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Page 76
He tried to engage Baker in conversation, but the latter, his hands free
now, paced the room nervously, acting like some caged animal.
"I'm afraid of him!" he declared. "I don't know that I am doing what is
best. He's a bad man. He begs me to spare him for the sake of his
family."
"Is this a matter where settlement will do any injustice to others?"
asked Bart.
"None, now--it is past that."
"Then follow the dictates of your own judgment, Mr. Baker," directed
Bart, "being sure that you are acting with a clear conscience."
Colonel Harrington, when he returned, brought two documents. Baker
looked them over.
"Are they satisfactory?" inquired the colonel anxiously.
"Yes," answered Baker.
"Now understand, there is to be no gossip about this affair?" insisted
the magnate.
"I shan't talk," said Baker.
"And I am to have that express package?"
"Give it to him, Stirling."
Bart took the mysterious unclaimed package from his pocket. Colonel
Harrington seized it with a satisfied cry.
"You have wronged myself and others deeply, Colonel Harrington," said
Baker in a grave, reproachful tone, "but you have made some amends. I
forgive you, and I hope you will be a better man."
CHAPTER XXX
"STILL HIGHER!"
Bart Stirling was a proud and happy boy as he stood at the door of the
express office looking down the tracks of the B. & M.
A new spur was being constructed, and it divided to semi-inclose a
substantial foundation which was the start of the new and commodious
express office. The blue sky, smiling down on the busy scene, was no
more serene than the prospect which the future seemed to offer for the
successful young express agent.
With his last reckless crime Lem Wacker had ceased to be a disturbing
element at Pleasantville. After two months' confinement he had limped
out of the hospital, out of town, and out of Bart Stirling's life.
Colonel Jeptha Harrington himself had left town with the beginning of
winter. It was said he intended to make an extended trip in Europe.
With his departure, a new Mr. Baker seemed to spring into existence.
Divested of his disguise, no longer a fear-filled roustabout fugitive,
Bart's strange friend had found a steady, lucrative position at the
hotel, and Bart felt that he had certainly been the means of doing some
real good in the world every time he looked at the happy, contented face
of his prot�g�.
Concerning all the details of Baker's past, Bart never knew the entire
truth.
Baker felt, however, that it was due to his champion that he explain in
the main the mystery of his connection with Colonel Harrington, and he
told a strange story.
It seemed that the purse-proud colonel had a poor brother living in
another State.
This brother owned a farm on which there lived with him a man named
Adams, a widower, and his little daughter, Dorothy.
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