FullReads

It would not be true to say that Mr. Gubb had become suspicious of Mr. Medderbrook’s honesty. The fact that the cashier of the Riverbank National Bank told him the Utterly Hopeless Gold-Mine stock was not worth the paper it was printed on did pain him, however.

It pained Mr. Gubb to think his father-in-law-to-be might be guilty of even unconscious duplicity, and when Mr. Master paid him the six thousand and seventy-five dollars Mr. Gubb decided that only three thousand dollars of it should pass immediately into Mr. Medderbrook’s hands. Mr. Gubb put two thousand dollars in the bank and invested the balance in furniture for his office and in articles and instruments that were needed for his detective career. The three thousand dollars he took to Mr. Medderbrook and paid it to him, leaving only eight thousand nine hundred dollars unpaid.

Mr. Medderbrook was greatly pleased with this and told Mr. Gubb so.

“This is a bully payment on account,” he said, “and if you keep on this way you’ll soon be all paid up, but you don’t want to let that worry you, for I’m having a brand-new lot of stock in a brand-new mine printed, and I’ll sell you a whole lot of it as soon as we are square. I’m going to call it the Little Syrilla Gold-Mine–“

“I don’t think I’ll buy any more gold-mine stock after the present lot is paid up completely full,” said Mr. Gubb.

“That’s all right,” said Mr. Medderbrook. “I haven’t given the printer final orders yet and if you prefer something else I’ll make it Oil-Well stock. It is all the same to me. The property will produce just as much oil as it will gold. Every bit!”

“Have you heard from Miss Syrilla recently of late?” asked Mr. Gubb.

“Yes, I have,” said Mr. Medderbrook. “I have heard two dollars and a half’s worth.”

The telegram, which Mr. Medderbrook permitted Mr. Gubb to read after he had paid the cash in hand, said:–

Heaven smiles on us. Have given up all vegetable diet. Have given up potatoes, beets, artichokes, fried parsnips, Swiss chard, turnips, squash, kohl-rabi, boiled radishes, sugar beets, corn on the cob, cow pumpkin, mushrooms, string beans, asparagus, spinach, and canned and fresh tomatoes. Have lost ten pounds more. Weight now only nine hundred and fifteen pounds. Dorgan worried. I dream of Gubby and love.

Mr. Gubb sighed happily. “I suppose,” he said blissfully, “that by the present moment of time Miss Syrilla has only got left a remainder of six double chins out of seven, dear little one!” And he went back to his office feeling that it would not be long now before the apple of his eye was released from her side-show contract.

The next day Mr. Gubb had begun his labors on a new and interesting case when the door opened.

“Gubb, come across the hall here!”

Gubb looked up from the labor in which he was engaged and blinked at Lawyer Higgins.

“At the present time I am momently engaged upon a case,” said Mr. Gubb. “As soon as I am disengaged away from what I am at, I expect to be engaged at the next thing I have to do. I shouldn’t wish to assume to be rude, Mr. Higgins, but when a deteckative is working up a case, and has a sign on his door ‘Out–Back at Midnight,’ he generally means he ain’t receiving callers on no account.”

“That’s all right,” said Higgins briskly, “but this is business. I’ve got a real job for you.”

“I am engaged upon a real job now,” said Philo Gubb.

“This is a detective job,” said Mr. Higgins. “We want you to find a man, and if you find him, there’s two hundred dollars in it for you. What sort of a job is it you have on hand?”

“I am searching out the whereabouts of a lost party,” said Gubb earnestly. “I’m investigating clues at the present time and moment.”