“Don’t bother!” Mr. Conne was saying in his brusque manner. “We’ll take no chances on losing any lives. Let Dean Devlin roast. He deserves it now—and hereafter too.”
Skippy was delighted that he was having his hand shaken by the greatest detective in his country. It was the longest handshake he had ever experienced. And, what was more wonderful still, Carlton Conne’s arm was about his shoulder.
“We only got your note last night, kid,” he was saying. “Your sweet old lady didn’t get out her pocketbook until yesterday afternoon when she wanted to go out for a walk, after being laid up with a cold. She took the train and came straight to New York.”
“I’m sorry, Mr. Conne—I’m sorry....”
“What are you sorry for? You’ve been a clever youngster through this whole thing—that note was a masterpiece.”
“I wrote it like that in case Devlin should find it on me, then he wouldn’t know I was sort of workin’ for you,” Skippy said apologetically.
“Couldn’t have done better myself!” Mr. Conne said crisply.
“We doped out the distance from the way you figured the time and your idea of telling how the house came to be left here and about the hermit. We knew you were somewhere in this section because Dick Hallam reported he spotted you in Hillbriar. I learned only yesterday from an insurance company complaint that an apparent systematic effort was being made to defraud by insuring boys and doing away with them to collect on the policies. I got Hallam on the phone, had him check in Hillbriar and he dug up the evidence that linked Devlin unmistakably to the racket. And a few hours later, just before I got your note, I received the information that Devlin, who had been in an insane asylum, when we thought he was under cover and had escaped, had developed a mania for killing while being apparently normal in other respects.”
He patted Skippy on the back and then went on: “So I prayed for a break that we might get to you in time. I blamed myself for putting you in such danger, but I never knew Devlin as a killer and I never suspected the racket he was working, or I wouldn’t have sent you on the job. Well, thank God we made it in time.”
“It’s all right, it’s all right, Boss,” Skippy answered.