—————
Joe showed the little sum, rapidly scribbling it on another piece of paper.
“Those figures add up to ten thousand four hundred and sixty-seven,” he resumed, “and of course I knew that before Tom announced the sum. And I knew I was safe in letting Tom have the list of figures I wrote, for he had not seen those you fellows had set down. I made my set of figures look as though a different person had set down each one, and Tom wasn’t familiar enough with you boys’ way of making figures to detect the change.
“Then, when I took the piece of paper from him, I burned that and with it the one that Charlie, Henry and Harry had written their figures on, so there wouldn’t be any chance of being found out later.”
“But how did you get the sum, ten thousand four hundred and sixty-seven, on the piece of stone?” asked Charlie. “You didn’t touch that after you took the paper from Tom, I can vouch for that.”
“No, I didn’t touch it,” affirmed Joe.
“Then how did the figures get on? There must have been some magic about that.”
“It’s very simple when you know how,” laughed Joe. “When I was talking here to you fellows, I just put the sum, ten thousand four hundred and sixty-seven on the flat side of the stone with a pencil. Then I turned it over and left it lying on the ground until I wanted it. Then it was easy enough for me to pick it up, cover it with a handkerchief and hand it to Charlie to hold. The sum was there on it all the while, and when Tom announced what my three figures added up to, a result that I, of course, knew beforehand, I simply had Charlie lift the handkerchief, and—there you were!”
For a moment there was silence among the boys. Then they burst out with:
“Well, I’ll be jiggered!”