“It will be better for you to come with me,” replied Toby, anxious to relieve Janet of the woman’s disturbing presence. “We will go to the hotel, and I’ll leave you there while I hunt up Mr. Holbrook. He may be stopping at the hotel, you know.”
The woman rose deliberately from her chair.
“It’s getting late,” she said. “I want to get my property and drive home before dark. Come along, boy.”
“Thank you, Toby,” whispered Janet, gratefully, as the two passed out of the room.
Mrs. Ritchie’s horse was hitched to a post in front of the house. They climbed into the rickety buggy and she drove into town and to the rambling old clapboard hotel, which was located on the main street. It was beginning to grow dusk by this time.
On the hotel porch stood the man they were seeking. Mr. Holbrook was smoking a cigarette and, with hands thrust deep in his pockets, was gazing vacantly down the street. Turning his attention to the arrivals the young lawyer seemed to recognize Toby. When the boy and the woman approached him he threw away his cigarette and bowed in deference to Mrs. Ritchie’s sex.
“I am Judge Ferguson’s clerk, sir,” began Toby.
“Yes; I know.”
“And this is Mrs. Ritchie, who employed the judge as her confidential business agent.”
“I am glad to know you, madam. Step into the hotel parlor, please. There we may converse with more comfort.”