As for Neale O’Neil’s getting out the car and going down to the station to meet Ruth and her friends when they arrived, that seemed to be quite impossible. The coming of the telegram was at an hour when already the Kenway automobile was far away from Milton, and Neale and Agnes in it were having high adventure.
CHAPTER XVIII—THE JUNKMAN AGAIN
When Ruth started home with Luke and Cecile Shepard several days had elapsed since Neale O’Neil and Agnes had discovered that Mr. Howbridge was out of town.
The chief clerk at the lawyer’s office had little time to give to the youthful visitors, for just then he had his hands full with a caller whom Neale and Agnes had previously found was a person not easily to be pacified.
“There is a crazy man in here,” grumbled the clerk. “I don’t know what he means. He says he ‘comes from Kenway,’ and there is something about Queen Alma and her bracelet. What do you know about this, Miss Kenway?”
“Oh, my prophetic soul!” gasped Neale O’Neil. “Costello, the junkman!”
“Dear, me! We thought we could see Mr. Howbridge before that man came.”
“Tell me what it means,” urged the clerk. “Then I will know what to say to the lunatic.”
“I guess he’s a nut all right,” admitted Neale. He told the lawyer’s clerk swiftly all they knew about the junkman, and all they knew about the silver bracelet.
“All right. It is something for Mr. Howbridge to attend to himself,” declared the clerk. “You hang on to that bracelet and don’t let anybody have it. I’ll try to shoo off this fellow. Anyway, it may not belong to his family at all. I’ll hold him here till you two get away.”