Just as Aunt Abbie called that dinner was ready, Phil and Dick came tearing in. They leaped on Garry, shaking hands with him and pounding him exuberantly on the back.
“I told grandfather here,—yes, we call him that now,”—said Dick as he saw the look of wonder on Garry’s face. “I told him you would bring home the bacon.”
“Well, I like that,” put in Ruth indignantly. “Are you insinuating that I’m fat, Mr. Dick? Bacon yourself!”
Everyone laughed at Dick’s stuttering apologies, and then Garry demanded that they tell the story of their adventures since he left them.
Phil and Dick in turn recited what they had done, their stories being constantly interrupted by exclamations from Aunt Abbie, who became more and more excited as the stories were told, even though she knew what had transpired during the preceding hours.
“And, so we decided not to wait for you to come back,” said Phil, as he took up the concluding events. “We went and got the sheriff and brought him to the postoffice, where we laid the whole matter before him. He didn’t want to take any steps at first, because he could not conceive of a U. S. officer not being straight. Then Mr. Arthur, the bank president, came in, and Denton called him in and asked his advice. He took our side immediately, and told the sheriff to go ahead and get Simmons. I wouldn’t say for sure, but I guess that Arthur has a lot of political influence in the county. At any rate, the sheriff went ahead on his say so, and came back with Simmons. There the whole thing was put up to him, and say, you should have heard him explode. He threatened everyone with all kinds of things,—said he’d have the whole postoffice department here, and hollered about country sheriffs interfering with Federal officers and all that sort of stuff. And the more he hollered, the madder the sheriff got at being called a ‘hick,’ until if Simmons, calling him that for want of a better name, had proven his innocence then and there, I don’t believe the sheriff would have let him go without an order from the President.
“Finally Dick came to bat with an idea that was seized by all hands as the only sensible thing to do. He suggested that Denton send a telegram to the postal authorities at Washington with a description of the man and asking if it checked up. The masquerader shut up like a clam then. The sheriff wrote out his description and Denton sent the wire. About two hours later he got an answer saying that no man in the postal service with the name of Simmons answered that description, and ordered him held pending an investigation. My guess now is that there’s another inspector hot footing it here from Washington about this time.”
“Good land of liberty. Will you people come in and eat? That dinner must be stone cold by now,” said anxious Aunt Abbie.
“I’d rather get a look at this chap before I eat,” said Simmons. “I want to know who’s been using my name and papers that were taken away from me when I was captured.”
“Well, if that’s all you want, go in and eat till I run upstairs. I have his picture up there,” said Dick.