“Well, then, I’d give him the answer you just now gave me.”
Stanley looked at him, puzzled, for a moment. Then he uttered a short laugh and shook his head.
“You mean that I shall telegraph him the money is safe?”
“Just that,” replied Clay Varron. “You said yourself it was safe. That is what he asks.”
“That would be a prevarication. I don’t see how I can say that. He wouldn’t consider it safe if I told him where it was. No, Clay, I can’t do it. My uncle is always square with me. I should feel like a crook if I sent him such a message as that.”
“Well, what will you do? If you tell him the truth, what will be the consequence?”
“The consequence will be that he will think I am a fool,” answered Stanley Downs, without hesitation.
“He couldn’t think that, unless he’s a fool himself,” was Clay’s warm rejoinder. “Come again.”
“Well, he would know that I had failed in a matter where I should have used extreme care, and I doubt whether he ever would trust me again. I have fallen down, and there is no getting away from it.”
Stanley Downs strode up and down the room in such a dejected frame of mind that his friend became indignant.