"Sure! You can count on me. I'll be there."
"All right," said Bristow. "I'll see you at eight, then."
He went to the sleeping porch and lay down.
"'Withers not with me,'" the last words of the telegram lingered in his mind. "Why did he add that? What's that to do with a conference here tonight?"
Suddenly the answer occurred to him.
"It's Withers!" he thought, at first only half-credulous. "He's going to put it on Withers; he's going to try to put it on Withers."
He paused, thinking "wild" for a moment, so great was his surprise.
"It was Withers he was after from the start,—was it?"