CHAPTER XXI
THE RACE FOR LIFE
It took the united efforts of the Cape May police, Tom Curtis, and Roy Dennis to make the chauffeur who had come back with Roy’s car say where he had met Philip Holt, and when Philip had turned over the automobile to him to be brought back to Roy.
The chauffeur was frightened; he finally broke down and told the whole story. Philip Holt had driven from the farmhouse where he left Tania to the nearest village. There he had hired the chauffeur and the man had taken Philip within a few miles of New York. In the course of the ride, Philip had told the automobile driver the same story about Tania that he had told the old man in the tumbled-down farmhouse:
Tania was Philip’s sister. He was hiding her from enemies, who wished to steal the child away from him. If anybody inquired about the child or about him the chauffeur was to say nothing. Philip would pay him handsomely for bringing the car back to Cape May.
The reason that Philip Holt had sent back Roy Dennis’s automobile was because he knew that Roy would put detectives on his track if he failed to return it. Besides, it would be far easier for Philip Holt to get away with his precious iron safe if he were free of all other entanglements.
It was nearly midnight before the story that the chauffeur told was clear to Tom Curtis. The man believed that he knew the very house in which Tania was probably concealed. There was no other place like it near the town where the chauffeur lived.
Tom got out his own automobile. The chauffeur would ride with him. They would go directly to the old farmhouse. Tania would be there and all would soon be well.
It was about nine o’clock the next morning when Tom’s thundering knock at the rickety farmhouse door brought the foolish old man to open it. As soon as Tom mentioned Tania, the old fellow was alarmed. He was stupid and poor, but Philip Holt’s behavior had begun to look strange even to him.