CHAPTER XXI

THE RISING TIDE OF DOUBT

Lorna Nicholet made no further comment, waiting anxiously for the big blue limousine to approach. Surely it would stop before the lighthouse.

It did. The door of the car opened. But the crippled Arad Thompson did not appear. Instead, a broad-hatted stranger in a rusty black suit stepped out of the car.

"That's Rafe Silver driving, as usual," murmured Tobias. "But who is this fellow? He ain't no acquaintance of mine."

The stranger came promptly to the lighthouse door. He glanced sharply from the lightkeeper sitting on the bench with his pipe to the young woman in the doorway, and back again.

"You are Mr. Tobias Bassett?" was his opening speech.

"I cal'late."

"Mr. Arad Thompson has sent me to you for some information."

"I'm chock-full of it," rejoined Tobias easily, putting his pipe between his lips again and waving his hand.

"Confidential information," continued the man, glancing again at Lorna.

"That's all right," said Tobias. "This young woman knows almost as much as I do, and a little extry information won't hurt her a mite. What was you lookin' to find out?"

"My inquiry is in regard to the robbery of the Clinkerport Bank night before last."

He threw back the left lapel of his coat with a practiced gesture, revealing a glittering badge pinned near the armhole of his vest.

"Oh, sugar!" murmured Tobias. "A real detective? I cal'late I'm pinched."

Lorna dropped a fluttering hand upon his shoulder, but then saw that the old lightkeeper was still smiling cheerfully.

"You fire ahead, Mister."

"Did you ever see this knife before you picked it up under the bank window?" and the detective displayed the toy in his palm.

"Oh, sugar! Can't say as I did. And yet I might. Seems to me--wal, I cal'late I better say no and be done with it. I can't somehow seem to place that thing," declared the lightkeeper, in deep reflection.

He did not notice Lorna's expression of countenance.

"I hope you will not withhold your opinion, Mr. Bassett," said the detective.

"You take it from me, Mister," Tobias rejoined grimly, "I ain't going to refuse any information that may lead to the recovery of the bank's money and the arrest of the burglars. Me and Heppy's got an eight thousand dollar interest in the robbery, as ye might say."

"You are prepared to help us, then, no matter who is hit, are you?"

"I cal'late," agreed Tobias wonderingly.

The detective produced a little red-covered notebook from his pocket. He thrust it toward the lightkeeper.

"Did you ever see this before?"

"I don't know. Can't be sure that I ever did. But, mebbe."

"This address book was found on a ledge right by the vault door. There seems to be no doubt as to whom it belongs, for the owner's name in his own handwriting is on the fly-leaf. Mr. Thompson is quite convinced of the ownership of the book, for there are specimens of the same handwriting on file in the bookkeeping department of the bank."

"My goodness!" gasped Tobias, staring at the book but refusing to take it from the other's hand.

"This book could not have been on the ledge where it was found at the time the bank closed day before yesterday. The vault door was opened on the combination. And the combination is written on one of the pages of this address book."

"Oh, sugar!" murmured Tobias. "Then you've just as good as got one of the burglars, ain't you?"

"Oh, no!" gasped Lorna, cowering in the doorway.

The men did not appear to notice her agitation. Tobias still smoked calmly. The detective hesitated for a moment before he fairly forced the red memorandum book into the lightkeeper's hand.

"Look at it," he said. "See that name on the front page? Do you know his handwriting?"

Lorna dared not look over the lightkeeper's shoulder. At first glance she had recognized the red-covered notebook. There might have been some doubt regarding the ownership of the penknife; but of the notebook--never!

"My soul and body!"

The pipe dropped from the lightkeeper's fingers and was shattered at his feet. He gave this no attention. He was staring, quite fascinated, at the flyleaf of the little book.

"Doesn't the knife belong to the same person?" asked the detective, with sharp insistence.

For once Tobias was ready with no reply. He fluttered the leaves of the book with unsteady fingers. The visitor continued:

"Mr. Thompson said you would know if anybody did. He says you are a great chum of this fellow's--that he hangs about the lighthouse here a good deal.

"Now, there is no possibility of the book's having been left there before the vault door during banking hours. That fellow was never inside the cage for any purpose whatsoever."

Tobias finally regained his voice.

"You don't mean to say you think he'd be foolish enough to leave this book right in sight if he was one o' them burglars?"

"But I tell you it was found there. And you yourself found the knife under the window. Isn't that his, too?"

"I wouldn't go so far as to say it was, nor I wouldn't say it wasn't," announced the old lightkeeper with emphasis. "But it looks right senseless for him to have left the book there--let's see where you say he marked down the combination? That looks right silly, too. If he knowed the combination well enough to open the safe, why bother to write it down?"

"There it is," said the detective, pointing, and with emphasis. "Those figures in pencil. That is the bank vault combination. Or it was. Of course, it will be changed now."

"Yes. I see. Lockin' the garage door after the tin Lizzie's been stole," commented Tobias.

He squinted a long time at the row of numbers and letters written across the otherwise blank page. He turned back a leaf or two, and appeared to study the addresses written thereon.

"Yes," he muttered. "Writ down in pencil. All the rest in ink. He most always _does_ carry a fountain pen."

"No doubt about that knife being his, too, is there?" insisted the detective eagerly.

"I couldn't say. I give it as my opinion that I shall have to think it over purt' serious afore I can say one way or another."

"You don't claim," the detective said in some heat, "that there are so many fellows around here wearing platinum watch chains that you can't guess?"

"Oh, sugar! I wouldn't take so much for granted, if I was you, Mister. I don't 'low ary one o' them burglars belonged around here."

"How do you explain that address book?" snapped the other. "Left right on that ledge beside the vault door. And the combination written in it."

"Say, Mister," Tobias rejoined gravely, "seems to me I ain't got to explain it. You are the detective, not me. I've come across lots of things in this world o' toil and trouble that I couldn't begin to explain."

"You're stalling," said the detective harshly. "That is what you are doing. And it won't help this fellow any. Where is he? Have you seen him around here this morning?"

"I cal'late I ain't," said Tobias, shaking his head. "Is it true what they say, that he's run away?"

A slow red climbed the lightkeeper's wind-tanned cheek. Even his hairy ear became inflamed. Lorna, who was watching him breathlessly, knew that this dark flush signaled wrath--and Tobias was not prone to lose his temper easily.

"Lemme tell you something, Mister Man," he finally rasped. "I give it as my opinion that you air one o' them 'dead-sure' fellows. You know more than the Creator that made ye--or you think you do."

"I'm here to investigate this burglary," interposed the detective.

"Investigate all you dern please!" exclaimed Tobias. "But don't you come here and try to trip me up, fur I'm purt' sure-footed. I've gone as far as I'm going to. That is, until I know more than I do now. That there book probably belongs to Mr. Ralph Endicott. That leetle gold knife may belong to him, too. Further than that I can't and won't say."

"They tell me down at the village that he's skipped out."

"I don't know nothing about that."

"Is that the house his folks live in--that second one up there on the bluff?"

"Yes."

"Well, I'll go up there and see what they know about him. I guess I'll learn something."

"I cal'late you will," rejoined Tobias, with scorn. "I cal'late that if you see Professor Henry Endicott and tell him his nephew is a bank burglar you--an' Arad Thompson, too--will l'arn more than you expect. I shouldn't wonder."

The detective tramped away across the sandflat. Tobias secured his bandana and mopped his heated brow.

"Oh, sugar!" he murmured. "I ain't got no business bein' all het up this a-way. Won't nothing come of it. I give it as my opinion that fellow is purt' near half a fool!"

"But Tobias!"

He started and looked around. Lorna, pale and red by turns, suddenly clung to his shoulder.

"Tut, tut!" the old man muttered. "I'd forgot you was here, Lorny. Thought you'd gone upstairs to see Heppy."

"I--I am going. But I had to wait to hear what that man had to say. It's awful! Ralph----"

"Ain't no sense to that," interrupted Tobias with scorn. "O' course not."

"But that knife. It is his. I'm almost sure it is!" sobbed the girl.

"Oh, sugar! Wish't I'd never picked it up," complained Tobias. "Ain't nothing positive about it, I tell ye. I was too keen after a clue, I was."

"The book! That is surely his."

"Wal--yes. I cal'late. But it don't look sensible that he'd leave it there in the bank. Somebody picked it up, and put it there. Sure!"

"Tobias Bassett! how do you explain the combination being written in Ralph's address book?"

"Don't believe he ever wrote it there," the lightkeeper replied doggedly.

"Why, Tobias?"

"Them figgers don't look like what Ralph makes. I took a squint at some of his'n. Of course, folks writes diff'rent with a pencil from what they do with a pen 'most always. But, then----"

"Oh, Tobias! you are saying these things just to try to convince yourself--and me--that Ralph is not guilty."

"Oh, sugar! I don't have to convince myself of any such thing. I'd have to try mighty hard to made myself believe that he was guilty."

The young woman stared at him, her countenance very much troubled. She said at last slowly:

"There is no reason in your mind for a belief in his possible guilt, Tobias Bassett?"

"Nary reason," he declared in amazement.

"How about his poverty? If he is penniless? Suppose he needed a large sum of money to save him from trouble--from disgrace?"

"What the----"

The lightkeeper's eyes were staring--almost popping out of his head!

"I know it sounds terrible," moaned the young woman. "But if the Endicotts have lost all their money how do we know what financial trouble Ralph may be in? Oh! can't you _see_? He might have been desperately tempted. I hate to think of such a possibility. But----"

She burst into uncontrollable weeping at this juncture and, turning swiftly, ran into the house. Tobias had started erect upon the bench. It was several moments before he could utter any comment. Then:

"Now I have done it!" he ejaculated. "I've gone an' put my foot into it half-laig deep, and no mistake. I dunno. Mebbe Heppy's right. Enterin' in where angels fear to tread has its dangers. I cal'late my matchmaking scheme was all right. But who'd have ever thought anything like this would turn up?

"Oh, sugar!"