"Say, if you're going to talk that way, I won't stand in with you any longer!" cried Jackson, in a rage. "That money is going to stay right here, where I and all the rest of us can keep our eyes on it!"
"That's right—don't let him get away with a dollar of it!" burst out another man in the crowd.
"We'd better examine this bag first and make sure that we've got what we came after," declared the man who wore the medals on his vest.
Davenport tried to demur, but none of the crowd would listen to him. Although the Gladstone bag was locked, the oil well promoter was compelled to give up the key, and then the others looked over the contents of the bag.
"Twenty-six thousand dollars here," announced Tate, as he counted the money in the presence of the others.
"What's this package?" demanded the man who wore the medals. "Hello! Look here!" he exclaimed an instant later, after he had glanced at one of several documents held together by a rubber band.
"What have you got?" questioned Tate curiously.
"You let those alone!" bellowed Davenport, his face turning pale. "Give them to me! They are my private property!" and he endeavored to snatch the documents from the other man's hand.
"Not much!" answered the man with the medals, Corporal John Dunning, who had served over a year in France. "These papers belong to Mr. Richard Rover, and he is the one who is going to get them."
"Richard Rover!" burst out Jack, who was close enough to catch the words. "Why, that's my father!"