All heads bent interestedly.
“Notice how those tiny pencil ‘ticks’ are made in the beginning of some entries?” Bob pointed to several. “There aren’t any in the regular ledger, but the entries correspond, and they are always worded in a queer way. See this one, about fabric: ‘10 bolts fabric, cotton, quality A—dash—X—one hundred,’” he quoted. “Now all the entries that are ticked in the false ledger are backward like that—and the same in the regular book, but no others except the ticked ones are!”
“That’s curious,” muttered Barney. “What else?”
“Here are several bills of lading that weren’t entered Saturday, just slipped into the back of the regular ledger,” Bob drew them out and unfolded them. “One is all right, but the other is made out backward—the same as the ticked ones—and it isn’t a real bill of lading at all, because it is dated for today, and the shipment that arrived today isn’t to be delivered until tomorrow and we saw the two trucks exchanging goods on the byroad—or, Curt did.”
“Very clever, but what does it prove?” asked Barney.
“This bill of lading being dated ahead and being one of the ‘backward wording’ sort, shows that those are the entries that are ‘queer.’ That solves the mystery, because we know how those things are being substituted tonight.”
“But who does it incriminate?” asked Barney.
“Why—whoever’s writing matches this.”
“Then the bookkeeper is due for a call on the carpet—maybe worse,” said Barney. “That’s his book, and the false set is the same handwriting!”
“That settles that mystery and leaves only the one about Mr. Tredway’s possible evil wisher,” said Mr. Parsons.