Larry hardly knew what to do. It seemed that the bank clerk was not in his boarding-house, and yet the young reporter had learned not to trust to appearances.
“I think I’ll just go over and take a look, and make some inquiries,” he decided. “You had better stay around here. You may get some clew when you least expect it.”
“All right!” agreed the detective, “though I think your man has skipped out, and never came near this place.”
Larry shrugged his shoulders. He did not know what to think. A few minutes later he was talking to Mrs. Boland.
“A man with a white beard!” she exclaimed when the young reporter had asked if she had such a boarder. “Why, there’s no one like that in this house! You must be mistaken.”
But Larry knew he was not. He also knew what to expect.
“I see,” he reasoned. “Witherby came back here, disguised as an old man. That’s why the detective didn’t know him. And he probably went out disguised like a baker, or a butcher, and so he got away. He fooled the detective all right, and he’s fooled me. I’ve got to get after him.”
He thought rapidly for a few minutes.
“May I go to Mr. Witherby’s room again?” he asked of the landlady. She gave him permission.
But it was quite a different room to which the young reporter gained entrance a little later. All the bank clerk’s possessions had been taken away. The thousand-dollar bill was gone, and so was the false, sandy moustache.