banker heartily responded:
“I am sure you have not, Gerald; I would stake my fortune upon
your integrity and upon your unswerving faithfulness to my interests.
I will look into this matter just as soon as I am able. Ah! Allison, I
did not hear you come in. What is it, dear?” he concluded, turning,
as he caught the sound of her step behind him.
She came forward, blushing and smiling a welcome to Gerald.
“It is time for your beef broth, papa,” she said, as she placed a small
salver containing a cup before him.
Then she turned to our hero with outstretched hand.
“What an age it is since I saw you last, Gerald,” she remarked, and
then flushed again as she recalled her last interview with him.
He returned her greeting with what warmth he dared in Mr.
Brewster’s presence, but with a hand-clasp that spoke volumes.
23. CHAPTER V.
THE BANK ON SUNDAY MORNING.
Allison had come into the room where Gerald and her father were
conversing so earnestly just in season to catch the words of
commendation uttered by the latter.
“I am sure you have not, Gerald,” he had said; “I would stake my
fortune upon your integrity and upon your unswerving faithfulness to
my interests.”
She had noted, with the keen perception of a loving heart, the
troubled look in Gerald’s eyes, the anxious expression upon his brow,
and she instantly knew that something had gone amiss with him, in
spite of the fact that he seemed in perfect health, and was
handsomer and more manly than ever.
But in the excitement of greeting him—when she saw his face light
up with joy in her presence, when she felt the warm, lingering clasp
of his hand, and detected the old-time thrill in his voice—she forgot
all about it, for the time, and thought only of the pleasures of this
unexpected meeting.
When Gerald finally left the house it was with a very much lighter
heart than when he entered. His employer’s hearty and unqualified
assurance of confidence was like balm to his wounded spirit; while
his little interview with Allison had set all his pulses vibrating afresh
with his deep and abiding love for her.
He had not seen her for many months, and she seemed to have
grown a hundredfold more lovely than when he had bidden her
adieu on that bright Sunday morning so long ago.
24. He wondered if she had forgotten the evening previous—their
interview upon the veranda, where, with the moonlight streaming
upon them in its soft effulgence, they had been conscious only of
each other’s presence and the happiness that had thrilled every fiber
of their being. Did she remember their parting when the clock struck
ten? That blissful moment when their lips met in that involuntary
caress? That look into each other’s eyes, that low-breathed “Allison!”
“Gerald!” which had expressed so much?
She seemed a trifle more mature; she had acquired a little air of
dignity which, on the whole, he decided only added to her charms,
although at first it had chilled him slightly—at least, until he found
himself looking down into the expressive eyes.
He hoped he should see her again on the morrow, when he returned
with the boxes which Mr. Brewster had commissioned him to get
from the secret vault.
He smiled and uttered a sigh of content, as he passed his hand over
the pocket which held the keys the banker had given to him, and
realized that he never would have been entrusted with them if he
had not possessed the entire confidence of the man.
He hurried back to his lodging, where, in this happy frame of mind,
he settled down to the preparation of some lessons which were to
be recited that evening to a certain professor with whom he had
been studying for three years.
As we know, Gerald, at the time of his aunt’s death, had been in the
second year of the high school, but for a time after that his studies
were interrupted, as he found that his daily duties taxed his strength
to the utmost.
But as he became accustomed to his work, he began to get hungry
for his books again, and for a while attended evening school,
although his progress was thus necessarily slow.
Then he made the acquaintance of a professor by the name of
Emerson, who, becoming interested in the bright, ambitious lad,
25. offered to help him perfect his education and arranged for Gerald to
recite three times a week to him.
He was now in his twenty-first year, and expected by the coming
June to complete the studies of the second year of a regular college
course.
After partaking of a light supper, he repaired to the house of his
friend, Professor Emerson, where he acquitted himself most
creditably in his recitations.
The gentleman had become quite fond of his enterprising pupil, and
it was a great delight to him to teach one who was so eager for
knowledge and so quick to comprehend.
“By the way, Gerald, what do you intend to make of yourself when
you get through with your course?” he inquired to-night, as he
closed his book after the last recitation, and bent an inquiring look
on the handsome face before him.
“I think—since I am so well started in the banking business, I shall
stick to it, learn it thoroughly, and, if fortune favors me, perhaps
become a banker myself, by and by,” he replied, but with a smile at
his egotism in aspiring to a position such as Adam Brewster
occupied.
Professor Emerson eyed him curiously for a moment, then remarked:
“You’ll achieve it, if you undertake it, and, rightly conducted, banking
is a good business; still, I wish you might go a little higher,
intellectually—you would make a fine lawyer, your mental grasp is so
keen and accurate.”
“Thank you,” said Gerald, flushing at the compliment, “but it would
take me several years to prepare for the bar, after completing my
college course, and, since I have my own canoe to paddle, I think I
will adhere to what I have begun. I wish, though,” he added gravely,
as his mind suddenly reverted to John Hubbard, “I have time to
become thoroughly posted in law, and could combine the two, for
then I should always be sure of the faithfulness of my legal adviser.”
26. “Why, Winchester! I did not suppose you possessed so suspicious a
nature!” said his friend, smiling, but with a note of surprise in his
tones. “If every one was governed by such distrust I fear the
lawyers would fare hard.”
“I am not naturally suspicious,” replied Gerald, reddening, “and my
remark must seem narrow and intolerant to you; it was prompted by
the fact that one lawyer whom I know is anything but an honest and
conscientious man.”
“But, ‘one swallow does not make a summer,’ my boy,” retorted his
friend, laughing.
“I know it, sir, and I have no business to be suspicious of all men
because of one man’s failings. I will try to be more charitable toward
lawyers in the future,” said the young man, as he rose to leave.
He felt half-ashamed of having allowed himself to be so swayed by
his antipathy against John Hubbard, but all the way back to his
lodgings he was haunted by the face of the man and the malignant
scowl which had distorted it when he accused him of unfaithfulness
and dishonesty in his work.
Even in his sleep during the night he could not divest himself of the
consciousness of his vicious individuality—he seemed to be
continually pursuing and persecuting him until his visions became so
real that they finally drove him from his bed long before his usual
hour for rising on Sunday morning.
It was not yet dawn when he arose on Sunday morning, and, upon
looking from his window, Gerald saw that it was snowing.
He dressed himself with unusual care, for he hoped to see Allison
again, and, loverlike, desired to make as good an appearance in her
sight as possible. Then he hurried out for his morning meal, after
which he wended his way to the bank, where he arrived about half-
past eight.
The steps leading up to the door were covered with snow, and,
strangely enough, as he mounted them, leaving a footprint upon
27. every one, an uncomfortable sensation which was akin to guilt,
began to creep over him, causing his errand to become suddenly
repulsive to him, and making him long to go back to his room and
remain there.
But, throwing back his head with an air of conscious rectitude—for
was he not there at his employer’s command?—he quickly let himself
into the building, removing the key and relocking the door on the
inside to make sure that no one would follow him.
Passing through the inner door, he carefully wiped his feet upon the
mat, and removed his overshoes lest they should leave tracks upon
the floor—that same uncanny feeling which he had experienced
outside still pursuing him.
The bank was so still every footfall echoed noisily through it, and
sent a nervous shiver creeping down his spine.
“Good gracious!” he exclaimed, with an impatient shrug of his
shoulders, “I am no thief stealing in here to rob the place! Why on
earth should I feel like one? It is positively absurd!”
Proceeding directly to the vault, he drew the heavy bolts, unlocked
and swung open the massive iron-plated door. The place was cold
and gloomy, and again Gerald shivered with a nervous chill as he
stepped within those solid walls which so securely guarded their
hoarded treasure.
Proceeding directly to Mr. Brewster’s private drawer, the number of
which he had long known, he unlocked and drew it out, setting it
upon the floor.
It contained several packages of papers. But these held no interest
for him; he merely gave them a passing glance, then began to look
for the slot in the iron panel at the back of the aperture.
It required close searching to find it, but his efforts were finally
rewarded, whereupon he inserted the last of his keys, turned it half-
around, when the panel sprang outward, as Mr. Brewster had
described.
28. It appeared to be swung upon hinges, and, lifting it up, Gerald could
distinguish within the little vault thus disclosed a box of some
description.
He drew it from its place of concealment.
It proved to be a beautiful Japanese affair, inlaid with gold and
mother-of-pearl in an intricate pattern. There was a tiny key in its
lock, and for fear that it might drop out and be lost, Gerald removed
it and transferred it to a pocket in his vest, without once thinking
that he had it in his power to inspect the contents of the casket, if
he chose to do so.
Putting it carefully down upon the floor, he looked for the other. He
found it shoved away back in the secret vault. It was much larger
than the other—a common, though strong, wooden receptacle—and
it was also locked, while there was no key with it.
Gerald felt quite sure that the Japanese casket must contain the
jewels of which Mr. Brewster had spoken, and which were to be
given to Allison. Doubtless they were very valuable, and would be
doubly precious to her because they had once belonged to and been
worn by her mother.
He would probably see them upon her person some day; but,
strange to say, he did not feel half so curious about them as he did
regarding the contents of the larger box, for he had been impressed
by Mr. Brewster’s manner and expression when he had said that it
contained “nothing of special value to any one—except myself.”
However, he felt that it was no business of his what either held; his
duty lay simply in conveying them safely to his employer.
Putting the drawer back in its place, he relocked it, when, gathering
the boxes from the floor, he turned to leave the vault. At that instant
a shadow obscured the light admitted by the open door.
Gerald started forward with a sudden and terrible heart-throb. His
face flushed hotly, then paled to the hue of marble as he was
29. confronted by John Hubbard, who was standing upon the threshold,
a sardonic grin distorting his sinister countenance.
“Aha! my young burglar,” the man exclaimed, in a tone of fiendish
triumph, “is this the way you are in the habit of spending your
Sundays?”
The sound of the expert’s voice at once restored Gerald’s
composure, although every nerve in his body was tingling with anger
at his manner of addressing him.
“I am no burglar, Mr. Hubbard, and you know it,” he coldly returned.
“I am not in the habit of coming here—I have never been in the
bank on Sunday before this; but——”
“What have you there?” sternly interposed his companion, and
indicating by a gesture the boxes in Gerald’s hands.
“Some things belonging to Mr. Brewster.”
“So I judged. How came you here?”
“By his orders,” the young man briefly replied, and then wondered at
the almost satanic leer which swept over the features of the man
before him.
“Indeed! but how did you pass all these barriers?” with a nod
backward over his shoulder.
“Why, by means of these keys, which Mr. Brewster himself gave to
me, when he asked me to perform this errand for him,” the young
man responded, as he held up the bunch by the ring, and which Mr.
Hubbard instantly recognized as belonging to the banker.
“When did you see Mr. Brewster?” he questioned, a look of
perplexity flashing over his face.
“Yesterday afternoon—he sent for me to go to him,” Gerald
explained.
“H’m!” ejaculated the expert, with a frown. Then, after a moment of
thought, he added: “What is in those boxes?”
30. Again Gerald flushed. Then he threw back his handsome head
haughtily.
“Excuse me,” he said freezingly, “but that is a question which Mr.
Brewster alone is qualified to answer.”
“Ha! ha!” laughed his companion, but with so weird a note in the
sound, which echoed and re-echoed mockingly through the vault,
that Gerald’s blood almost seemed to congeal in his veins. “You are
very non-committal, my fine fellow,” he continued, with a snarl, “but
do you dare to tell me that you don’t know what either of those
boxes contains?”
“I must decline to discuss the matter with you, Mr. Hubbard,” was
the terse reply.
“Indeed!” sneered his companion. Then he observed, served,
authoritatively, as he went a step nearer Gerald. “Very well, we
won’t discuss it; but since I am Mr. Brewster’s attorney, I will relieve
you of all further care of them. Give them to me.”
“No, sir!” said Gerald resolutely, and retreating from him.
“Give them to me, I tell you!” commanded the man angrily.
“I cannot do that, Mr. Hubbard,” Gerald calmly returned. “Mr.
Brewster requested me to come here for them, and then bring them
directly to him. I shall deliver them to no other hands.”
Once more that strange laugh echoed through the dismal vault.
“You will have to go a long journey to do that, young man,” said
John Hubbard, showing his white teeth in a horrible grin.
“How so?” queried Gerald, in surprise, but with a strange numbness
stealing over him, “I—I do not understand you.”
“Adam Brewster is dead!” said John Hubbard.
31. CHAPTER VI.
GERALD SUFFERS AN INDIGNITY.
There was a dead silence in that gloomy place for the space of a full
minute after John Hubbard’s terrible announcement.
“It cannot be possible!” Gerald finally gasped, as he staggered back
against the side of the vault, almost paralyzed from horror. As he did
so, the topmost box in his hands slipped from his grasp, and fell with
a crash to the floor.
The lock was either broken or forced from its socket by the
concussion, and the lid flew back, thus disclosing to the curious eyes
of John Hubbard various articles of valuable jewelry.
“Aha! diamonds! pearls! rubies and emeralds!” he exclaimed, as he
stooped to examine them more closely. “Truly, young man, you were
taking time by the forelock to feather your nest before an inventory
could be taken of your employer’s effects.”
“What do you mean, sir?” he exclaimed, starting forward, a
dangerous gleam in his eyes. “Do you dare assert that I knew that
Mr. Brewster was not living, and stole here to rob him?”
“I am forced to admit that it looks very much like it,” was the
deliberate and cruel response.
A terrible shock went quivering through Gerald at these words, for
he realized but too well that the man would do his utmost to injure
him by putting the worst possible construction upon the situation.
“You know better!” he cried, hot indignation and resentment flaming
up within him; “you know I would not touch a penny that did not
belong to me.”
32. “Ahem! that all sounds very well, my would-be paragon of honor,”
sneered the expert, “but you will have to prove it, you know.”
“Prove it! Why, of course, I can prove it,” replied Gerald, a little smile
of scorn for his recent fear curling his lips, and a consciousness of
rectitude and security supplanting it, “I have Mr. Brewster’s note of
yesterday, asking me to come to him, as he had a special
commission for me, and then the very fact of my having his keys
proves that I am here under orders,” and again he held them up to
his companion’s view.
“H’m! so he wrote you to come to him, did he?” queried John
Hubbard thoughtfully. “Where is the note? I should like to see it.”
Gerald put his hand into his coat-pocket; then suddenly remembered
that he had put on his best suit that morning.
“Ah!” he said, “it is in the pocket of my other coat.”
John Hubbard’s eyes gleamed with a cunning light at this
information.
“Well, you will doubtless need all the proof you can bring to get you
out of this scrape,” he gruffly observed. “Maybe you can produce
such a note, but I doubt it. Did any one see Mr. Brewster give you
those keys?”
Gerald’s heart sank at the question, as he remembered that he and
his employer had been utterly alone throughout their interview,
except for the few minutes that Allison was in the room, and he was
sure she had heard nothing that would prove the truth of what he
had asserted. At least he knew she was not there when the keys
were given to him.
“You have no right to question me like this, or to doubt my word,
and I will have no further conversation with you about the matter,”
he responded, after a moment of thought.
But he was deathly pale as he stooped to recover the box that had
fallen. He found that it was not broken; the lock had only been
forced by the fall. He carefully arranged the jewels which had been
33. somewhat displaced, although, fortunately, none had been spilled;
then, shutting the box, he relocked it with the key which he took
from his vest-pocket.
John Hubbard watched him warily while he was thus engaged. “I will
take charge of those things,” he sternly observed, as Gerald was
about to replace the key in his pocket.
“Excuse me; but I do not think you will,” the young man coldly
returned.
“I am Mr. Brewster’s attorney, and it will be my duty to settle his
estate; consequently all his property will pass through my hands.
Give me those boxes!” the man concluded authoritatively.
“No, sir. Mr. Brewster authorized me to take them to his house; I
shall do as he ordered, and since you say he is no longer living, give
them to Miss Brewster; he stated that he wanted the jewels for her.”
And he started to leave the vault as he concluded.
“You will do no such thing, you young upstart!” snarled John
Hubbard, at the same time making an agile spring backward out of
the vault, when he swung to the ponderous door almost before
Gerald comprehended his intention.
“Now, you beggarly upstart, I have you just where I want you,” he
cried, in a cruel, exultant tone, and putting his lips to the keyhole, “I
once gave you an object-lesson regarding your fate if you continued
to stand in my way.”
Gerald did not deign to reply to these taunts and presently he knew,
by the closing of the outer door of the bank, that he was alone.
His heart was very heavy, for he began to realize that his case was
desperate. Fate and his evil-minded foe had conspired to so involve
him in a network of compromising circumstances, it seemed likely
that he was destined to be proved a graceless scamp and a daring
robber.
34. His employer, the only one who had it in his power to exonerate him
from blame and prove his innocence, was dead.
He felt almost sure that John Hubbard intended to bring an officer
there to arrest him, with the evidences of his guilt around him.
With this thought there came the temptation to restore those boxes
to the secret vault from which he had taken them.
Mr. Brewster had said that no one, save himself and the man who
constructed it, knew of its existence. If he should conceal those
jewels and the other box, there would be no evidence, beyond John
Hubbard’s word, to prove that he had attempted to take them from
the bank. His word would be just as good as that of his enemy, upon
whom the burden of proving his own accusations would have to rest.
“But I should have to deny all knowledge of them. I should be
obliged to lie, and that I will not do, even to save my—myself from
prison,” he said to himself, with an air of proud resolution. “No, I will
tell the truth and take my chance; I have Mr. Brewster’s note telling
me to come to him; I have also his keys, and the two taken together
ought to be strong points in my defense.”
Nevertheless, these arguments were small consolation in view of his
unfortunate situation.
Then his thoughts reverted to Mr. Brewster, and hot tears rushed
into his eyes as he realized that the man was lying still in death, and
they would never meet in this life again. He was still weak from the
shock he had experienced upon learning the fact so suddenly, and
he wondered what could have caused the unlooked-for attack.
He had appeared to be very comfortable, and hopeful of soon
getting out again, when he had seen him the previous day, and it
seemed awful to him that he should have been so ruthlessly cut
down, just in the prime of life, and in the height of prosperity.
He was wild with impatience to learn the particulars, and chafed
restively against his confinement in that tomb-like place.
35. “Poor Allison! It will be a terrible blow to her,” he mused; “she will be
all alone in the world now; but she is fortunate to be left an heiress,
and thus shielded from the hardships of life.”
Alas! he little thought that the fortune which would fall to the girl
was destined to bring upon her dangers and trials from which he
would have shrunk appalled could he have foreseen them.
He sprang to his feet and began to pace the vault restlessly, for a
feeling of faintness and sickness came over him; he also experienced
a difficulty in breathing, as the air in the place began to be vitiated.
Suppose John Hubbard should not return in season to release him
before suffocation overtook him, he thought, a nervous chill creeping
over him; but he discarded it with a bitter smile.
He well knew that the man would not dare to let him die there—that
he was planning for him a worse fate than death, out of a cruel spirit
of revenge, because he had dared to love the girl whom he, for
some strange reason, coveted. He believed that he meant to so
crush and humiliate him that he would never want to seek Allison
Brewster again, or meet the gaze of her pure, clear eyes.
“He shall not do it! by Heaven! he shall not succeed in his atrocious
designs!” he cried out, in a sudden anguish, as those torturing
thoughts flitted through his brain. “I am an honest man, and I swear
I will yet prove it to the world, in spite of the worst that he can do.”
A little later he heard the outer door of the bank open and close
again, then the sound of steps and voices drawing near him, until
presently, the bolt which fastened the door of the vault was shot
back, and the next moment John Hubbard, accompanied by a
policeman, stood in his presence.
“Here, Mr. Officer, is your prisoner, and that,” pointing to the two
boxes upon the floor, “is the booty with which he was about to make
off when I caught him,” the man explained, as he shot a look of
malignant triumph at his victim.
36. “Humph!” ejaculated the officer, as he darted a comprehensive
glance around the place, and at the same time taking the measure
of Gerald.
“It is very fortunate that I happen here just as I did,” Mr. Hubbard
went on. “I seldom come to the bank on Sunday, but there were
some papers here which I was obliged to have to-day, and thus I
came upon him in the midst of his depredations.”
“H’m! you look rather young and green to be a bank-robber,” the
policeman remarked, not unkindly, as he searched the pale,
handsome face of his prisoner; “you don’t seem like the sort, either,
that would be up to such business.”
“I am no bank-robber,” said Gerald, with quiet dignity, and meeting
the man’s searching look unflinchingly, “I am here under orders.”
“Whose orders?”
“My employer’s, Mr. Brewster’s,” and Gerald proceeded to give him a
brief account of the facts of the case, though he said nothing about
the secret vault.
“That sounds all straight and right,” said the policeman, as he
gravely turned to Mr. Hubbard.
“Yes; he tells a very plausible story,” was the sneering response, “but
it is perfectly absurd, when you come to think of it, that Mr. Brewster
should intrust such a commission to a mere boy, when I have been
his attorney, and have conducted his affairs for years; and on
Sunday, with so much secrecy, too! That was not Adam Brewster’s
way of doing business; it is far more likely that he would have sent
for what he wanted, openly and aboveboard, and on some day
during regular banking hours. No, sir; he can’t pull the wool over my
eyes; and as I feel bound to protect the interests of my late client, I
shall expect you to do your duty, and take the fellow in charge,” he
concluded authoritatively.
“Well, I suppose I must,” the man responded, with evident
reluctance, adding, as he drew from a capacious pocket a pair of
37. steel bracelets, “hold out your hands, my young man.”
Gerald shrank back a step.
“Oh! not that!” he said, with pale lips; “I beg you will not handcuff
me. I will go with you peaceably.”
“Well, maybe you would. I’m inclined to believe you; but it’s my rule
to make sure of my birds, and I don’t make any exceptions,” said the
man, as he dexterously slipped the shackles upon the wrists of his
prisoner; but with an air that betrayed he did not very much relish
the business in hand.
“The keys, Mr. Officer; I must have the keys,” John Hubbard
interposed, as they were about to leave the vault.
“Where are they, youngster?” demanded the man. “Hand them over.”
“They are in the left pocket of my coat,” said Gerald, with difficulty
repressing a groan over his ignominious and utter failure to execute
his employer’s commission.
He was impressed that the larger box contained some secret which
Mr. Brewster would not, on any account, have made known to the
world, and he could not bear the thought that John Hubbard would
now learn it, and perhaps put it to an ignoble use.
The expert plunged his hand into the pocket designated, and drew
forth the keys, after which he stooped to secure the boxes, and left
the vault, followed by the officer and his prisoner.
“Now you may go and cage your bird,” he remarked to the former. “I
will let you out of the bank, but I have some business here, and
shall remain a while longer.”
He unlocked the outer door, and the two men passed out into the
storm. John Hubbard stood looking after them for a few moments, a
fiendish expression on his thin face.
“Gad! what luck!” he muttered. “If ever I made a shrewd move, it
was in coming here this morning to get those papers.”
38. He returned to the vault, which he securely locked, also the gate to
the iron inclosure.
Then, taking the two boxes, he went inside the banker’s private
office, and deposited them upon the table there.
“Humph!” he observed, as he fastened a keen, curious glance upon
the larger, “there is no key to that, but I’m going to know what it
contains, all the same.”
Whereupon he sat down, drew it to him, and deliberately began to
pick the lock.
39. CHAPTER VII.
MR. BREWSTER’S WILL.
After Gerald left Mr. Brewster, on Saturday afternoon, the banker—
Allison also having retired—sat for a long time in deep thought, an
anxious look on his thin face, a stern expression in his shrewd, gray
eyes.
“It certainly looks bad,” he muttered; “somebody has evidently been
meddling with my private accounts; but Gerald is not the rogue—he
is true to the core. I never knew any one possessing a finer sense of
honor. If I thought that Hubbard was up to any rascality—and I am
sometimes inclined to think he is too sharp—I’d cut him loose
without ceremony; and yet”—with a scowl of annoyance—“that
might not be so easily done, for some of our transactions have
become strangely mixed. Somehow, I have never had quite so much
confidence in him since that day when he proposed for Allison. I—I
really would like to break away from him before she gets through
school next summer, for, of course, she will never want to marry
him, and I am very sure I do not want him for a son-in-law.”
Again he dropped into profound thought, which was finally
interrupted by the entrance of his attendant, with the light repast
which constituted his supper.
A little later, Allison came again, to read the evening paper to him,
after which they chatted socially for a while, when the banker said
he felt weary, and would retire.
His attendant was assisting him to prepare for bed when he
suddenly put his hand to his head and made an exclamation as if he
were in pain.
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