Frank Merriwell's New Comedian Part 46

"No; I shall pay you, for you did the best you could. It was not your fault that you made a mistake in the ma.s.s of carriages at the depot."

"Didn't make no mistake," a.s.serted the cabby, sullenly.

"Well, it's useless to argue over it," said Merry, as he gave the man the promised ten dollars. "I am sure you made a mistake."

"Think I couldn't follow Bill Dover and his spotted nigh hawse?"

exploded the driver. "I couldn't have missed that hawse if I'd tried."

Frank saw one of the horses attached to the other cab was spotted. He had noticed that peculiarity about one of the horses attached to the cab the mysterious woman had entered.

"It's the same horse!" exclaimed Merry.

"'Course it is," nodded the driver.

The man had paid his fare and was carelessly sauntering into the hotel.

As he disappeared through the door-way, Frank sprang to the door of the other cab, flung it wide open, and looked in, more than half expecting to discover the woman still inside.

No woman was there!

Frank caught his breath in astonishment, and stood there, staring into the empty cab.

"Hi, there! wot cher doin'?" called the man on the box.

Frank did not answer. He reached into the cab and felt on the floor. He found something, brought it forth, looked at it amazed.

It was a woman's dress!

But where was the woman?

Garment after garment Frank lifted, discovering that all a woman's outer wearing apparel lay on the floor of that cab.

"Vanished!" he muttered. "Disappeared--gone? What does it mean?"

Then he thought of the man who had left the cab and entered the hotel, and he almost reeled.

"That was the woman!"

He had seen one woman change into a man on the train, and here was another and no less startling metamorphosis.

"Driver," he cried, "didn't you take a person on in woman's clothes at the station and let one off in man's clothes just now?"

"None of yer business!" came the coa.r.s.e reply. "I knows enough not ter answer questions when I'm paid ter keep still."

That was quite enough; the driver might as well have answered, for he had satisfied Merriwell.

Frank was astonished by the remarkable change that the woman had made while within the cab, but now he believed he understood why she had not been detected while on the train. She had been able to make a change of disguises in the toilet room, and had pa.s.sed herself off as a man. Hodge had looked for a veiled woman, and he had looked for a veiled woman; it was not strange that both of them had failed to notice a person in masculine attire who must have looked like a woman.

Up the hotel steps Frank leaped. He entered the office, he searched and inquired. At last, he found out that a beardless man had entered by the front door, but had simply pa.s.sed through and left by a side door.

"Given me the slip," decided Frank. He realized that he had encountered a remarkably clever woman.

And the mystery was deeper than ever.

Frank went to the hotel at which the company was to stop, and found all save Wynne had arrived. Hodge was on the watch for Merry, and eagerly inquired concerning his success in following the woman. Frank explained how he had been tricked.

"Well, it's plain this unknown female is mighty slippery," said Bart.

"You have not seen the last of her."

"I am afraid there are some things about this double mystery which will never be solved," admitted Frank. "For instance, the ident.i.ty of the man who fell into the river."

"We'll be dead lucky if we do not have trouble over that affair," said Hodge.

"How do you mean?"

"Some fool is liable to swear out a warrant charging us with throwing the unknown overboard."

"I thought of that," nodded Frank, "and that is why I took occasion on the train to straighten out your story somewhat. It is always best, Bart, to stick to the straight truth."

Hodge flushed and looked resentful, but plainly sought to repress his feelings, as he said:

"I am not the only person in the world who believes the truth should not be spoken at all times."

"If one cannot speak the truth," said Merry, quietly, "he had better remain silent and say nothing at all, particularly in a case like this.

There is an old saying that 'the truth can afford to travel slowly, but a lie must be on the jump all the time, or it will get caught.'"

"Well, I don't think this is any time to moralize," came a bit sharply from Bart. "If we were to go into an argument, I rather think I could show logically that a white lie is sometimes more commendable than the truth."

"In shielding another, possibly," admitted Merry; "but never in shielding the one who tells it. The more a person lies, the more he has to lie, for it becomes necessary to tell one falsehood to cover up another, and, after a while, the unfortunate individual finds himself so ensnared in a network of fabrications that it is impossible for him to clear himself. Then disaster comes."

"Oh, don't preach!" snapped Bart. "Let's go to your room and talk this matter of the veiled woman over. There is trouble brewing for you, and you must be prepared to meet it. Havener has registered for the company, and all you have to do is call for your key."

So Frank and Bart went to the room of the former.

Puelbo had been well "papered." The work was done thoroughly, and every board, every dead wall, and every available window flaunted the paper of "True Blue."

The failure of "For Old Eli" was still fresh in the minds of the people of the city, but neither had they forgotten Frank Merriwell's plucky promise to bring the play back to that place and perform it successfully there.

The newspapers of the place had given him their support, but Frank was determined that extracts from the notices in the Denver papers should reach the eyes of those who did not read the Puelbo papers closely. With this end in view, he had the extracts printed on flyers, as small bills are called, and the flyers were headed in startling type:

"Five Hundred Dollars Fine!"

To this he added:

"Each and every person who reads the following clippings from Denver newspapers will be fined Five Hundred Dollars!"

It is needless to say that nearly every one who could read was careful to read the clippings through to the end.

This manner of attracting attention was effective, even though it may seem rather boyish in its conception.