"All right," replied Joe cheerfully. "But first allow me to apologize for troubling you, and to thank you for your courteous answers to my questions."
If this was intended for sarcasm it had no effect whatever upon the policeman, who walked off with a very dignified step, while Joe moved on to find Arthur Hastings. He discovered him in the reading-room of the hotel, holding an earnest conversation with a young fellow in citizen's clothes. It was Rowe Shelley; but when he left his uniform in his room he seemed to have left with it nearly all the resemblance he had once borne to Roy Sheldon. Joe could see now that the two boys did not look so very much alike after all.
"I want to assure you of one thing, Wayring," said Rowe, as Joe seated himself in a chair by his side; "what that policeman told you about my stealing a lot of money before I left home, is utterly false. The little I have with me is what I have managed to save during the last two years out of my regular allowance. I have the best of reasons for believing that every cent there is in that house rightfully belongs to me, but I have never touched any of it except when it was given to me."
"Are there any stores on the island?" inquired Joe.
Rowe replied that there were not. The entire island was claimed by his guardian, who said he was Rowe's uncle, although he was no relation to him. Besides the family mansion, and the barns and other out-buildings that belonged to it, there were four tenement houses that were occupied by his guardian's hired help.
"And I know they are not hired simply to work the place and keep the grounds in order," said Rowe bitterly. "They are employed to keep an eye on me, although they do not seem to pay any attention to me. When I had saved a little money and began laying my plans to skip out, there was not one among them to whom I could go for help, or whom I dared take into my confidence. I had to depend upon myself."
"Then what was the use of a regular allowance of money if you couldn't spend it?" inquired Arthur.
"I could save it for an emergency like this, couldn't I? Besides, whenever I wanted anything, I could send for it by some one who was coming to the city. Did you learn anything more about your missing friend? Hastings tells me that there is no doubt he was mistaken for me and sent away in that carriage."
"That is what I think," answered Joe. "I know the name of the detective who arrested him, as well as the agency to which the detective belongs. It's Wilcox's, two-thirty-four Bank street, and there's where we must go the first thing in the morning."