"I judged so," Chet said dryly. "Don't you always have sich when you girls go in for acting?"

"Now--"

"I am sympathetic, Laura--I swear I am!" her brother cried, putting up his hands for pardon. "Don't shoot. But of course things always will go wrong.

Who is it--Bobby? Or Jess? Or Lil?"

"It is Hester Grimes."

"Wow!" exclaimed Chet. "I didn't know she was in it at all."

Laura told him of the emergency that had arisen and how Hester Grimes seemed certain to be drawn into the affair.

"Why, that big chunk can't act," said Chet quite impolitely. "She looks enough like her father to put on his ap.r.o.n and stand behind one of his butcher blocks."

"Oh, that is awful!" Laura objected. "But I know she will spoil our play."

"Humph! Why didn't you, Laura, suggest somebody else for the part, as long as Margit couldn't take it?"

"I didn't know of anybody."

"I thought they called you 'Mother Wit,'" scoffed Chet. "You're not even a little bit bright."

"No, I guess you are right. I have lost all my brightness," sighed Laura.

"It has been rubbed off."

"Then you admit it was merely plate," laughed Chet. "But say! why didn't you think of the girl who helped you out before?"

"Who? What girl?"

"That Red Cross girl. What's her name?"

"Janet Steele!"

"That's the one. Some pippin," said Chet with enthusiasm. I saw her this afternoon and helped her plow home--"

"Chetwood Belding! Wait till Jess Morse hears about it."

"Aw--"

"Jess will spark, old boy; you see if she doesn't"

"Jess is the best girl in the world; and she's got too much sense to object to my helping another girl home through the snow."

"All right," chuckled Laura, in a much more cheerful mood. "But don't make the mistake of praising Janet to Jess. That is where the crime comes in."

"Oh! Well, I won't," her brother declared thoughtfully.

"And where did you beau Janet from?" Laura asked.

"The hospital."

"Were you there to see that poor man?"

"Rich man, you mean," grinned her brother. "I took him some books and a lot of papers. He is able to sit up and read."

"But he doesn't know who he is?"

"He declares his name is John _Something_, and that he ought to be in Alaska right now. Says the last he knew he was in Sitka. Something happened to him there. Whatever it was, his brain must have been affected at that time. For he cannot remember anything about the first part of his life."

"But, Chetwood!" exclaimed Laura earnestly, "that man is not a miner. He is not tanned. His hands are not rough. He was as well groomed, the matron says, as any gentleman who ever was brought to the Centerport Hospital."

"But he was in Alaska. You should hear him tell about it."

"He has lived two lives, then," said Laura thoughtfully.

"And must be beginning his third now," put in Chet. "What do you know about that? And him with a roll of more than two thousand dollars--every bill brand-new."

"Oh, Chet!"

"Well, what is it?" her brother asked, looking curiously into Laura's suddenly glowing face.

"Does he know he has so much money?"

"Why, yes. I've been telling him to-day all about that funny bill he pa.s.sed on me. He says he is glad he has so fat a purse, as he will be obliged to remain in bed long with that leg in a cast."

"But, Chet! has he got the money himself?"

"It is in the hospital safe."

"I wonder! I wonder!" the girl murmured.

"What is it now?" asked Chet

"I wonder if any other bills in his roll are like that hundred-fifty note father swapped with Mr. Monroe for you."

"Huh?" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed her brother, quite puzzled.

"It was on the Drovers' Levee Bank, of Osage, Ohio. I wrote it down, and the names of the cashier and president of the bank. Do find out, Chet, if there are any more of those new bills issued by that bank in his roll."

"What for?" demanded Chet.

That Laura would not tell him, only made him promise to do as she asked.

Mother Wit had an idea; but she would not explain it to anybody yet.

CHAPTER XIV