“Why?” demanded Roy Dennis sharply.
Phyllis determined to be perfectly frank. “I will tell you my reason for asking you that question,” she began. “You may not know it, but our little friend, Tania, disappeared from Cape May the very same day that Philip Holt left the Cape. We all knew that Mr. Holt had known Tania for a number of years before we met her. He thought that the child ought to be shut up in some kind of an institution, but Miss Morton wished to put the little girl in a school. So it may just be barely possible that Mr. Holt took Tania away without asking leave of any one.” Phil made absolutely no reference to the stolen money and jewels in her talk with Roy Dennis. If they could run down Philip Holt and Tania the treasure-box would be disclosed as a matter of course.
Roy Dennis hesitated for barely a second. Then he remarked to Phil, half-admiringly: “You have been frank with me, Miss Alden, and, to tell you the truth, I think it is about time that I be equally frank with you. I have no idea where Philip Holt now is, but I do know something about how he got away from Cape May, and I am beginning to have my suspicions that there might have been something ‘shady’ in his behavior that I did not think of at the time. Three nights ago, it must have been about eleven o’clock, I was just about ready for bed when Mr. Holt rang me up and asked to speak to me alone. He said that he had just had bad news and wished to get out of Cape May as soon as possible. He asked me if I would lend him my car so that he could drive to a nearby railroad station where he could get a train that would take him sooner to the place he wished to go. I thought it was rather a strange request and asked him why he didn’t borrow Tom Curtis’s car? He said that Mrs. Curtis had gone to bed and that he did not like to disturb her. He and Tom had never been friendly, so he did not wish to ask him a favor. Well, I can’t say I felt very cheerful at letting Philip Holt have the use of my car, but he said that he would send it back in a few hours and it would be all right. I got it out for him myself and he drove away in it. It didn’t come back until this morning, and you never saw such a sight in your life, covered with mud and the tires almost used up.”
Phil nodded sympathetically. “Who brought the car back to you?” she asked. “Was it Mr. Holt?”
Roy Dennis shrugged his heavy shoulders. “No, indeed! He sent it back by a chap who wouldn’t say a word about himself, Holt, or from which direction he had come.”
“Is the man still in town?” asked Phil, her voice trembling, “and would you mind Tom Curtis’s asking him some questions? We are so awfully anxious.”
Roy Dennis rose quickly. “I believe the fellow is around yet, and I’ll get hold of him and take him to Tom at once. I don’t think that Philip Holt has had anything to do with the kidnapping of the little girl, but his whole behavior looks pretty funny. We will make the chauffeur chap tell us where Philip Holt was when he turned over my car to him.” Roy was off like a flash.
Phyllis and Lillian were making their apologies to Ethel for being obliged to hurry off at once to the houseboat when Mabel Farrar took hold of Phil’s hand. Her usually haughty expression had changed to one of the deepest interest. “I am so sorry about the little lost girl,” she said. “I hope you will soon find her. She is a queer, fascinating little thing. I have watched her all summer, and she certainly can dance. I can’t believe that Philip Holt has actually stolen her, yet I don’t know. Roy Dennis just told Ethel Swann and me something awfully queer. He says he found a bright scarlet ribbon, like a bow that a child would wear in her hair, in the bottom of his motor car when the chauffeur brought it back to him to-day.”
Phil’s black eyes flashed. “If I ever needed anything to convince me that Philip Holt stole Tania away from us that would do it,” she returned indignantly. “Little Tania slept every night with her hair tied up with a scarlet ribbon so as to keep it out of her eyes. When we find where Philip Holt is we shall find Tania, and if I have any say in the matter he shall answer to the law for what he has done.”