Part 11

While the girls were enjoying their sodas, the man, whose attention had been attracted to them when they first approached the counter, eyed them attentively. As they paid the check and turned away, he got up, and moving across the short space between them, stood directly in their way. They were about to walk around him, when he spoke.

“Say,” he demanded, in a low tone, “what did you do with my sister?”

“Your sister?” repeated Nancy, in astonishment.

“Come on! Don’t notice him,” whispered Jeanette, trying to urge them on their way.

“Now just you wait a minute,” he persisted. “Don’t try to get away from me. There’s something I want to find out and you’ve got to tell me.”

Jeanette looked wildly around to see if she could see a policeman, but there were none in sight.

“We know nothing about any of your affairs,” said Nancy firmly.

The man laughed unpleasantly.

“Maybe you don’t know me, but I know you; and your friends too. You’ve done me a couple of ill turns, and now to pay up a little you can tell me where Georgia is.”

Now Nancy knew where she had seen him before. The peculiar acting man in front of them in the theater that day so long ago; Georgia in tears in the lobby; the girls taking her to tea, and making up enough to send her home; the meeting with Georgia in the store at Christmas time; her months of boarding at Janie’s house. All this flashed through her mind, followed immediately by the picture of a man bending over her dresser one night at college; his capture by means of her flashlight; the room filled with girls; Tim’s entrance to take the man into custody.

“Georgia!” gasped Jeanette.

“Yes, Georgia,” repeated the man. “You tried to coax her away from me, by getting her to live at your house; but I fixed that! You didn’t want her any more after you found out about the brooch. Did you?”

The girls were so surprised and shocked by the man’s words that they were absolutely speechless.

“She came back with me for a while after that,” he continued, “and then gave me the slip again. Now what I want to know is, where is she? Where have you hidden her?”

“We know nothing at all about Georgia’s whereabouts,” said Nancy, finding her voice at last. “We only wish we did. We too have been looking for her for a long time.”

“Is that the truth?” demanded the man, looking sharply at her.

“It certainly is. Now let us pass at once.”

Seeing a policeman crossing the station, the man slunk off, and was soon lost in the crowd; and the girls hurried out, and up the stairs toward the train.

“My goodness!” panted Martha, as they almost ran along the platform. “I was scared.”

“I wasn’t scared; for there were too many people all around us; but I was almost stunned by the unexpectedness of the encounter,” said Nancy.

“Poor, poor Georgia,” commented Jeanette, “to have such a brother! What do you——”

“Our car!” cried Martha. “It’s gone.”

“It can’t be,” protested Nancy. “That is our engine.”

“Well, you can see for yourself that the car ‘Elaine’ isn’t anywhere around here,” persisted Martha, excitedly.

“They are switching,” said Jeanette, after a careful survey of the scene. “‘Elaine’ is probably farther out in the yards. We’ll walk on a ways.”

“She’s gone. She’s certainly gone,” repeated Martha, after they had proceeded for some distance, and still saw no signs of the runaway car.

“There it is!” cried Nancy, pointing across several tracks, where, far ahead, almost at the bridge over the Hudson River, stood “Elaine.”

“How in the name of fortune can we get to her?” demanded Martha.

“The answer to that,” said Jeanette, smiling, “is that you can’t, at present.”

“Unless you want to climb over those two trains,” added Nancy. “They’ll probably switch again, and bring her farther in.”

They stood watching, and Martha breathed more freely when an engine soon picked up the lost “Elaine” and brought her in near the platform where the girls were waiting. Soon they were able to get on board again.

“Now that the excitement is over,” said Nancy, as they settled down in their chairs for the rest of the trip, “let’s discuss our strange encounter. Mart did so much dancing around out on the platform that we had no chance to talk about it.”

“Well, I didn’t want to get left,” protested Martha.

“Of course we _did_,” laughed Nancy.

“Can you figure out the mystery at all. Nan?” asked Jeanette.

“No, Janie, I really can’t, that is in detail. We know now that this man whom we first saw that day in the theater is Georgia’s brother; and that he is a—a—” she hesitated, not liking to say the word.

“A thief!” prompted Martha, who had no such scruples. “And what did he mean by saying that you had done him a couple of ill turns?”

“First, in befriending Georgia, I suppose,” replied Nancy slowly, “since that took her away from him. And second, for turning him over to Tim that night at college——”

“Oh,” squealed Martha, “was _he_ the burglar that you captured with the flashlight?”

“Yes.”

“You realize, Nan, judging by what he just said, that he was responsible for the brooch being found in Georgia’s pocket?” asked Jeanette.

“Do you suppose he was lying? I don’t see how he could have worked it.”

“Nor I, but he doubtless has ways and means of which we know nothing; and I’m just as sure as sure—and always have been—that Georgia was not guilty.”

“So am I; and I wish more than ever, now, that we could find her,” replied Nancy.

“Perhaps if we advertised?” suggested Jeanette.

“You might. But don’t expect any results; for there are so many papers, and so many cities. She might not even be in this country now.”

“What about the brooch story!” asked Martha. “I never heard that!”

“No, we never told it, and never intended to; but since you have accidentally heard part of it, you may as well learn the rest,” replied Jeanette.

Jeanette went on to tell her briefly how, after Georgia had been living with them for some months, and had been left alone for the week-end, a valuable brooch of Mrs. Grant’s had been found in Georgia’s pocket under very puzzling circumstances, and that, immediately after, Georgia had mysteriously disappeared.

“How very uncomfortable for all of you,” was Martha’s comment, when Jeanette had finished her explanation. “Why don’t you tell everybody you know,” she proposed, after a moment’s thought, “that you want to find Georgia! Just give them a description of her, and tell them to be on the lookout for such a person. You needn’t tell them why you want her.”

The girls smiled skeptically over her suggestion.

“I’ll ask John—Mr. Pierce anyhow,” she persisted. “He meets such a lot of people.”

“First call for dinner. Dining car forward,” called a waiter, passing through the car.

“Let’s go in right away,” proposed Martha, rising promptly. “If we don’t, we’ll be standing in line later. We had a very light lunch, you know,” she added, as Jeanette smiled. “And I’ll have to be leaving you in about an hour.”

So they went in to the dining car, and lingered over their last meal together on the trip; talking over the happenings in detail, as perhaps only a trio of college girls can.

When Martha’s station was reached, they bade her good-by until the opening of college; and by that time they were so tired and sleepy, that they dozed until their own station was called.

“Just think,” observed Nancy, as they walked along the platform, “the next time we come here we’ll be starting out for our last year at Roxford. Our senior year, Janie. It doesn’t seem possible; does it?”

THE END