“I—I am prejudiced, I fear.”
“So am I,” agreed Dud, with a grim chuckle. “I’m going after that man Grimes. It’s funny he should go into business with a mysterious capital right after the old firm was closed out, when before that he had had no money to invest in the firm of which he was a member.”
“I feared as much,” sighed Helen. “And he was so eager to throw suspicion on the lost bookkeeper, just to satisfy my curiosity and put me off the track. He’s as bad as Uncle Starkweather. He doesn’t want me to go ahead because of the possible scandal, and Mr. Grimes is afraid for his own sake, I very much fear. What a wicked man he must be!”
“Possibly,” said Dud, eyeing the girl sharply. “Have you told me all your uncle has said to you about the affair?”
“I think so, Dud. Why?”
“Well, nothing much. Only, in hunting through the files of the newspapers for articles about the troubles of Grimes & Morrell I came across the statement that Mr. Starkweather was in financial difficulties about the same time. He settled with his creditors for forty cents on the dollar. This was before your uncle came into his uncle’s fortune, of course, and went to live on Madison Avenue.”
“Well—is that significant?” asked the girl, puzzled.
“I don’t know that it is. But there is something you mentioned just now that is of importance.”
“What is that, Dud?”
“Why, the bookkeeper—Allen Chesterton. He’s the missing link. If we could get him I believe the truth would easily be learned. In one newspaper story of the Grimes & Morrell trouble, it was said that Grimes and Chesterton had been close friends at one time—had roomed together in the very house from which the bookkeeper seemed to have fled a couple of days before the embezzlement was discovered.”