“Oh, lord! Oh, lord! What did she say when she saw me dead to the world—and bald-headed?”
“She did not see you. I had concealed you.”
“Good boy, good boy.”
“She offered me two hundred dollars reward to bring you home,” and Mr. Middleton related all that Mrs. Brockelsby had said.
“It would be all off when she saw me bald-headed. What the devil wouldn’t she suspect? I don’t know. I would say I didn’t know where I had been. That would certainly sound fishy. It would sound like a preposterous excuse to cover up something pretty questionable. People don’t go out in good society and get their heads shaved. She’s pretty independent and uppish now. She said the next time she knew of me cutting up any didoes, she would get a divorce. She comes into two hundred thousand from her grandfather’s estate in six months and she’s pretty independent. Say, my boy, can’t you take a check for the money she wants? She’s going to Washington to-morrow. Tell her I went out of town and sent the money. I will go out of town. But the boys will see my bald head. Where do you suppose I was? What sort of crowd was I with? I must have a wig. You must get it for me. The boys would josh me to death, and if the story got to my wife it would be all off. I’ll go to Battle Creek and get a new lot of hair started.”
Mr. Middleton sat down and wrote busily for a moment. He handed a sheet of paper to Mr. Brockelsby.
“What’s this? You resign? You’re not going to help me out?”
“I am no longer in your employ. I will undertake to do all you ask of me for a proper compensation, say one hundred and fifty a day for two days.”
“What?” screamed Mr. Brockelsby. “This is robbery, extortion, blackmail.”
“It is what you often charge yourself. Very well. Get your own wig and be seen on the streets going after it. Leave your wife to wonder why I do not come to report what progress is made in the search for you and to start a rigorous investigation herself. I am under no obligations not to ease her worry, to calm her disturbed mind by telling her I have found you. She’ll be hot foot after you then.”