It would be hard to describe the blissful joy with which the detective seized one of the yellow telegraph blanks and wrote these words, addressed to Horace Hastings:
“I have Grace with me, perfectly well and unharmed. She asks me to give her love to papa and mamma and to say that she is coming home just as quickly as she can. As I shall be needed here for some time yet, perhaps you would better come for her. One of the kidnappers is dead, one a prisoner, and I hope soon to have the third.”
“Pendar.”
Brief as was the absence of the detective from the hotel, the interval had been sufficient for a terrifying situation to develop. A larger crowd than usual gathered at sight of the little girl sitting on the lap of the man supposed to be a commercial traveler, and when the two hurried down the street, there were eager inquiries as to what it meant. An instinctive feeling of caution led Harvey to make evasive answers, for he feared to tell the truth to the excited crowd; but he could not falsify and was pressed so hard that he was literally forced to give the facts. The little girl, who had walked down the street with the supposed commercial traveler, was Grace Hastings, kidnapped some time before in Philadelphia, and the man who had her in charge was one of the most famous detectives in the country.
The story sounded so incredible that for a minute or two it was not believed. Every member of the group had read of the unspeakable crime, and their feelings were stirred to the depths. Parents especially were insistent that no punishment was too severe for the authors of the cruel wrong.
“And one of them was that fellow who fired his pistol at the detective when he was starting off with you in your flying machine?” demanded a red-faced listener.
Harvey nodded.
“He was; where is he now?”
“Yes; where is he?”
A dozen glanced in different directions. Could they have laid hands on the miscreant his life would not have been worth a moment’s purchase.