“No, we’ll stay at a hotel until morning, after we cover as much ground as we care to,” decided Jerry. “No use taking any chances with night travel.”
They had said nothing to Mrs. Johnson about their reasons for wanting to see the professor, and to his original one, of merely desiring an explanation about the yellow clay, Jerry had added another.
“Fellows,” he said, “I’m not so sure but what mother could claim that she was fraudulently induced to sell that land. It wasn’t a square deal, anyhow, and maybe the professor, unless he’s too friendly with that Universal Plaster Company, could give evidence in our favor.”
“What good would it do?” asked Bob.
“Why, if we could prove that the sale of the land was brought about by fraud, the transfer would be set aside,” Jerry said. “Mother could have her property again, and get a profit from the medicated mud. I only hope it will turn out that way.”
“And you think the professor can help you?” asked Ned.
“He may be able to. I can’t believe that he’s gone back on me altogether, though it does look so.”
Discussing this subject made the time pass quickly for the boys, and soon they had arrived at a hotel where, once before, they had put up over night.
“We’ll stay here,” decided Jerry, “and go on in the morning.”
At supper that evening Bob called Jerry’s attention to an advertisement in the paper, extolling the virtues of the yellow clay for rheumatism and other ills.