"Hadn't you looked over the bonds and stuff since you took them home?"

"No," Mr. Ackerman admitted. "I got them from the broker yesterday and as it was too late to put them into the safe-deposit vault, I took them home with me instead of putting them in our office safe as I should have done. I thought it would be easier for me to stop at the bank with them this morning on my way to business. It was foolish planning but I aimed to save time."

"So the pocketbook was at your house over night?"

Mr. Ackerman nodded.

"Yes," confessed he. "Nevertheless it did not go out of my possession.

I had it in the inner pocket of my coat all the time."

"You are sure no one took the things out while you were asleep last night?"

"Why--I--I don't see how they could," faltered Mr. Ackerman. "My servants are honest--at least, they always have been. I have had them for years. Moreover, none of them knew I had valuable papers about me.

How could they?" was the reply.

Once more silence fell upon the room.

"Come, Tolman," e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed the steamboat man presently, "you are a level-headed person. What is your theory?"

"If I did not know my son and myself as well as I do," Mr. Tolman answered with deliberation, "my theory would be precisely what I fancy yours is. I should reason that during the interval between the finding of the purse and its return the contents had been extracted."

He saw the New Yorker color.

"That, I admit, is my logical theory," Mr. Ackerman owned with a blush, "but it is not my intuitive one. My brain tells me one thing and my heart another; and in spite of the fact that the arguments of my brain seem correct I find myself believing my heart and in consequence cherishing a groundless faith in you and your boy," concluded he, with a faint smile.

"That is certainly generous of you, Ackerman!" Mr. Tolman returned, much moved by the other's confidence. "Stephen and I are in a very compromising situation with nothing but your belief between us and a great deal of unpleasantness. We appreciate your att.i.tude of mind more than we can express. The only other explanation I can offer, and in the face of the difficulties it would involve it hardly seems a possible one, is that while the coat was hanging in the lobby--"

There was a sound outside and a sharp knock at the door, and an instant later Mr. Donovan entered, his face wreathed in smiles. Following him was the woman who had checked the coats, a much frightened bell boy, and a blue-uniformed policeman.

The woman was sobbing.

"Indeed, sir," she wailed, approaching Steve, "I never meant to keep the pocketbook and make trouble for you. I have a boy of my own at home, a lad about your age. What is to become of him now? Oh, dear; oh, dear!"

She burst into pa.s.sionate weeping.

"Now see here, my good woman, stop all this crying and talk quietly,"

cut in the policeman in a curt but not unkind tone. "If you will tell us the truth, perhaps we can help you. In any case we must know exactly what happened."

"She must understand that anything she says can be used against her,"

cautioned the detective, who in spite of his eagerness to solve the mystery was determined the culprit should have fair play.

"Indeed, I don't care, sir," protested the maid, wiping her eyes on her ridiculously small ap.r.o.n. "I can't be any worse off than I am now with a policeman taking me to the lock-up. I'll tell the gentlemen the truth, I swear I will."

With a courtesy he habitually displayed toward all womanhood Mr. Tolman drew forward a chair and she sank gratefully into it.

"I spied the bill book in the young gentleman's pocket the minute he took off his coat," began she in a low tone. "It was bright colored and as it was sticking part way out I couldn't help seeing it. Of course, I expected he would take it with him into the dining room but when he didn't I came to the conclusion that there couldn't be anything of value in it. But by and by I had more coats to hang up and one of them, a big, heavy, fur-lined one, brushed against the young gentleman's ulster and knocked the pocketbook out on to the floor so that it lay open under the coat rack. It was then that I saw it was stuffed full of papers and things."

She stopped a moment to catch her breath and then went resolutely on:

"It seemed to me it was no sort of a plan to put the wallet back into the lad's pocket, for when I wasn't looking somebody might take it. So I decided I much better keep it safe for him, and maybe," she owned with a blush, "get a good-sized tip for doing it. I have a big pocket in my underskirt where I carry my own money and I slipped it right in there, meaning to hand it to the young man when he came out from lunch."

The corners of her mouth twitched and her tears began to fall again, but she wiped them away with her ap.r.o.n and proceeded steadily:

"But nothing turned out as I planned, for no sooner was the bill book in my pocket than I was called away to help about the wraps at a lady's luncheon upstairs. There were so many people about the hall that I had no chance to restore the bill book to the lad's pocket without some one seeing me and thinking, perhaps, that I was stealing. There was no help but to take it with me, trusting they would not keep me long upstairs and that I would get back to my regular place before the young gentleman came out of the dining room. It was when I got out of the elevator in the upper hall that I spied d.i.c.k, one of the bell boys I knew, and I called to him; and after explaining that I couldn't get away to go downstairs I asked him to take the wallet and put it in 47's pocket.

He's a good-natured little chap and always ready to do an errand, and more than that he's an honest boy. So I felt quite safe and went to work, supposing the young man had his pocketbook long ago."

All eyes were turned upon the unlucky bell boy who hung his head and colored uncomfortably.

"So it was the boy who took the contents of the pocketbook!" was Mr.

Ackerman's comment.

"Speak up, boy," commanded the officer. "The gentleman is talking to you." The lad looked up with a frightened start.

He might have been sixteen years of age but he did not look it for he was pale and underfed; nor was there anything in his bearing to indicate the poise and maturity of one who was master of the occasion. On the contrary, he was simply a boy who was frankly distressed and frightened, and as unfeignedly helpless in the present emergency as if he had been six years old and been caught stealing jam from the pantry shelf. It did not take more than a glance to convince the onlookers that he was no hardened criminal. If he had done wrong it had been the result either of impulse or mischief, and the dire result of his deed was a thing he had been too unsophisticated to foresee. The plight in which he now found himself plainly amazed and overwhelmed him and he looked pleadingly at his captors.

"Well, my boy, what have you to say for yourself?" repeated Mr. Ackerman more gently.

"Nothin'."

"Nothing?"

"No, sir."

"You did take the things out of the pocketbook then."

"Yes, sir."

"But you are not a boy accustomed to taking what does not belong to you."

The culprit shot a glance of grat.i.tude toward the speaker but made no reply.

"How did you happen to do it this time?" persisted Mr. Ackerman kindly.

"Come, tell me all about it."

Perhaps it was the ring of sympathy in the elder man's voice that won the boy's heart. Whatever the charm, it conquered; and he met the eyes that scanned his countenance with a timid smile.

"I wanted to see what was in the pocketbook," said he with nave honesty, "and so I took the things out to look at them. I wasn't goin'

to keep 'em. I dodged into one of the little alcoves in the hall and had just pulled the papers out when I heard somebody comin'. So I crammed the whole wad of stuff into my pocket, waiting for a time when I could look it over and put it back. But I got held up just like Mrs. Nolan did," he pointed toward the woman in the chair. "Some man was sick and the clerk sent me to get a bottle of medicine the minute I got downstairs, and all I had the chance to do was to stick the empty wallet in 47's pocket and beat it for the drug store. I thought there would be letters or something among the papers that would give the name of the man they belonged to, and I'd take 'em to the clerk at the desk an' say I found 'em. But no sooner had I got the medicine up to room Number 792 than the policeman nabbed me with the papers an' things on me. That's all there is to it, sir."

"Have you the things now?" the officer put in quickly.

"Sure! Didn't I just tell you I hadn't had the chance to hand 'em over to the clerk," the boy reiterated, pulling a wad of crumpled Liberty Bonds and doc.u.ments out of his pocket, and tumbling them upon the table.

There was no doubting the lad's story. Truth spoke in every line of his face and in the frankness with which he met the scrutiny of those who listened to him. If one had questioned his uprightness the facts bore out his statements, for once out of the hotel on an errand he might easily have taken to his heels and never returned; or he might have disposed of his booty during his absence. But he had done neither. He had gone to the drug store and come back with every intention of making rest.i.tution for the result of his curiosity. That was perfectly evident.

"I'm sorry, sir," he declared, when no one spoke. "I know I shouldn't have looked in the pocketbook or touched the papers; but I meant no harm--honest I didn't."

"I'll be bound of that, sir," the woman interrupted. "d.i.c.k was ever a lad to be trusted. The hotel people will tell you that. He's been here several years and there's never been a thing against him. I blame myself for getting him into this trouble, for without meaning to I put temptation in his way. I know that what he's told you is the living truth, and I pray you'll try and believe him and let him go. If harm was to come to the lad through me I'd never forgive myself. Let the boy go free and put the blame on me, if you must arrest somebody. I'm older and it doesn't so much matter; but it's terrible to start a child of his age in as a criminal. The name will follow him through life. He'll never get rid of it and have a fair chance. Punish me but let the little chap go, I beg of you," pleaded the woman, with streaming eyes.