“He’ll never suspect anything,” he heard Mr. Cutler say.

“Hush!” cautioned Mr. Sandow. “He’s altogether too smart!”

“I hope I can prove too smart for you,” thought Tom, as he laid the papers on Mr. Keen’s desk. “There’s some funny business going on in this office and I think it has to do with the doctor. I’ll keep my eyes open.”

CHAPTER XVI
AN ODD CLIENT

That night, when Tom got to bed, he thought so intently about what had happened, that he could hardly sleep. He tried to outline some plan, by which he might get at the bottom of the mystery that seemed to be developing, but he could concoct none that appeared satisfactory.

“I’m sure of one or two things,” he said to himself. “One is that Sandow doesn’t like me, and, I believe he’s a little bit afraid of what he thinks I know. Another is that Mr. Cutler doesn’t like me, but he isn’t alarmed that I know anything. He’d have me discharged if he could. And another thing is that Sandow and Cutler are in with each other. And the last thing is that it has to do with the estate of Dr. Spidderkins.

“But I don’t see what I can do. I don’t know anything about law, and if I spoke to Mr. Boise, Cutler might make it appear that everything was all right, and I would only be laughed at. No, I’ll lay low for a while yet.”

“Well, Tom,” said Mr. Keen the next morning, “I see you got the papers all right. I found them on my desk, when I came in. But you should not have opened the envelope they were in. Some of them might have been lost.”

“I didn’t open the envelope.”

“You didn’t? Why, I found it open on my desk.”