"No help for it, though. So here goes. I wish I'd done as Mr. Emberg said and let the Retto matter drop. But it seemed too good to lose sight of."

He soon had the _Leader_ office on the wire, and, a few seconds later, was talking to Mr. Emberg. He was rather surprised at what the city editor said.

"What's the matter with you, Larry?" was the inquiry that came through the telephone. "We've been waiting for you. Have you seen the _Scorcher_?"

"No. Why?" asked Larry, an uneasy feeling coming over him. There seemed an atmosphere of "beat" about him, and he was afraid of Mr.

Emberg's next words.

"Why, they've got a big story about Mr. Potter being home," went on the city editor. "They say he is concealed in the house, and has been ever since the scare."

"That's not true!" replied Larry. "I was at the house this morning, and he wasn't home. I've been all around the steamer piers and got no trace of him. I just left his daughter, and she would know if he had been home all this while."

"Well, they've got the story," repeated Mr. Emberg, with the insistence that city editors sometimes use when they fear their reporters have been beaten. "I sent Harvey up to the house in a hurry to make inquiries. The _Scorcher_ got out an extra. Where have you been?"

"I just finished the tour of the docks."

"Well, you'd better go up to the house and make sure. It looks queer."

"I'll bet that story came from Sullivan," said Larry. "He's sore on us, and would do anything to get even. He wants to find Mr. Potter, you know."

"I hope you're right," and Mr. Emberg's voice was not as cordial as it usually was. "Let me hear from you soon again. I'll have one of the men fix up something for the first edition. You tell him about the inquiries made of the ship captains."

Larry's heart was like lead. To have worked so hard, and then to have another paper come out with a "scare" story about Mr. Potter's return, was discouraging.

"That story's a fake," he decided, as he prepared to telephone in the result of his morning's work. "I'll prove it is, too, and make them take back-water."

Larry's story of the trip to the steamship offices was not very interesting reading, for it was but a record of failure. He realized that, but there was nothing else to print and the paper had to have something. It was not Larry's fault, for even a reporter on a special a.s.signment cannot provide fresh and startling news every day, though all newspaper men try hard enough for this desirable end.

After Larry had telephoned in all the information he had, he hurried uptown to the Potter house. He found Grace had just come in, and, to Larry's relief, she had not been successful in getting any news from Captain Padduci. In a few words the reporter told what the _Scorcher_ had printed.

"We must deny that at once!" exclaimed Grace. "I wonder why they print such untruths!"

"For one reason, because the _Scorcher_ is trying to live up to its name and give the public 'hot' news," replied Larry, "and, for another, because Sullivan has some end to gain. He stands in with the _Scorcher_ men, and I think my old enemy, Peter Manton, is responsible for this."

"What can you do to offset it?" asked Grace.

"I can have a signed statement from you or your mother in our last edition."

"A signed statement?"

"Yes, a little interview with you, in the form of a communication, with your name at the foot, denying that your father is at home.

This will take the wind out of the _Scorcher's_ sails."

"Then I'll give you the interview at once. What shall I say?"

Larry told her, and in a few minutes the message was being dictated over the Potter telephone to Mr. Emberg.

"I'm glad to hear this, Larry," the city editor said. "We had quite a scare. I thought they had you beaten, even though Harvey came back and said Mrs. Potter sent down word there was no truth in the _Scorcher_ yarn. You certainly had us scared."

"I was frightened myself," admitted Larry, with a laugh.

"This will make story enough for to-day, unless you find Mr.

Potter," Mr. Emberg went on. "Now lay pipes for something for to-morrow."

"I will," Larry replied, though he did not in the least know what new features he could "play up."

At that instant the bell rang, and a whistle indicated that the letter carrier was at the door. Grace answered it. She came back on the run, a missive in her hand.

"It's from my father!" she exclaimed, as she tore open the envelope.

Larry watched Grace while she read the letter. It was short, for she had quickly finished with it and turned to the reporter.

"He's written about you!" she exclaimed.

"About me?"

"Yes. Listen," and Grace read:

"'I am well. Still have to remain away. Don't try to find me. Will be home soon. Tell Larry Dexter to give up. He's chasing me too close.'"

"Chasing him too close!" exclaimed Larry in bewilderment. I only wish I was! I haven't the least clue to his whereabouts. I wonder what he means? Is that his writing?"

"I can't be mistaken in that," Grace replied. "It is just the same as the other letter was."

"Let me see," and the young reporter examined the envelope. It was similar to that containing the first note which had come from Mr.

Potter, save there was no blot on it and the stamp showed no excess of mucilage.

"I'll take this to the sub-station," Larry went on. "It was probably mailed in the same place as was the other. I'll see if the carrier had any such experience as he did with the former note."

"I think it would be a good plan," Grace answered. "Oh, this is beginning to wear on my nerves! As for mother, she is almost ill over it. Her physician says if father is not found soon he cannot say what will happen to mother."

"Still she must know your father is safe."

"That is the worst of it. She will not believe these notes are from him, or, rather, she believes he is held captive somewhere and is forced to write them. Nothing I can say will make her think differently. She is wearing herself to a shadow over it."

"We must do something!" exclaimed Larry.

"Yes; but what?" asked the girl. "You are working hard and I am doing all I can, but our efforts seem to amount to nothing. What more can we do?"

"I'm trying to think of a plan," Larry responded. "The search of the steamship piers gave us no clue; the police here have not been able to find a trace. We can try one thing more."

"What is that?"

"You can hire private detectives. Sometimes, in cases of this kind, they are better than the police, as they a.s.sign one man, who devotes all his attention to the search, while the police, as a rule, don't bother much to find missing persons."

"Then I'll hire the best private detectives to be had!" exclaimed Grace. "Where ought I to go?"

Larry named an agency, that he had heard was first-cla.s.s, and offered to take Grace to the office. The reporter knew one of the men on the staff, as he had once written a story in which he figured, and the officer had been grateful for the mention of his name. Detectives, even private ones, are p.r.o.ne to vanity in this respect, as a rule.