CHAPTER V. THE UNEXPECTED.

The unexpected happened at least twice to the motor boys between ten-thirty and eleven o’clock that Thursday morning. First, they naturally expected to have trouble with the runabout, but it carried out its work handsomely and deposited them in the Malvern Country Club garage at precisely five minutes of eleven.

There was not much talk between the boys during the ride. McGlory was concerned with his “Pauper’s Dream” reflections--and Matt had reflections of his own. Besides his thoughts, which were none too agreeable, Matt had to recall Billy’s instructions for finding the way, and also to be on the alert for any sudden tantrum on the part of the runabout. But the tantrum did not develop, and the boys left the garage and made their way across the broad lawn of the clubhouse to a porch which extended along the front of the building.

“I’d like to see Mr. Joshua Griggs,” said McGlory to a stout person wearing side-whiskers and knee breeches. The servant looked the boys over.

“Wot nyme?” he asked.

“Matt King and Joe McGlory--two nymes.”

“’E’s hexpecting you. This w’y, please.”

The boys were ushered through a great apartment with a beamed ceiling and a fireplace that covered half of one end of the room, up a flight of broad stairs, and along a wide hall. Here the servant paused by a door and knocked. A mumble of voices, coming from the other side of the door, ceased abruptly.

“What’s wanted?” demanded some one.

“Mr. McGlory hand friend, sir.”

“Send ’em in.”

The servant pushed open the door, drew to one side, and bowed the boys out of the hall. Then the unexpected happened for the second time.

There were two men in the room, and the atmosphere was thick with tobacco smoke and a reek of liquor. A box of cigars was on a table; also a decanter and two glasses, a bowl of cracked ice, and a bottle of “fizz” water.

A man was seated in a comfortable chair, rocking and smoking. This man was Hannibal J. Levitt, owner of the unmanageable runabout.

The other man was tall and gaunt. He wore a black frock coat and gray trousers, a flowing tie, and a big diamond in the front of his pleated white shirt. His hair was a trifle long and a trifle thin on the crown. A mustache spread widely from his upper lip; and a wisp of pointed beard decorated his chin.

This latter individual exploded a hearty laugh as McGlory recoiled and stared like a person in a trance.

“Howdy, son?” barked the man in the long coat, sweeping down on the cowboy and seizing his hand. “Something of a surprise, hey? Lookin’ for Griggs, by gad, and you find me!”

“Colonel!” gulped McGlory. “Speak to me about this! Why, I thought you were in Tucson?”

“Made up my mind at the last minute that I’d better trek eastward and make sure the deal for the ‘Dream’ went through.” He slapped McGlory on the back. “A fortune, my boy, for all of us, by gad! The ‘Dream’s’ a bonanza--gold from the grass roots down. But present your friend; present your friend.”

The colonel turned beamingly toward Matt.

“My pard, Matt King,” said McGlory. “Everybody has heard of him, I reckon.”

“You do me proud,” bubbled the colonel, seizing Matt’s hand and pumping his arm up and down. “A friend of McGlory’s is a friend of mine. Allow me”--and he turned toward Levitt, only to find Levitt leaning across the table, his jaws agape. “Well, well, well!” mumbled the colonel. “What’s flagged you, Levitt?”

“We’ve met before,” grinned Levitt.

“How’s that?”

“These are the young fellows to whom I gave that confounded runabout.”

“A conspiracy, by gad, to keep me from meeting McGlory! How’d you expect him to get here in a motor wagon you couldn’t run yourself?”

“I didn’t know who the lads were, colonel, or I’d have been more considerate. But”--and here he turned to Matt--“how _did_ you do it?”

“We had plenty of trouble with the machine,” said Matt, “but we made it bring us.”

The situation was clearing. Levitt, at the time Matt and McGlory had met him that morning, was also on his way to the Malvern Country Club.

“Re-markable!” cooed the colonel. “But it’s a terrible land for dust, ain’t it?” He poured something from the decanter into the glasses. “Irrigate!” he said. “Advance by file, my young friends, and refresh the inner man.”

“None for me, colonel,” answered Matt, whose opinion of the colonel was dropping by swift degrees.

“That’s the way I stack up, too, colonel,” grinned McGlory.

The colonel looked horrified.

“From Arizona, Joseph,” he murmured, “and you won’t indulge? Ex-traordinary, I must say. Smoke?” And he indicated the box of cigars.

“No, colonel,” declined Matt.

A sheepish look crossed McGlory’s face as he met the colonel’s inquiring eye.

“I’m in line with my pard,” said he.

“Astounding!” gasped the colonel. “Both habits are reprehensible--exceedingly so. I honor you highly, my lads, but--ahem!--your shining example is one by which I may not profit.” He turned to the mining engineer. “The fire-water is before us, Levitt,” said he; “charge!”

Two hands gripped the glasses simultaneously, and a gurgling followed. The colonel dried his lips elaborately with a large yellow handkerchief.

“The day, Joseph,” he resumed, “is not far distant when you can own a private yacht, a racing stable, an imported car, and a lordly mansion. I have come personally to New York to drive the business through and clinch it. To-night we show the moneyed interests what we’ve got up our wide and flowing sleeves. Half a million in coin, my son, will rise to the bait like a speckled trout to the alluring fly. But be seated, be seated; let’s all be seated.”

Matt took a chair by an open window, and McGlory dropped into another at a little distance.

“The telegram I received, colonel,” observed the cowboy, “was signed ‘Joshua Griggs.’”

“Even so, my dear youth,” smiled the colonel, lowering himself into a chair and lifting his feet to the top of the table. “Mr. Griggs lives in Hempstead. I am enjoying his hospitality, and he has put me up at this most delightful club. I arrived yesterday afternoon, and I yearned to clasp your honest palm before we met in Liberty Street to-night. Incidentally, I will relieve you of further responsibility in the matter of the bullion. Being somewhat fatigued after my long and arduous railroad journey, the Syndicate meeting was put off. To-night, however, we shall be there; and to-night, my son, we put our fortunes to the touch.”

The colonel was altogether too loquacious to suit Matt--too fluent and insincere. That he was entirely capable of engineering a huge swindle Matt felt sure. And Matt regretted to note that the colonel exerted a powerful influence over McGlory.

“Is this deal for the ‘Pauper’s Dream’ on the level, colonel?” inquired the cowboy.

A lighted bomb, suddenly dropped in front of the colonel and Levitt, would not have caused more consternation. The colonel’s feet fell from the table with a bang, and the mining engineer once more threw himself half-way across the table top.

There followed a period of silence. The colonel, after an odd look at Levitt, was first to speak.

“McGlory,” said he, “you are my friend, and I would take a good deal from a friend. Has my integrity ever been questioned? Have you any reason to believe that this mining deal is not on the level?”

“Shucks!” deprecated McGlory. “Is the syndicate anxious to buy a pocket that’s been worked out? Have they got so much money, these Syndicate fellows, that they want to drop some of it into a mine that’s a ‘dream’ in more senses of the word than one?”

This was another bomb. Levitt went white, and breathed hard. Colonel Billings drew a deep breath, studied McGlory’s face, and then looked at the ceiling. Then once more he was first to speak.

“My son,” said he, “you talk like a buck ’Pache with more tizwin aboard than is good for him. And yet you must be in your sober senses. What are your grounds for expressing yourself in that--er--preposterous manner? I wait to learn!”

“Well,” answered the cowboy, “when Levitt took his header from that runabout of his, on the Jericho Pike, a long yellow envelope dropped from his pocket----”

“I breathe again!” interjected the colonel. “You found it, McGlory?”

“That’s the size of it.”

“And you read the contents of that yellow envelope?”

“Matt and I wanted to find out the name of the man who owned the runabout. That’s how we happened to read the ‘private report.’ It wasn’t good reading, colonel.”

“It was for private perusal by the inner circle, my son,” said the colonel. “Levitt and I were vastly worried over the loss of that report. I will trouble you for it, my boy.”

The colonel reached out his hand. McGlory took the envelope from his pocket, and was about to pass it over when Matt reached forward and caught it from his fingers.

“I beg your pardon,” said Matt, “but I was the one who found this envelope. I gave it to Joe when I threw off my coat, east of Krug’s Corner, to tinker with the runabout. I am going to take care of it.”

All four were on their feet--Matt determined, McGlory puzzled and bewildered, the colonel wrathful, and Levitt with a dangerous gleam in his eyes.