“I don’t know who the old man was. But it’s my belief the other was the fellow who got hurt in that fire and who says he is the real Howard Milmarsh. It couldn’t have been anybody else.”
“Well, how do you suppose he got into your bedroom?”
“There’s only one way to account for it, and that is that Nick Carter had a hand in it. He has been trying to beat me out of this property with that fellow who is in the hospital, and it may be that his man has recovered enough to come here.”
“Got his memory back, eh?”
“I don’t know about that. He could be brought here to scare me without that. He didn’t speak last night—only looked at me.”
“He was quite a scrapper,” observed Lampton.
“Well, he could be that and still not have all his senses about him,” maintained the other.
“I’ll tell you one thing, fellows,” suddenly broke in the possessor of the Milmarsh mansion. “I’m just about sick of this whole thing. It looks to me as if I’m the scapegoat, while you get all the profit. I’m going to give up. There’s too much trouble in trying to prove that I am the rightful heir. I’d rather be poor, and worry along as I have done for years than take all this that I’ve gone through with since I’ve been up in this devilish house.”
“What’s the matter with you? Are you——”