"That was all right. But what do you suppose he could have told you about the will that I don't know?"
"I don't know; but Mr. Gibbons can."
"Mr. Gibbons?"
"Yes; he is going to bring you before 'Squire Sprague. But, father, you didn't touch that will, did you?"
"What an idea! Do you suppose it would have been admitted to probate if it hadn't been all right? Now, Gus, I am going to ask you to leave me for a while. I have some business that needs attending to. I will call you after a few minutes."
Mr. Layton hardly waited for his son to take his leave when he threw himself into a chair and covered his face with his hands. He remained thus for a few minutes, and then got up and walked the floor.
"Oh, I wrote it! I wrote it!" he cried out in agony. "I forged Captain Nellis's name to it. What will become of me if it is found out?"
CHAPTER XXI.
SAM IS DISCHARGED.
"So far so good," said Sam Houston, as he finished his dinner at his boarding-house and stood on the front steps picking his teeth. "Now, if Gus speaks to his old man about the codicil, and the father wants to know what I know about it, what shall I tell him? That, and what I am going to tell Hank about that pearl, will require a little study. However, it is all in a lifetime."
Sam Houston went down to the store again, and shortly afterward the proprietor went to his dinner. He was gone about an hour, and then Hank Lufkin came into the store very soon after he did. Mr. Vollar was busy at something behind the board partition and Sam stepped quickly forward to wait upon him; but before he could lift a finger or utter a sound Hank broke in with: