The Case and the Girl - Page 144/149

"And you told the lawyer?"

"Everything I knew, and some I guessed at. I thought the old guy would throw a fit, but he didn't. He came through game after the first shock. But say, that dame had sold him out all right. He never had an inkling anything was wrong; no more did the banks. We went over, and talked to the president of one of them--a smooth guy with white mutton chops--and the girl had signed up the preliminary papers already, and tomorrow the whole boodle was going to drop softly into her lap. Say, I felt better when I learned they hadn't copped the swag yet. But just the same I needed help."

"And you got it?"

"Sure; those two duffers coughed up money in a stream. Called in a detective agency, and gave me three operatives to work under me. Got the chief on the wire, and made him give me a free hand. Then I had a cinch."