CHAPTER V.

The next day at noon, after a hurried lunch at the restaurant, Alec stopped at the post-office on his way back to the factory. He wanted to add a few lines to the birthday letter which he had written Philippa the night before. He wrote them standing at the public desk; then, drawing the old wallet from his pocket, he took out the long-cherished gold coin from its wrapping of tissue-paper and dropped it into the envelope.

"I'm afraid it isn't safe to send it that way," he said to himself, balancing the letter on two fingers. "It is so heavy that any one could guess what's in it, and it might wear through. I did want her to have it in gold, but I suppose it will be more sensible to send a postal order."

After a moment's deliberation, he turned to the window beside the desk, and asked for a money-order blank. Some one came in while he was filling it out, but he was so absorbed in his occupation that he did not look up until he turned to push the slip and the money through the window bars toward the clerk. Then he saw that it was Ralph Bently who stood behind him, flipping a postal order in his fingers, impatient to have it cashed. They exchanged careless nods, and Alec, sealing his letter, dropped it into the box and hurried back to his work. As the outer door swung shut, Bently leaned his arms on the window ledge and spoke to the clerk, who was an intimate friend of his.

"Say, Billy," he exclaimed, "let me see that coin that Stoker paid you just now, will you? Push it out here a minute."

"What's up?" inquired the clerk, as he complied with the request.

"Oh, nothing much. I just wanted to look at the date." As he examined it, he gave a long whistle. "Whe-ew! It's the same. Curious coincidence, I must say! This young brother takes up a collection Sunday night. Avery drops in her five-dollar gold piece that she got as a prize, you know. Collector turns his back on the meeting to count the money, hands in a report of only four dollars and ninety-six cents. Vows he never saw the gold in the box. A thorough search of the room fails to bring it to light. n.o.body can imagine how it disappeared. The next morning he has a coin of the same date to dispose of."

"Who is the fellow, anyway?" asked the clerk.

"That's just it! Who is he? n.o.body knows. He came here from some little place back in the country several months ago, and went to work in the Downs & Company shoe factory."

"If that's the case, why don't you ask your uncle about him? He's both the company and the manager in the firm, isn't he? He'd know whether the fellow was to be trusted or not."

"I intend to," was the answer; "and say, Billy, if you don't mind, I'll take that coin. Here's its equivalent."

He pushed a rustling new bank-note toward his friend. "See me play Sherlock Holmes now. I always did think I'd make a good detective."

"Look out," was the warning reply. "You have only a slim bit of circ.u.mstantial evidence, and it would be hard on the boy to start such a tale if there were no truth in it."

With the coin in his pocket, Ralph sauntered down to his uncle's office. It was some time before the busy man could spare time to listen to him.

"Well," he said at last, looking up, pen in hand, "what can I do for you this morning, Ralph?" He had always taken a special interest in his sister's only son, and now smiled kindly as he approached.

"Oh, nothing, thank you, uncle. I just dropped in to ask you about one of the employees in the factory. Who is this Alec Stoker, and where did he come from?"

The manager's brow contracted an instant in thought. The factory was a large one, and the roll of employees long.

"Stoker! Stoker!" he repeated. Then his face cleared. "Ah! He is the nephew of the best salesman we have on the road. Came well recommended from a little town called Ridgeville, I believe. He seems to be a faithful, energetic boy, and has already pushed up to one promotion."

"Did any one recommend him besides his uncle?" asked Ralph, meaningly.

"No, that was sufficient. But you evidently have a reason for these inquiries. Do you know anything about him?"

"No, only--" he shrugged his shoulders. "Something happened last night that put me on my guard. Didn't Avery tell you?"

At the mention of his daughter's name in connection with Ralph's insinuations, Mr. Windom was instantly alert. He laid down his pen.

"No, tell me!" he demanded.

In as few words as possible, Ralph told of the disappearance of Avery's money from the collection box, and the discovery he had made at the post-office. When he had finished, Mr. Windom shook his head gravely.

"You are making a very serious charge, Ralph," he said, "and on very slight provocation. At sixteen one is apt to jump at hasty conclusions. Take the advice of sober sixty, my boy. It is a remarkable coincidence, I admit, but even the common law regards a man as innocent until he is proved guilty, and surely a society that stands for all that the Christian Endeavour does would not fall below the common law in its sense of justice. I'm surprised that its members should be so quick to whisper suspicion and point the accusing finger."

"Oh, I'm not a member!" Ralph exclaimed, hastily. "I am perfectly free to say what I think. Somehow I've never liked the fellow from the start. He takes so much on himself, and seems to want to push himself in where he doesn't belong."

Mr. Windom, swinging round in his revolving chair toward his desk, picked up his pen again. "Stoker is all right so far as I know," he said. "It would be a very small thing to let a personal dislike influence you in this."

He spoke sternly. Adjusting his eyegla.s.ses, he pulled some papers toward him, and Ralph, feeling that he desired the conversation to close, backed out of the office with a hasty good day. His face flushed at his uncle's implied rebuke, and he resolved that if there was any possible way, he would prove that his suspicion was right. He stopped at the post-office on his way home, to speak to the clerk again.

"Billy," he said, in a confidential tone, "do a favour for me. Just drop a line to the postmaster at that address, will you, and ask him to tell you what he knows about a former resident of that place--one Alec Stoker? I'm hot on his track now, and I'm going to trace this thing out if it takes all the year."

"Found out anything?" asked the clerk.

"Ask me later," Ralph answered, with a knowing look. "It's a detective's policy to keep mum."

So the poison of suspicion began its work. In a few days, the answer came to the clerk's letter. Alec Stoker was O. K. so far as the postmaster of Ridgeville knew. His grandfather had been one of the most highly respected citizens of the place, but--then followed an account of Alec's father. This the self-appointed young detective seized eagerly.

"Humph! Thought there was bad blood somewhere!" he exclaimed. He took the report to his uncle, who read it gravely, and dismissed him with a short lecture on the cruelty of repeating such stories to the intentional hurt of a fellow creature. Stung to anger by this additional reproof, Ralph was more determined than before to prove that his suspicions were correct. He carried the letter to the president of the society, urging investigation.

"No!" was the determined answer; "better lose a thousand times that amount than accuse him falsely. Because his father was dishonest is no proof that he is a thief. Drop it, Bently. Don't put a stumbling-block in the poor fellow's way by spreading such insinuations as that. He seems one of the most earnest and sincere members we ever had in the society."

With a muttered reply about wolves in sheep's clothing, Ralph took his letter to the treasurer and secretary. Meeting the same response from them, he talked the matter over with some of the members, who were more willing to listen than the others, and less conscientious about repeating their surmises. So the poison spread and the story grew. It came to Alec's ears at last. There is always some thoughtless talebearer ready to gather up the arrows of gossip and thrust them into the quivering heart of the victim.

Then the matter dropped so far as the society was concerned. Alec simply stayed away. Some there were who never noticed his absence.

Some were confirmed in their suspicions by it. Ralph Bently declared that it was proof enough for him that Stoker felt guilty. If nothing was the matter, why should he have dropped out so suddenly when he had pretended all along to be so interested in the services and had taken such an active part in them?

The president, noting his absence, promised himself to look him up sometime, but such promises, never finding definite dates, are never fulfilled. The member of the visiting committee who had called on Alec during his illness, and was really interested in him, started to call again. Something interrupted him, however, and he eased his conscience, which kept whispering that it was his duty to go, by sending him one of the printed invitations they always sent to strangers, cordially urging a regular attendance at the meetings.

Then the society went selfishly on in its old channels, unmindful of the young life set adrift again in a sea of doubt and discouragement, with no hand held out to draw it back from the peril of shipwreck.

The despairing mood that had settled down on Alec during the summer seized him again. He would work doggedly on during the day, thinking of Flip and his Aunt Eunice, and feeling that for their sakes he must stick bravely at it. There was no other position open to him. But it was almost intolerable staying in a town where people not only knew of his father's disgrace, but pointed accusing fingers at him. His sensitiveness on the subject made him grow more and more morbid. He brooded over it until he imagined that every one who happened to glance steadily in his direction must be saying, inwardly, "Like father, like son."

He knew that Ralph Bently had gone to Mr. Windom with his information. The talebearer had given him an exaggerated account of the interview. He felt that there was no longer any use for him to hope the manager would ever raise him to the position of his trusted a.s.sistant, no matter how thoroughly he might learn the details of the business. For that reason he studied the newspapers for the advertis.e.m.e.nts of help wanted. He intended to make a change at the first opportunity.

Once, crossing a street, he met the Windom carriage coming toward him. Avery, fair and gracious beside her mother, was bowing to an acquaintance. He started forward eagerly. He had not seen her since the last night he attended church, but the picture of her pure, sweet face, upturned like a white flower as she listened to the service, had been with him ever since. It had come before him many an evening when, with head bowed on his hands, he had leaned over the little table in his room, gazing intently into vacancy; it had laid a detaining hand on him when he would have flung out of the house in his desperation, in search of some diversion to keep him from brooding over his fate.

Now they were almost face to face. Forgetting everything but his pleasure in seeing her once more, and remembering her smiling greetings in the past, his hand went up involuntarily toward his hat; but he stopped half-way, for, turning toward her mother just then, she called her attention to something on the other side of the street.

"Just what I might have expected!" muttered Alec, thinking she purposely avoided him. His teeth were set and his face white with mortification. But in his heart he had not expected it. He had taken a vague comfort in the thought that she would believe in his innocence, no matter who else doubted. She had insisted so kindly on his never giving the lost money another thought.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "HIS HAND WENT UP INVOLUNTARILY TOWARD HIS HAT."]

If there had been only one accusation to deny, he could have gone to her with that, he thought. He would have compelled her to believe his innocence by the very force of his earnestness. But the knowledge of the accusation against his father silenced him.

"h.e.l.lo! You nearly knocked me down, Stoker. Where are you going?" It was one of the factory boys who asked the question, and Alec, hurrying down the street with unseeing eyes, became suddenly aware that he had run against some one who had caught him by the arm, and was laughingly shaking him to make him answer. "Where are you going?"

"Oh, I don't know, and I don't care," was the reckless answer.

"All right, come along if you want good company," was the joking reply, and the other boy, slipping his arm in Alec's, turned his steps to a corner where a jolly crowd were waiting for him to join them.

After that there were no more lonely evenings for Alec, when he sat with bowed head beside his table, staring into vacancy. He should have had another promotion in March. Alec felt that he was proficient enough to be advanced, and he told himself bitterly that the reason he was not was because the manager mistrusted him.