Keeping up with Lizzie Part 5

"She paused, and tears came to her eyes again.

"'You are thinking o' the money,' says I.

"'I am thinking o' the money,' says she. 'It has been promised to him. He will expect it.'

"'Do you think he is an honest man? Will he treat you well?'

"'I suppose so.'

"'Then let me talk with him. Perhaps he would take you without anything to boot.'

"'Please don't propose that,' says she. 'I think he's getting the worst of it now. Mr. Potter, would you lend me the money? I ask it because I don't want the family to be disgraced or Mr. Rolanoff to be badly treated. He is to invest the money in my name in a very promising venture. He says he can double it within three months.'

"It would have been easy for me to laugh, but I didn't. Lizzie's att.i.tude in the whole matter pleased me. I saw that her heart was sound. I promised to have a talk with her father and see her again. I looked into his affairs carefully and put him on a new financial basis with a loan of fifteen thousand dollars.

"One day he came around to my office with Alexander an' wanted me to draw up a contract between him an' the young man. It was a rather crude proposition, an' I laughed, an' Aleck sat with a bored smile on his face.

"'Oh, if he's good enough for your daughter,' I said, 'his word ought to be good enough for you.'

"'That's all right,' says Sam, 'but business is business. I want it down in black an' white that the income from this money is to be paid to my daughter, and that neither o' them shall make any further demand on me.'

"Well, I drew that fool contract, an', after it was signed, Sam delivered ten one-thousand-dollar bills to the young man, who was to become his son-in-law the following month with the a.s.sistance of a caterer and a florist and a string-band, all from New Haven.

"Within half an hour Dan Pettigrew came roarin' up in front o' my office in the big red automobile of his father's. In a minute he came in to see me. He out with his business soon as he lit in a chair.

"'I've learned that this man Rolanoff is a scoundrel,' says he.

"'A scoundrel!' says I.

"'Of purest ray serene,' says he.

"I put a few questions, but he'd nothing in the way o' proof to otter--it was only the statement of a newspaper.

"'Is that all you know against him?' I asked.

"'He won't fight,' says Dan. 'I've tried him--I've begged him to fight.'

"'Well, I've got better evidence than you have,' I says. 'It came a few minutes before you did.'

"I showed him a cablegram from a London barrister that said:

"'Inquiry complete. The man is a pure adventurer, character _nil_.'

"'We must act immediately,' says Dan.

"'I have telephoned all over the village for Sam,' I says. 'They say he's out in his car with Aleck an' Lizzie. I asked them to send him here as soon as he returns.'

"'They're down on the Post Road I met 'em on my way here,' says Dan. 'We can overtake that car easy.'

"Well, the wedding-day was approaching an' Aleck had the money, an'

the thought occurred to me that he might give 'em the slip somewhere on the road an' get away with it. I left word in the store that if Sam got back before I saw him he was to wait with Aleck in my office until I returned, an' off we started like a baseball on its way from the box to the catcher.

"An officer on his motor-cycle overhauled us on the Post Road. He knew me.

"'It's a case o' sickness,' I says, 'an' we're after Sam Henshaw.'

"'He's gone down the road an' hasn't come back yet,' says the officer.

"I pa.s.sed him a ten-dollar bill.

"'Keep within sight of us,' I says. 'We may need you any minute.'

"He nodded and smiled, an' away we went.

"'I'm wonderin' how we're agoin' to get the money,' I says, havin'

told Dan about it.

"'I'll take it away from him,' says Dan.

"'That wouldn't do,' says I.

"'Why not?'

"'Why not!' says I. 'You wouldn't want to be arrested for highway robbery. Then, too, we must think o' Lizzie. Poor girl! It's agoin' to be hard on her, anyhow. I'll try a bluff. It's probable that he's worked this game before. If so, we can rob him without violence an' let him go.'

"Dan grew joyful as we sped along.

"'Lizzie is mine,' he says. 'She wouldn't marry him now.'

"He told me how fond they had been of each other until they got accomplishments an' began to put up the price o' themselves. He said that in their own estimation they had riz in value like beef an' ham, an' he confessed how foolish he had been. We were excited an' movin' fast.

"'Something'll happen soon,' he says.

"An' it did, within ten minutes from date. We could see a blue car half a mile ahead.

"'I'll go by that ol' freight-car o' the Henshaws',' says Dan.

'They'll take after me, for Sam is vain of his car. We can halt them in that narrow cut on the hill beyond the Byron River.'

"We had rounded the turn at Chesterville, when we saw the Henshaw car just ahead of us, with Aleck at the wheel an' Lizzie beside him an' Sam on the back seat. I saw the peril in the situation.

"The long rivalry between the houses of Henshaw an' Pettigrew, reinforced by that of the young men, was nearing its climax.

"'See me go by that old soap-box o' the Henshaws',' says Dan, as he pulled out to pa.s.s 'em.

"Then Dan an' Aleck began a duel with automobiles. Each had a forty-horse-power engine in his hands, with which he was resolved to humble the other. Dan knew that he was goin' to bring down the price o' Alecks an' Henshaws. First we got ahead; then they sc.r.a.ped by us, crumpling our fender on the nigh side. Lizzie an' I lost our hats in the scrimmage. We gathered speed an' ripped off a section o' their bulwarks, an' roared along neck an' neck with 'em.

The broken fenders rattled like drums in a battle. A hen flew up an' hit me in the face, an' came nigh unhorsin' me. I hung on. It seemed as if Fate was tryin' to halt us, but our horse-power was too high. A dog went under us. It began to rain a little. We were a length ahead at the turn by the Byron River. We swung for the bridge an' skidded an' struck a telephone pole, an' I went right on over the stone fence an' the clay bank an' lit on my head in the water. Dan Pettigrew lit beside me. Then came Lizzie an'

Sam--they fairly rained into the river. I looked up to see if Aleck was comin', but he wasn't. Sam, bein' so heavy, had stopped quicker an' hit in shallow water near the sh.o.r.e, but, as luck would have it, the bottom was soft an' he had come down feet foremost, an' a broken leg an' some bad bruises were all he could boast of.

Lizzie was in hysterics, but seemed to be unhurt. Dan an' I got 'em out on the sh.o.r.e, an' left 'em cryin' side by side, an'