Polo’s great eyes snapped. “Albert Edward could find out,” she said. “The boys tell him lots of things.”
Adelaide did not tell Polo that her brother’s testimony would count for little, as he was himself suspected, and the girl went away determined to assist in unravelling the mystery.
Stacey called frequently and Adelaide could but admire his patience with the whims of the sick boy. Jim asked him to try to find out whether Buttertub and Ricos were the intruders on our Catacomb party, and this was one of the very few requests which Jim made that Stacey refused.
“I don’t want to have anything to do with those fellows,” he said, “and you know I never could act the spy.”
“I have been thinking,” Stacey said, after Adelaide had told him Polo’s history and the needs of the Home, “that we boys might get up some sort of an athletic entertainment in behalf of the Home of the Elder Brother. The cadets all like Terwilliger, and if they knew that his little brother and sister were supported by the Home, they would all chip in willingly.”
“Terwilliger has such a good salary,” Adelaide replied, “that Polo tells me they intend, as soon as their mother is able to leave the hospital, to take the children from the Home, rent an apartment in my tenement, and set up housekeeping for themselves. But, if the Terwilligers do not need it, you may be sure there will always be poor children enough who do. And something might happen, Terwilliger might lose his place at your gymnasium, and not be able to support his brother and sister, after all.”
Adelaide was thinking uneasily as she spoke of the cloud which shadowed Polo and her brother. What if it should be proved that the ex-convict had committed the two robberies in the Amen Corner with the assistance of his sister.
“Oh, Terwilliger won’t lose his situation,” Stacey remarked confidently. “Colonel Grey likes him, and so do all the fellows. He’s up on every kind of athletics; knows all the English ways of doing things, for he has been a jockey at the Ascot races and a coach to the Cambridge crew. He’s so good-natured too; doesn’t mind helping fellows outside of hours. He goes out rowing with me every Wednesday night in a two-oared gig on the Harlem.”
“Were you rowing with him on the 10th?” Adelaide inquired eagerly, for this was the night of the Catacomb party.
“Yes,” Stacey laughed, “and we were late, and I got a special blowing up for it, too. You see, they lock the door at ten, and I had to ring the janitor up, and he was raving, for he had already been disturbed to let Ricos and Buttertub in, and he was in no mood to pass it over. He reported us all to Colonel Grey, who gave us order marks for it.”