"Yes. He was my father's best friend."
"And it was he whom you saw coming out of that alley with the other man that Jerry Buck, the newsboy, told you was one of the burglars?"
"Yes, I'm sure of it. I know him too well to make a mistake."
"And I know him, too," muttered Hook, "and I propose to know him better by and by. You observe that he is one of the witnesses to your grandfather's will!" he added, aloud.
"Yes."
"Now, Frank, let me tell you something you don't know, but might have known if you had taken the trouble to read this document carefully. Listen to this clause in your grandfather's will, which has a most important bearing on this case:
"'And if, at the age of twenty-two, my grandson, the said Frank Mansfield, shall be found to be honest and upright, and in every way a reputable member of society, the sealed parchment, together with the buried treasure which it represents, which I deem unsafe, in these days of fraud, to intrust to the keeping of any bank, shall be delivered to him, and shall become his sole property by virtue of this my last will. If, however, the said Frank Mansfield shall have become deceased, or if he shall have been at any time proven guilty of any unlawful act, then this, my last will and testament, together with the accompanying parchment and the buried treasure it represents, shall be given to my good friend, Elijah Callister, of the City of New York, to become his sole property, under the provisions of this will.'"
"And knowing this, Mr. Callister tried to have me convicted of crime!" cried Frank, springing to his feet in great excitement. "Can it be possible that the man is so base?"
"Young man, it looks tremendously like it," said Caleb Hook, decidedly, folding up the will and putting it in his own pocket.
"You tell me that Cutts led you into this affair—and I want you to understand for what you proposed to do you are most decidedly to blame—that he agreed to pay these boys, Ed Wilson and Jim Morrow, who, according to the story told by them to that boy Barney, have undoubtedly left already in the early morning train for California, where, had the plot succeeded, they could never have been reached to prove your innocence, even had they been so disposed.