An evening or two later Dave Dennison reported to Keith that he had found Phrony. Dave's face was black with hate, and his voice was tense with suppressed feeling.

"How did you find her?" inquired Keith.

"Shadowed the preacher. Knew he and that man had been confabbin'. She's clean gone," he added. "They've destroyed her. She didn't know me." His face worked, and an ominous fire burned in his eyes.

"We must get her home."

"She can't go. You'd never know her. We'll have to put her in an asylum."

Something in his voice made Keith look at him. He met his gaze.

"They're getting ready to do it--that man and the preacher. But I don't mean 'em to have anything more to do with her. They've done their worst.

Now let 'em keep away from her."

Keith nodded his acquiescence.

That evening Keith went to see a doctor he knew, and next day, through his intervention, Phrony was removed to the private ward of an asylum, where she was made as comfortable as possible.

It was evident that she had not much longer to stay. But G.o.d had been merciful to her. She babbled of her baby and her happiness at seeing it soon. And a small, strongly built man with grave eyes sat by her in the ambulance, and told her stories of it with a fertility of invention that amazed the doctor who had her in charge.

When Mr. Rimmon's agents called next day to make the preliminary arrangements for carrying out his agreement with Wickersham, they found the room empty. The woman who had charge of the house had been duly "fixed" by Dave, and she told a story sufficiently plausible to pa.s.s muster. The sick woman had disappeared at night and had gone she did not know where. She was afraid she might have made away with herself, as she was out of her head. This was verified, and this was the story that went back to Mr. Rimmon and finally to Ferdy Wickersham. A little later the body of a woman was found in the river, and though there was nothing to identify her, it was stated in one of the papers that there was good ground for believing that she was the demented woman whose disappearance had been reported the week before.

CHAPTER XXIX

THE MARRIAGE CERTIFICATE

One day after Phrony was removed, Keith was sitting in the office he had taken in New York, working on the final papers which were to be exchanged when his deal should be completed, when there was a tap at the door. A knock at the door is almost as individual as a voice. There was something about this knock that awakened a.s.sociations in Keith's mind.

It was not a woman's tap, yet Terpy and Phrony Tripper both sprang into Keith's mind.

Almost at the same moment the door opened slowly, and pausing on the threshold stood J. Quincy Plume. But how changed from the Mr. Plume of yore, the jovial and jocund manager of the Gumbolt _Whistle_, or the florid and flowery editor of the New Leeds _Clarion_!

The apparition in the door was a shabby representation of what J. Quincy Plume had been in his palmy days. He bore the last marks of extreme dissipation; his eyes were dull, his face bloated, and his hair thin and long. His clothes looked as if they had served him by night as well as by day for a long time. His shoes were broken, and his hat, once the emblem of his station and high spirits, was battered and rusty.

"How are you, Mr. Keith?" he began boldly enough. But his a.s.sumption of something of his old air of bravado died out under Keith's icy and steady gaze, and he stepped only inside of the room, and, taking off his hat, waited uneasily.

"What do you want of me?" demanded Keith, leaning back in his chair and looking at him coldly.

"Well, I thought I would like to have a little talk with you about a matter--"

Keith, without taking his eyes from his face, shook his head slowly.

"About a friend of yours," continued Plume.

Again Keith shook his head very slowly.

"I have a little information that might be of use to you--that you'd like to have."

"I don't want it."

"You would if you knew what it was."

"No."

"Yes, you would. It's about Squire Rawson's granddaughter--about her marriage to that man Wickersham."

"How much do you want for it?" demanded Keith.

Plume advanced slowly into the room and looked at a chair.

"Don't sit down. How much do you want for it?" repeated Keith.

"Well, you are a rich man now, and--"

"I thought so." Keith rose. "However rich I am, I will not pay you a cent." He motioned Plume to the door.

"Oh, well, if that's the way you take it!" Plume drew himself up and stalked to the door. Keith reseated himself and again took up his pen.

At the door Plume turned and saw that Keith had put him out of his mind and was at work again.

"Yes, Keith, if you knew what information I have--"

Keith sat up suddenly.

"Go out of here!"

"If you'd only listen--"

Keith stood up, with a sudden flame in his eyes.

"Go on, I say. If you do not, I will put you out. It is as much as I can do to keep my hands off you. You could not say a word that I would believe on any subject."

"I will swear to this."

"Your oath would add nothing to it."

Plume waited, and after a moment's reflection began in a different key.

"Mr. Keith, I did not come here to sell you anything--"

"Yes, you did."

"No, I did not. I did not come--only for that. If I could have sold it, I don't say I wouldn't, for I need money--the Lord knows how much I need it! I have not a cent in the world to buy me a mouthful to eat--or drink. I came to tell you something that only _I_ know--"

"I have told you that I would not believe you on oath," began Keith, impatiently.