Before leaving his office, a three years' lease was arranged for and everything looked lovely. What was more, the addition could be started at once.
"Well, by the Great Horn Spoon!" ejaculated Mr. Dean when they were well outside. "You are a wonder! That is what I call nerve. Now tell me all about it."
"Bah!" replied Willis, "I hated to do it, but I had to. I was going to ask the old boy what Mr. Williams would say to him, but I thought better of it. To-night is when I have my fun. I'll tell my uncle about our deal and watch him squirm. I wonder if he'll get mad. I can tell by the way he acts if this recording business was a put-up job. There still remains the question, though—why does he want to keep me away from that cabin? It has something to do with my father's old mine, I'm sure of that much; and I'll find out, you see if I don't."
The evening papers gave a glowing account of the interest of Mr. Beverly H. Pembroke in the new Y.M.C.A. cabin project, and gave the plan of work. A circus was already being planned to raise funds for the building, and a stock company had been organized among the boys of the Boys' Department to furnish funds with which to begin work at once. Work would be started the next Saturday. The stockholders and some others would go to the cabin on Friday evening, camp around a fire all night, and be ready to begin work in the morning. After supper that evening Willis had a long chat with his mother, and talked over with her all the things that had been disturbing him in regard to his uncle's recent actions.
"I think you must surely be mistaken," she said. "What object could he have in doing such things. You must remember that you have a very vivid imagination, and you must watch it."
"No, mother, it is not imagination, for this is how I know this time: Didn't you see how red and nervous he got when I told him what Mr. Pembroke had agreed to do. Right after supper he left for down town without a word. I don't know what it is, but there is some fact relative to father's death that he has never told us. If we could only find Tad, I'm sure he could help us out. I'm going to find father's mine, though, and it's not so very far from that cabin, either. Mother, isn't it wonderful that we are going to have the very old house that father built so long ago? After I find the mine, I'll find out about its worth; but it can't be worth so very much or Tad would never have left it. If the tunnel is still locked up like you said Tad wrote it was, why, we can't get into it. It belongs to Tad. Perhaps it will never be opened. Mother, some day when you have a chance, talk with Uncle Joe and see what you can find out. Father might have left keys and information concerning the mine with him."
"No, son, he wouldn't have keys, because it was Tad that locked up the tunnel. It is Tad that has the keys. But listen, don't worry over it a bit or build any false hopes on it. School will open in a week, and I want you to take advantage of all it can give you. We'll be here until Christmas, anyway, I think, unless Aunt Lucy should slip away before that time."
"I wonder what uncle would say to me if I asked him about Tad when he comes home tonight. I think that's what I'll do."
About nine o'clock he heard the heavy footsteps of his uncle on the veranda, and in another moment heard him in the hall. After hanging up his hat and coat, he came into the library, picked up the Evening Telegraph, and began to read, entirely ignoring Willis. After they had sat thus silently for some minutes, Willis spoke:
"Uncle, did you ever know a man named Tad Kieser, who was a great friend of my father's?" The man moved uneasily in his chair, but, without looking up from his paper, he inquired of the boy what he knew of Tad Kieser.