Chapter 27

LATE VISITORS

The little express office was dark and lonely-looking when Bart again reached it.

Bart unlocked the office door, shot the inside bolt carefully after him, lighted the lantern, placed it on the desk, and opened the safe.

As he selected the big brown envelope marked "Martin & Company," and bearing the express company's shining green seals, his fingers tingled. The immensity of the sum intrusted to his charge perturbed him a trifle.

Bart relocked the safe, stowed the envelope in an inner pocket, and opened the drawer of a little stand leaning against the safe.

He took out a revolver. Mr. Leslie himself had advised him to always have one handy in the express office. Bart had never touched the weapon before. It had been loaned him by Mr. Haven, and Darry had brought it to the office. Bart slipped it now into a side pocket.

He noticed in detail the entry on the messenger's slip. The prepaid charges on the Martin & Company consignment were seven dollars and seventy-five cents, or five cents for every hundred dollars or fraction of it over the first fifty dollars, which was charged for at regular tariff rates, twenty-five cents.

"It is fifteen thousand dollars, right enough!" mused Bart. "Now, to make sure of the form of receipt."

He filled out a special receipt that acknowledged besides the usual delivery, a verification of the amount of the inclosure, its acceptance as correct, and left a blank for the names of two witnesses.

Bart was now ready to sally forth on his peculiar errand, and had fully decided in his mind the persons he would get to act as his witnesses.

"What is that!" he questioned, suddenly and sharply.

He could hear a springy vehicle bound over the near tracks, and then its wheels cut the loose cindered road leading up to the express office.

It halted. He could catch the quick, labored breathing of two horses, a carriage door creaked! some low voices made a brief hum of conversation, and the vehicle seemed to depart.

Bart stood stock-still, wondering and guessing. Footsteps sounded on the platform. There came a thundering thump as of a heavy cane on the office door.

"Who is there?" demanded Bart.

"Colonel Harrington. I've got to see you."

"Come in," Bart said, unbolting the door.

Colonel Harrington was red of face and fussy of manner. He threw the door shut with his foot, and sank to a bench, breathing heavily.

"Was there something you wanted to say to me, Colonel Harrington?" inquired Bart.

"Yes there was!" snapped out the rich man of Pleasantville. "Anxious to see you! Just drove up to your house. They told me you were here. I once offered you a hundred dollars."

Bart nodded, with a faint smile.

"It wasn't enough," stumbled on the colonel. "I am now going to make it a thousand."

"Why, what for, Colonel Harrington?" demanded Bart in surprise.

"Because you can earn it."

"How?"

"Shall I be blunt and plain?"

"It is always the best way."

"Very well, then," resumed the colonel desperately. "A certain unclaimed express package was sold here to-day, marked A.A. Adams. You've got it."

"How do you know that?"

"Oh, you know it and I want it. Hand it over, and here"--the colonel made a dive for his pocketbook--"here's your thousand dollars."

Bart made a signal of remonstrance with his hand, his face grave and decided.

"Stop right there, Colonel Harrington," he said forcibly. "Are you aware that you are offering a bribe to a bonded representative of the express company?"

"Rot take your express company!" growled the colonel angrily. "I am one of its stock-holders. I could buy the whole concern out, if I wanted to!"

"Until you do, I obey official instructions," announced Bart. "Please do not degrade yourself and embarrass me, Colonel Harrington, by saying anything further on this score. I will not sell my honor, nor swerve a hair's breadth from a line of duty plain and clear. The package you refer to was legally purchased by the highest bidder, I hold it temporarily in trust for him. It is as safe and sacred with me as if it was the property of the First National Bank of Pleasantville."

Colonel Harrington squirmed, got red and pale by turns, gripped his cane fiercely, and then, relaxed with a groan.

"It's my property!" he declared. "I can prove it's my property."

"Then I suggest that you persuade the person who bought it of that fact," said Bart.

"Say!" shot out the colonel eagerly, his eye brightening, "if I bring an order from that same person, will you give up the package?"

Bart hesitated.

"You know where he is, then?" he inquired suspiciously.

"I--I might find him," stammered the military man.

"I do not think I would," said Bart. "Bring him here personally, and I will hand it over to him--in your presence, if he says so."

The colonel groaned again. It was plainly to be seen that he was in an intense inward frenzy.

"Stirling, you've got to give me that package!" he cried, springing to his feet and lifting his cane threateningly.

"Have I?" said Bart, facing him watchingly.

"Be careful, Colonel Harrington! you are pretty near committing a criminal offense."

"You're in the plot--you know all about it! Give up that package, or--or--"

"Colonel Harrington," said Bart calmly, but every word ringing out as clear as the tone of a bell, "I am no ruffian, and I hate violence, but if you lift that cane to me again--I'll shoot."

Bart showed the gleaming top of the weapon in his pocket, backing to the door.

Just then the door behind him was forcibly thrust open, its edge hitting him violently. Then someone pounced upon him.

The attack was sudden and effective. A piece of rope was looped deftly about Bart's arms, holding him helpless, secured behind, and as he was pushed roughly against the desk. Lem Wacker's evil face leered down upon him.

"Don't you holler!" ordered Lem.

As he spoke, he leaned over the railing. The waste box held a mass of cotton that had packed some of the parcels disposed of at the sale that afternoon. Lem grabbed up a handful, and forcibly stuffed it into Bart's mouth.

"Wacker! Wacker!" gasped Colonel Harrington in affright, "don't--don't hurt him. This is dreadful--"

"Shut up!" ordered Lem Wacker recklessly, "you want something and don't know how to get it. I do--and will."

He snatched at Bart's tightly-buttoned coat and tore it loose, groped inside and drew out a package.

"I've got it," he announced. "No!--he ripped off the end of the parcel--here's a haul."

Bart writhed, choked on the loose strangling filaments of cotton, but could not utter a word.

"Give me that package!" cried the colonel. "Stop! where are you going?"

Lem Wacker had bolted. The colonel stared in marveling astonishment as his cohort sprang through the open doorway. Bart had managed to wad the cotton in his mouth into a compact wet mass, enabling him to speak.

"Colonel Harrington!" he cried, "that man has not got the package you were after. He has instead stolen a money envelope for Martin & Company containing fifteen thousand dollars in currency, and is making off with it. Cut this rope instantly that I may pursue him, or I give you my word that, as a partner in his crime, rich as you are, and influential as you are, you shall go to the State penitentiary."