“Will they do it?” asked Jerry. “They may be in Slocum’s pay, and hide her away.”
“The young man is right,” said one of the detectives. “We’ll drive on a way and then sneak back and size the place up.”
This was done, and five minutes later found the colonel and our hero walking along a hedge which separated the grounds on one side from a woods.
“Look there!” Jerry cried suddenly, and pointed to an upper window of the brick building beyond.
He had seen Nellie Ardell’s face as the young lady walked about the apartment. As the others gazed upward Alexander Slocum appeared. He held a sheet of paper and a pen in his hands.
“He wants her to sign something,” cried our hero in a low voice. “See! see! he is going to force her.”
“Leave me be, Mr. Slocum,” those below heard Nellie Ardell exclaim. “I will not sign off my interest in that property. Leave me be! Oh, that somebody was at hand to help me!”
“Come on—there is no time to waste!” cried Colonel Dartwell, and pushed through the hedge.
Jerry followed, and both ran for a side door of the building, which stood open.
Here they found themselves confronted by a burly man of advanced age, evidently the proprietor of the sanitarium.