He stood patiently waiting for her to state her wants.
But Arden went into a strange panic of fear and uncertainty.
“I—I think I’ve forgotten something!” she gasped, backing nervously away from the window. “I—I’ll come back—later.” She forced to her face a rather sickly smile.
“Very well,” said the man behind the wicket. “I’ll be open for quite a while yet.”
Then, turning away, Arden fled, pulled open the door, scurried across the tracks and rushed back to college. Her one thought was to bring Terry and Sim with her to the station on a strange errand. She wanted them to help her identify the man in the ticket office as the missing Pangborn heir, pictured on the placard in the post office.
For that was exactly what Arden believed. So obsessed had she become with the poster picture and the reward offered for information about the original, that she was sure she was right.
The man who had popped up at the wicket window was Harry Pangborn.
“I’m positive of it!” murmured Arden as she ran faster. “But I must get Sim and Terry to look at him. I’ll need their evidence.”
CHAPTER XVII
In Danger
With startling suddenness, the night, aided by the dense fog, settled down over Cedar Ridge. Arden was alarmed. She had not thought it was so late, though she was quite sure the supper bell had not yet rung. She ran faster, her beating heart keeping time with her pattering feet.