Clay turned the paper and read the date line.
“Why,” he said in amazement, “the paper is over two weeks old. Well, it doesn’t matter how it got here, it is here, and makes a millionaire of the boy we—or Captain Joe, rather—fished out of the Rio Grande! And a pretty good job he did, too!”
“I didn’t tell Paul of the discovery,” Alex said, after a pause, during which he blocked the door to the cabin, “because I didn’t want to lose him. Just the minute he gets hold of that paper he’ll want to be off, and I want Rube or Buck, or both, to get well acquainted with him so as to be appointed guardian. How does that strike you?”
“Fine!” exclaimed Clay.
“We might have guardians in duplicate!” Alex laughed. “Do they ever have guardians in duplicate?”
“Sometimes they have three,” was the reply. “But why did you keep so sly about it? You might have told me!”
“Well,” was the answer, “I was in doubt what to do about it. You see, I didn’t want you to know about it until I had it all thought out. You would be apt to tell the other boys, and I didn’t want to be bothered.”
“What are you going to do now? It is still up to you to decide, you know.”
Clay, having given up all idea of notifying the boy of his accession to great wealth, dropped down on the railing of the Rambler and looked at Alex with eager eyes. “Will you tell Paul?”
“No, I think not,” replied Alex. “You see, I want to wait until Rube and Buck get here. They may not want to accept the trust.”