AUNT JANE'S NIECES AT MILLVILLE
BY
EDITH VAN DYNE (one of L. Frank Baum's pen names)
1908
Continued....
CHAPTER XVI.
A MATTER OF SPECULATION.
Old Hucks, still smiling, but dreadfully nervous
over the discovery of
Joe, and Mr. Merrick's sudden activity in the boy's
behalf, speedily
harnessed Daniel and induced the reluctant steed to
amble down the path
to the cabin. Leaning on Uncle John's arm, the
invalid walked to the
buggy and was assisted to mount to the seat beside
Thomas. Then away
they started, and, although Dan obeyed Hucks more
willingly than any
other driver, the Major and Uncle John walked
'cross-lots and reached
the hotel a good fifteen minutes in advance of the
equipage.
The Millville Hotel depended almost entirely for
patronage upon the
commercial travelers who visited the place
periodically to sell goods to
the merchants, and these did not come too often,
because trade was never
very energetic and orders never very large. Bob West
boarded at the
hotel, and so did Ned Long, a "farm hand," who did
sundry odd jobs for
anyone who needed him, and helped pay his "keep" by
working for Mrs.
Kebble when not otherwise engaged.
Mrs. Kebble was the landlady, and a famous cook.
Kate Kebble, a
slatternly girl of sixteen, helped her mother do the
work and waited on
the table. Chet Kebble, the landlord, was a silent
old man, with
billy-goat whiskers and one stray eye, which, being
constructed of
glass, usually assumed a slanting gaze and refused
to follow the
direction of its fellow. Chet minded the
billiard-room, which was mostly
patronized Saturday nights, and did a meager
business in fire insurance;
but he was "so eternal lazy an' shifless," as Mrs.
Kebble sharply
asserted, that he was considered more a "hanger-on"
of the establishment
than its recognized head.
The little rooms of the hotel were plainly furnished
but maintained with
exceptional neatness.
The one in the east corner of the second floor met
with the approval of
Uncle John and the Major, and was promptly engaged.
It was cheerful and
sunny, with outlooks on the lake and the village,
and contained a lounge
as well as the bed.
When the invalid arrived, he was assisted to this
apartment and
installed as its permanent occupant.
"Any baggage?" asked Mr. Merrick.
"There's a small trunk lying at the Junction," said
Joe; "but it
contains little of importance."
"Well, make yourself at home, my boy, and get well
at your leisure,"
remarked Uncle John. "Mrs. Kebble has promised to
look after you, and
the Major and I will stop in now and then and see
how you progress."
Then he went out, engaged Nick Thorne to go to the
Junction for the
boy's trunk, and selected several things at the
store that he thought
might be useful to the invalid. Afterward he marched
home again beside
the Major, feeling very well pleased with his
morning's work.
When the girls reached home late in the afternoon,
they were thrown into
a state of great excitement by the news, briefly
related by their uncle,
that Joseph Wegg had returned to Millville
"considerably smashed" by an
automobile accident, and was now stopping at the
village hotel
for repairs.
They refrained from making remarks upon the incident
until they were
alone, when the secret council of three decided to
make Joe Wegg's
acquaintance as soon as possible, to discover what
light the young man
might be able to throw upon the great mystery.
"Do you know, girls," said Louise, impressively, "it
almost seems as if
fate had sent Joe Wegg here to be an instrument in
the detection of the
murderer and robber of his poor father."
"If Joe knew about it, why didn't he track the
villain down himself?"
inquired Patsy.
"Perhaps he hasn't suspected the truth," said Beth.
"Often those who are
closely concerned with such tragedies do not observe
the evidences of
crime as clearly as outsiders."
"Where did you get that information?" demanded
Patsy.
"From one of Anna Doyle Oppenheim's detective
stories," answered Beth,
seriously. "I've been reading up on such things,
lately."
"Detective stories," said Louise, reflectively, "are
only useful in
teaching us to observe the evidences of crime. This
case, for example,
is so intricate and unusual that only by careful
thought, and following
each thread of evidence to its end, can we hope to
bring the criminal
to justice."
"That seems to me conceited," observed Miss Doyle,
composedly.
"Detective stories don't have to stick to facts; or,
rather, they can
make the facts to be whatever they please. So I
don't consider them as
useful as they are ornamental. And this isn't a
novel, girls; it's
mostly suspicion and slander."
"You don't seem able to be in earnest about
anything," objected Beth,
turning a little red.
"But I try to be." said Patricia.
"We are straying from the subject now under
discussion," remarked
Louise. "I must say that I feel greatly encouraged
by the sudden
appearance of the Wegg boy. He may know something of
his father's former
associates that will enable us to determine the
object of the murder and
who accomplished it."
"Captain Wegg was killed over three years ago,"
suggested Miss Doyle,
recovering easily from her rebuff. "By this time the
murderer may have
died or moved to Madagascar."
"He is probably living within our reach, never
suspecting that justice
is about to overtake him," asserted Louise. "We must
certainly go to
call upon this Wegg boy, and draw from him such
information as we can. I
am almost certain that the end is in sight."
"We haven't any positive proof at all, yet,"
observed Patsy, musingly.
"We have plenty of circumstantial evidence,"
returned Beth. "There is
only one way to explain the facts we have already
learned, and the
theory we have built up will be a hard one to
overthrow. The flight of
Captain Wegg to this place, his unhappy wife, the
great trouble that old
Nora has hinted at, the--"
"The great trouble ought to come first," declared
Louise. "It is the
foundation upon which rest all the mysterious
occurrences following, and
once we have learned what the great trouble was, the
rest will be
plain sailing."
"I agree with you," said Beth; "and perhaps Joseph
Wegg will be able to
tell us what the trouble was that ruined the lives
of his parents, as
well as of Old Hucks and his wife, and caused them
all to flee here to
hide themselves."
It was not until the following morning that the
Major found an
opportunity to give the confederates a solemn wink
to indicate he had
news to confide to them. They gathered eagerly on
the lawn, and he told
them of the finding of Joe Wegg in the isolated
cabin, and how old
Thomas and Nora, loving the boy as well as if he had
been their own
child, had sacrificed everything to assist him in
his extremity.
"So ye see, my avenging angels, that ye run off the
track in the Hucks
matter," he added, smiling at their bewildered
faces.
Patsy was delighted at this refutation of the
slanderous suspicions that
Thomas was a miser and his smiling face a mask to
hide his innate
villainy. The other girls were somewhat depressed by
the overthrow of
one of their pet theories, and reluctantly admitted
that if Hucks had
been the robber of his master and old Will Thompson,
he would not have
striven so eagerly to get enough money to send to
Joe Wegg. But they
pointed out that the old servant was surely hiding
his knowledge of
Captain Wegg's past, and could not be induced to
clear up that portion
of the mystery which he had full knowledge of. So,
while he might be
personally innocent of the murder or robbery, both
Beth and Louise were
confident he was attempting to shield the real
criminal.
"But who is the real criminal?" inquired Patsy.
"Let us consider," answer Louise, with the calm,
businesslike tone she
adopted in these matters. "There is the strolling
physician, whom we
call the Unknown Avenger, for one. A second suspect
is the man McNutt,
whose nature is so perverted that he would stick at
nothing. The third
suspicious individual is Mr. Bob West."
"Oh, Louise! Mr. West is so respectable, and so
prosperous," exclaimed
Patsy.
"It's a far jump from McNutt to West," added Beth.
"Leaving out Hucks," continued Louise, her eyes
sparkling with the
delightful excitement of maintaining her theories
against odds, "here
are three people who might have been concerned in
the robbery or murder.
Two of them are under our hands; perhaps Joseph Wegg
may be able to tell
us where to find the third."
They pleaded so hard with the Major to take them to
call upon the
injured youth that very day, that the old gentleman
consented, and,
without telling Uncle John of their plans, they
drove to Millville in
the afternoon and alighted at the hotel.
The Major went first to the boy's room, and found
him not only very
comfortable, but bright and cheerful in mood.
"At this rate, sir," he said, smilingly, "I shall be
able to discharge
my guardian in quick time. I'm twice the man I was
yesterday."
"I've brought some young ladies to call upon you,"
announced the Major.
"Will you see them?"
Joe flushed at first, remembering his plastered
skull and maimed
condition. But he could not well refuse to receive
his callers, whom he
guessed to be the three girls Old Hucks had praised
to him so highly.
"It will give me great pleasure, sir," he replied.
An invalid is usually of interest to women, so it is
no wonder that the
three young ladies were at once attracted by the
bright-faced boy, who
reclined upon his couch before the vine-covered
windows. They thought of
Ethel, too, and did not marvel that the girl grieved
over the loss of
this friend of her childhood.
Joe had to recount the adventure with the
automobile, which led to his
injuries, and afterward give an account of his life
at the hospital.
That led, naturally, to the timely assistance
rendered him by the
faithful Thomas, so that Louise was able to broach
the subject nearest
her heart.
"We have been greatly interested in your old
servants--whom we acquired
with the farm, it seems--and all of us admire their
simplicity and
sincerity," she began.
"Nora is a dear," added Beth.
"And Thomas is so cheerful that his smile is enough
to vanquish any
attack of the blues," said Patsy.
"The Hucks are the right sort, and no mistake,"
declared the Major,
taking his cue from the others.
This praise evidently delighted the boy. They could
have found no more
direct way to win his confidence.
"Nora was my mother's maid from the time she was a
mere girl," said he;
"and Thomas sailed with my father many years before
I was born."
They were a little surprised to hear him speak so
frankly. But Louise
decided to take advantage of the opening afforded
her.
"Nora has told us that some great trouble came to
them years ago--a
trouble that also affected your own parents. But
they do not wish to
talk about it to us."
His face clouded.
"No, indeed," said he. "Their loving old hearts have
never recovered
from the blow. Would you like to know their history?
It is a sad story,
and pitiful; but I am sure you would understand and
appreciate my old
friends better after hearing it."
Their hearts fairly jumped with joy. Would they like
to hear the story?
Was it not this very clue which they had been
blindly groping for to
enable them to solve the mystery of the Wegg crime?
The boy marked their
interest, and began his story at once, while the
hearts of the three
girls sang-gladly: "At last--at last!"
AUNT JANE'S NIECES AT MILLVILLE
Continued....
 
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