“Are you telling me the truth?”
“Surely. He said that you two talked over the matter, and that you asked him to aid you in finding the girl, and he said he had given you the idea that he could bring her back to you.”
“So he did,” ejaculated the old man.
“And I fear that he intends to do you wrong, as much as I hate to say it of the fellow whom I have grown up with, but then we could not expect to have him care as much for Annie as I do, not being related to her.”
For a long time the old man sat in his chair muttering to himself. He had grown to love this boy, this very young boy, who had always sent in the best reports from college to him, like his own son even. But the last blow had fallen.
“Annie,” he whispered as he labored upstairs to his bedroom, “I shall never see you again. You have had your revenge now, for I shall not be upon the earth long.”
Then he sent for his nephew after his valet had put him in bed, and said:
“If Tom Cooper comes here, he is to be refused admittance; also notify the bank that he is to be discharged.”
After George Benson heard this he went down stairs, and with a malicious smile upon his face wrote the letter, and as he dropped it in the mail box, he said to himself:
“So you will find the girl, will you, Tom Cooper? We will soon see what your future will amount to.”