CHAPTER XIX.

COLONEL WIMPLETON HUMILIATED.

Colonel Wimpleton was alone in his library when I reached the house. He made a gesture towards a chair, but he was as stiff in his manner as he had been when I met him that day in the street. Yet, in spite of this display of dignity, I could see that he was troubled. He looked rather pale, and the toddy-blossoms on his nose were in stronger contrast than usual with the rest of his face. If I read him right, he was sorely vexed and perplexed.

“I received your note, Wolf,” said he, struggling, I thought, to appear colder and stiffer than he really felt. “I am astonished at its contents.”

“I supposed you would be, sir,” I replied.

“Am I to believe that you destroyed the check I gave you?” demanded he, sternly.

“That is the simple truth.”

“Wolf, I have always believed you were honest, whatever else you may have been; but this story is incredible.”

“I grant that it looks very strange, but it is none the less true because it is strange. You remember that you wrote two checks on the day we were at the hotel in Grass Springs.”

“Of course I remember it,” answered he, petulantly, as though he deemed the question an intimation that he was not in condition at the time to remember it. “I tore up the first one, by accident, with the paper you wrote.”

“Well, sir, I was not sure at the time that you did tear up the first one. I am satisfied now that you did not. I could not find a single piece of it.”

“Humph! That may be.”

“Nick Van Wolter was at the hotel that day. I met him in the street, when I was looking for the pieces of the check.”

“When you sent him over-- No matter about that,” said he, suddenly checking himself.

But he had said enough to assure me that Nick had told him something; and I was now willing to believe that the fellow was really the snake Waddie had declared he was.

“I met him in the street,” I continued, without heeding the slip the magnate had made. “He told me he had been into the hotel, and had seen the landlord. I am confident he went into the room where we were, and took the check.”

“It don’t look probable.”

“You wrote the check in a book you carried in your pocket,” I proceeded, hoping I should be able to convince him of the truth of what I said.

“I did,” he replied, taking the check-book from his pocket.

“When you had written it, you tore it out?”

“Yes, in this place;” and he pointed out the leaf in his check-book, on which he had made the marginal memorandum. “I tore the first check from this margin, and here is the amount, and ‘Steamer,’ indicating for what purpose it was paid.”

“Where is the place from which you tore the second check?” I asked, anxiously.

“As the second was a duplicate, I wrote it at the end of the book, and made no memorandum in the margin,” he replied, turning to one of the last leaves in the volume.

“Now, sir, I think you have the means of convincing yourself that it was the first check, and not the second, which was paid at the bank to-day,” I continued. “That margin, where you tore off the first check, is rather rough and uneven. The edge of the check will correspond to it.”

“We will go to the bank, if Mr. Barnes is there,” said the colonel, more interested than I supposed he would be.

We walked to the bank, and the cashier handed him the check. The edge where it had been torn off was very irregular, and the colonel adjusted it against the margin. It exactly fitted, as I knew it would, and he could not escape the conclusion that the first, and not the second check had been used. I felt then that I had vindicated my veracity, and I was satisfied. The magnate told the cashier that he had drawn duplicate checks, and believed the first had been destroyed; that my story was true, in short; but he wished nothing said. He then told me to return to his house with him.

“Wolf, I would rather give ten thousand dollars than have this matter stirred up,” said the colonel, when we were again seated in the library. “It has already given me a great deal of trouble and uneasiness.”

“But you do not intend to let Nick Van Wolter run away with ten thousand dollars--do you?” I inquired.

“Has he run away?”

“Yes, sir; I have no doubt he has. His mother says he has gone to Hitaca to take a situation in a hotel, and carried his clothes with him; but I warrant he will not stay long in Hitaca.”

“He is a scoundrel, then.”

“Undoubtedly he is.”

Colonel Wimpleton walked up and down the room in deep thought. I did not know then what troubled him; but I learned the truth before morning.

“What can be done?” he asked, pausing before me.

“Pursue and arrest him.”

The great man pursed up his lips, and did not seem to like the advice.

“That would stir up the whole affair,” said he.

“What affair, sir?” I asked.

“He stole the check at Grass Springs. I should not like to listen to the testimony which would be brought forward to prove that Nick was there that day,” answered the colonel, with a sickly smile.

“We need not arrest him, then. You can compel him to give up the money,” I suggested.

“Can we catch him?”

“I don’t think he got away from Hitaca last night. The train south leaves at twenty minutes past seven. When I ran the Ucayga, I hurried her up so that we were in season for it; but she was late yesterday afternoon, and I know she lost it.”

“But he may have left by some other conveyance.”

“There is no other, unless he took a private vehicle. If he did that, we can easily trace him. But I think he will take the eleven o’clock train, south, to-morrow forenoon. He will not expect any discovery at once, and will not hurry himself. He knows very well that there is no conveyance to Hitaca till to-morrow forenoon, and he will be a hundred miles off before the next boat arrives there.”

“How shall we get there? I don’t like to drive twenty-five miles in the night. I am not very well,” replied the colonel.

“We will go in the Belle if you please. You can take one of the berths, and go to bed. There is a good breeze, and we shall be in Hitaca in three or four hours.”

“Very well; I will do so. Who goes with you?”

“Tom Walton.”

“Is it necessary that he should go with you?”

“No, sir.”

“I wish to talk with you about other matters,” he added, with an air of embarrassment, “and do not wish for any listeners.”

“I will be alone then, sir.”

Fluttering with excitement, I left him, promising to be at the wharf with the Belle in an hour. I crossed the lake, found Tom Walton, and told him I wanted the boat till the next night. Fortunately she was not engaged, though a gentleman had spoken about a cruise up the lake in her. Tom went down, and put her in order for the trip, while I went home to tell my father and mother where I was going. My father was very curious to know what was going on; but I could only stop long enough to tell him that I thought everything was coming around right again. As the check was the key to all the other secrets between the colonel and myself, I did not dare allude to it.

Sailing the Belle across the lake, I found Colonel Wimpleton on the wharf, muffled in his overcoat. Tom had lighted the cabin, and it was all ready for the reception of my passenger; but he preferred a seat with me in the standing-room. Shoving off, I headed the boat up the lake, and she soon began to fly over the waves, under the influence of the fresh north wind. Colonel Wimpleton was silent for a time. Since I first met him, early in the evening, I had been impressed by his altered manner. Something apparently weighed heavy upon his mind, and he appeared to be struggling, with the pride of his character, to conceal it.

“Wolf, this is bad business,” said he, when the Belle was approaching Gulfport.

“Bad for Nick Van Wolter, sir,” I replied.

“For me too,” he added, after a long pause. “I would not have this matter stirred up for double the sum Nick has stolen. It is better for me to give you another check, and let the scoundrel go.”

“I have no claim upon you, sir, for such a sum. You are very generous, and I ought to be the last one to impose upon your kindness.”

“Why didn’t you draw the check, and not burn it?”

“I did not think it was right for me to take so much money under the circumstances. Pardon me, sir; I do not like to allude to the matter again.”

“If you had drawn the check the next day, there would have been no trouble. If Nick had his check then, I don’t see why he did not collect it.”

“I haven’t been over to Centreport since the day I was dismissed, and perhaps he thought it would not be safe to present it, unless he knew I was in town. I met him when I first came over, and he drew the check as soon as he had seen me.”

“It is a pity you burned the check,” mused the magnate.

I did not care to remind him of the unpleasant affair at Grass Springs, and I kept still.

“Wolf, tell me candidly why you burned that check,” said he, after a silence of several minutes.

“I did not think it was right for me to use it. If my father or mother found it upon me, I could not tell how I came by it. I might lose it, and some one else get the money,” I answered.

“But why did you think it was not right for you to use it?” he inquired.

“I do not like to explain.”

“Do so; I will not be angry.”

“Well, sir, I did not think you were in condition to do business; and if it were known that I drew the check, people would think I had been swindling you. It was partly for your sake and partly for my own that I destroyed it.”

“In my note to you the next day, I wrote that the check would be paid.”

“I had already destroyed it then.”

There was another long pause in the conversation, though two or three times the colonel began to speak, and then checked himself. It was plain to me that he was struggling to utter something at which his pride revolted, and though I was very curious to know what was coming, I deemed it prudent to keep still.

“Wolf, I have been terribly humiliated,” said he, with a desperate effort. “I have suffered intolerably since that affair at the Springs. That one of my employés, a mere boy, should tell me I was drunk,--_drunk_; that’s the word,--has made me miserable.”

“I am sorry--”

“Don’t apologize, Wolf,” he interposed. “It is not so much that you said it, as because it was true.”

He uttered the words with a long and heavy sigh; and really he was so sad that I could not help pitying him.

“I am sorry it was true; but--”

“Hear me, Wolf. You have said to me what no other living being ever said to me, or would have dared to say.”

“I hope you will excuse me, sir. It was very bold in me to say it, even if it was true.”

“Wolf, I haven’t drank a drop since that night. I never will drink another drop,” he continued, taking no notice of my apologies and explanations. “To put it in the power of any one to look down upon me is too humiliating. I have done it once. I never will do it again.”

How far his conscience reproached him I had no means of knowing, for he attributed his suffering wholly to mortified pride. He was silent again, and I thought it would be impudence in me to commend his good resolution; but certainly nothing ever afforded me more pleasure, for I knew that his natural firmness, amounting to obstinacy, would keep him true to his pledge.