CHAPTER XXIV.

AUNTIE TAKES THE TRAIL.

"Mix a tablespoonful of corn starch with a quarter of a cupful of

water. Stir this into a cupful of boiling water, and boil for two

minutes; then add the juice and rind of a lemon and a cupful of sugar,

and cook three minutes longer. Beat an egg very light, and pour the

boiling mixture over it. Return to the fire and cook a minute longer,

stirring all the while--a most tasty lemon sauce"----

"T' 'ell wit' these limon sauces!" exploded Michael Phelan, hurling

the book across the room and bounding from his chair. "Sure 'n I'll

niver be able to look a limon in the face agin. Limon, limon,

limon--these blame books are filled wit' 'em. 'Tis a limon I am mesilf

an' all fer a limon colored bill. But I'll not stand it a minute

longer, shut down into this tomb wit' nothin' but mice fer comp'ny.

Wurra! Wurra! Rose O'Neil, but your blue eyes an' your black hair an'

your divilish smiles have spelled me finish."

Phelan wrung his hands and took a turn around the room. Now and again

he stopped and shook his fist at the ceiling, and at last, beside

himself, he made a rush for the door that led to the stairway. Opening

a crack, he listened. Nothing but heavy silence beat down on him from

above and he shivered. He looked back into the kitchen and his eye

fell on the pile of cookbooks. With a muttered oath he flung himself

through the doorway and crept upstairs.

He had to feel his way through the narrow slit of a corridor above,

and it was with an immense sigh of relief that he opened the door and

stepped into the great drawing room he had left. In the dim light of

the one glowing lamp he made out Whitney Barnes deep in the embrace of

a great chair and sonorously asleep.

"So that's the way he's kapin' watch!" hissed Phelan through his

teeth, as he fairly pounced across the room. First he seized the young

man's feet and threw them from their resting place to the floor,

exclaiming as he did so:

"Here you--wake up!"

"Yes, dear," mumbled the young man in his sleep, "I could abide with

you always."

"Don't yez be afther dearin' me," snarled Phelan. "Wake up!"

Barnes opened his eyes and asked thickly:

"Wassa masser."

"What are yez doin' there?" cried Phelan.

"What am I doing here," rejoined Barnes, now wide-awake and getting on

his feet. "Why, I'm keeping watch at the window--on guard as it

were."

"On guard, is it?" snorted Phelan. "On guard an' snorin' like a bazoo.

'Tis a fine night watchman ye'd make. But, say, hain't ye seen nothin'

o' Mr. Gladwin since?"

"Now, I told you, Officer," returned Barnes severely, "that I would

let you know just as soon as he returned. I have been keeping guard

here, and no one could enter the house without my knowing it. You will

kindly return to the kitchen and wait."

"An' you got no word from him?" asked Phelan, in manifest distress.

"No," with emphasis.

"Oh, my! oh, my!" complained Phelan bitterly. "Sure this is the worst

muddle I ever got mesilf into! The sergeant will find him in that

uniform, sure. It'll cost me me job, that's what it will! How late is

it now?"

Barnes consulted his watch.

"Five minutes past ten."

"Howly Moses! If I ever get out of this scrape I pity the mon that

offers me money fer the lind o' me uniform agin. I'll grab him by

the"----

A sharp ring at the doorbell cut him short and wrote another chapter

of tragedy in his countenance.

"Hello! there's some one at the door," spoke up Barnes. "You'd better

go and see who it is, Officer."

"Me!" gurgled Phelan. "Me! an' walk into the arms o' Sergeant

McGinnis. Let 'em stay out, whoever it is, or yez go yersilf."

"All right," said Barnes, "and in case it should be your friend

McGinnis you better go and hide in the kitchen, like a brave officer.

I'll let you know when it's time to come out."

Phelan did not budge as Barnes left the room, but stood muttering to

himself: "How the divvil did I iver let mesilf in fer this thing--I

dunno! That's what love does to yez--a plague on all women! If"----

"Helen, Helen, where are you?" cried a shrill feminine voice that

seemed to clutch the very heart of Michael Phelan with a grip of ice.

"Howly murther! What's that?" he breathed, backing away from the

door.

"Help! Murder! Police!" was borne in on him in even more agonized

tones, and before he could move another step Mrs. Elvira Burton burst

into the room--flushed and wild-eyed--in the throes of one of her

famous fits of hysterics.

Phelan took a backward leap as she came toward him, and she yelled:

"Stop! stop! Where's my niece?"

With his eyes almost out on his cheeks Phelan managed to articulate:

"What, ma'am?"

"You know what I mean--don't deny it!" Mrs. Burton shrilled.

"I don't know what yez're talkin' about," protested Phelan, backing

toward the doorway that led to the kitchen.

The hysterical woman stopped, struggling for breath. When she could

speak again she said fiercely:

"Who are you?"

"I--I"---- Phelan began.

"Tell me who you are or I'll have you arrested--I'll call the

police."

"Oh, for the love of hiven, don't call the police!" begged Phelan,

still backing toward the door.

"Then tell me what you are doing here."

"I'll answer no questions," cried Phelan. With a desperate backward

leap he gained the narrow doorway behind and vanished. He pulled the

door shut and clung to the knob, hearing the muffled demand hurled at

him:

"Here! Come back here! Helen! Helen! I want my niece! Oh, Helen, come

to auntie!"

Then Barnes and the other pretty ward of the distraught Mrs. Burton

entered the room. The young man had stopped Sadie in the hallway to

ask a few questions and endeavored to soothe the frightened girl. He

had taken possession of her hand again and still held it as he led her

to the door of the drawing room.

They did not attempt to enter until after the precipitate disappearance

of Michael Phelan. As Mrs. Burton stood looking helplessly at the closed

door, her ample bosom heaving and her breath coming in short

hysterical gasps, Barnes was whispering to Sadie:

"Ah, Miss Sadie, I can't tell you how overjoyed I am at seeing you

again. And so that's your auntie--fancy that chap refusing to meet

her! Why"----

That was as far as he got. Auntie suddenly wheeled round and caught

sight of him.

"Ah! Gladwin!" she screamed and made a rush for him.

With all his characteristic aplomb and insouciance Whitney Barnes was

unable to face such a rush with any degree of calmness.

"No! no! a mistake!" he retorted and sought to sidestep.

Mrs. Burton was too quick for him and seized his arm in an iron grip.

"Where is Helen? What have you done with her?" she demanded in the

same wild tones.

"I-I-I d-d-don't know," stammered Barnes.

"You have hidden her somewhere and you must give her up," stormed the

woman. "You're a scoundrel--you're a kidnapper--you're a wretch."

She flung Barnes from her with all her strength and he slammed against

the wall. She was about to charge upon him again when Sadie rushed

between them.

"Oh, auntie," she cried. "This is not Mr. Gladwin."

"Of course he isn't," chimed in Barnes, trying to shake himself

together again. "He isn't Mr. Gladwin at all."

"Then who are you?" cried Mrs. Burton.

"Oh, he's some one else," Sadie assured her.

"Yes, you bet I am," continued Barnes, striving his best to appear his

usual jaunty self. "I'm some one else entirely different--I-I'm not

Gladwin in the least."

"What are you doing here?" shot out Mrs. Burton.

"Ah, that's it," he responded. "I'm on guard--keeping watch!"

"I knew it! I knew it!" and the shrill voice rose to a plangent pitch

again. "You have hidden her away. Helen! Helen!"

"Now, now, now--my dear lady," broke in Barnes, soothingly.

"I'm not your dear lady," she flashed on him.

"My dear auntie"--Mrs. Burton's hysteria was becoming contagious--"I

beg your pardon," he added hastily, "your niece, Miss Helen, is not

here. I've been watching for hours, and she's not here--no one is

here."

"That shirt-sleeved man is here--and you're here!"

"But, auntie, he's a friend of Mr. Gladwin's," interposed Sadie.

"Ah, ha! I knew it!" screamed Mrs. Burton. "He's in the plot." And

again she plunged for him, crying, "You're his friend--you're helping

him to steal my niece. But you shan't--I'll prevent it--I'll search

the house. Come, Sadie!"

Barnes dodged skilfully and permitted Mrs. Burton to pass out into the

hallway. Sadie was about to follow when the young man stopped her.

"But I must go with auntie," Sadie objected.

"Never mind auntie now. I want to tell you about your cousin."

"Then you've seen her?"

"No."

"But you know where she is?"

"No."

"Then what can you tell me about her?"

"Everything! Sit down, please. Remember you asked me to help you and I

promised to do so."

Mrs. Burton had managed to switch on the lights in the big reception

room back of the hallway and was searching behind curtains, under

books, behind pictures and in innumerable other places, after the

manner of hysterical women.

"I said I would help you, you know," ran on Barnes.

"Yes," and Sadie looked up into his eyes confidently.

"Do you know why I promised?"

"No. Why did you?"

Barnes bent down toward her and said with all the ardor he could

command:

"Because from the moment I saw you I became your slave. When I saw how

distressed you were about your cousin this evening my heart went out

to you--the instant you left I decided to act and I've been acting

ever since."

"Oh, how kind--what have you done?"

"I've watched."

"Watched?"

"Yes, watched. You don't understand that, but it's a very serious

matter. If you only knew how serious this whole thing is you'd realize

how I am trying to help you, and the risk I am taking."

"Oh, how noble of you! How brave you are!" and if Mrs. Burton had

waited another moment before returning to the room she would have had

another case for hysterics on her hands entirely separate and

independent of Helen's elopement.

"I can't find her--I don't believe she's in the house," wailed Mrs.

Burton.

Barnes regarded her dumbly for a moment and then said slowly and

ponderously:

"My dear lady, I assure you that she is not in the house. If you'll

only listen a moment"----

"I won't listen," Mrs. Burton snapped him up.

Sadie jumped to her feet and rallied to Barnes's defense:

"But, auntie, this gentleman has been doing everything he can to help

us--everything. He's been watching."

"Watching? Watching what?" demanded auntie, suspiciously.

"Ah, that's it! What? What haven't I been watching--for hours?" cried

Barnes.

"But what have you been watching for?" Mrs. Burton shrilled.

"For hours"----

"What?"

"I mean for yours--and Miss Sadie's sake, and now if you'll wait here

and watch with me"----

"Now I see it all," stormed Mrs. Burton, shaking her hand at Barnes

wrathfully. "You want to keep us here. Helen and that scoundrel have

gone and you want to prevent our following them."

"No, auntie, he's trying to help us," sobbed Sadie.

"He's lying to you, child," said Mrs. Burton, shooting vindictive

glances at Barnes. "Don't you know he's a friend of that wretch

Gladwin? But they can't hoodwink me. I know what to do now! Helen is

not of age--I'll swear out a warrant--I'll have him arrested for

abduction, a State prison offense."

"No, no, no," implored Barnes, in real alarm, "you must not do that.

That will make the whole thing public, and that is just what Gladwin

is trying to avoid."

"Don't you suppose I know that," sneered Mrs. Burton. "He's probably a

bigamist. He may have a dozen wives living--the beast!"

"But won't you understand," insisted Barnes. "He's trying to save her,

privately."

"Now, what are you talking about?"

Mrs. Burton regarded him as if she had suddenly realized he was a

raving maniac. And by way of justifying her inspiration he stumbled on

blindly:

"I don't know--you see, it's this way. Gladwin and I only found it out

this afternoon--quite by accident. And we decided to save her."

"That's enough--stop!" cried Mrs. Burton. "You're talking all this

nonsense to detain us. But I won't stay a minute longer. Come, Sadie,

we will go to the police station. I'll never rest until I have that

monster in jail."

And with another dagger glance at Barnes she swept her niece and

herself out of the room and out of the house to the waiting

automobile.

Barnes gripped his forehead in both hands to steady his reeling

brain.

"Isn't that just like a woman," he complained. "After explaining

explicitly she's going to have him arrested. But, by Jove! I must find

Travers and warn him that the police are on his track."

Seizing his hat and stick he rushed out into the night, just in time

to see Mrs. Burton's--or rather Jabez Hogg's--big car glide away from

the curb and shoot down the avenue like a vast projectile.