"ADVANCING THE SPARK."

"I'm not going to stand around and let you be rough with him," asserted Newt, finishing his dressing and taking another drink from the bottle.

"Nobody asked you to stand around," said Murgatroyd. "When I'm ready to get rough, you can go down to the river and stay there till I'm through."

"Why did you jump on him like that?"

Considering what he himself had done toward Matt's capture, Newt's stand was hardly consistent.

"I'll tell you," and, with that, Murgatroyd went on to relate the number of times his trail had crossed Matt's, and the circumstances.

Newt's eyes widened as the recital proceeded, and when the end was reached it found him moody and preoccupied.

"From all that," went on Murgatroyd, "you can see just how much I am in Motor Matt's debt."

"He saved my life," said Newt doggedly, "and I'm not going to let you be rough with him."

"Don't make a fool of yourself, Newt," scowled Murgatroyd.

"He did me a good turn," insisted the other, "and I'm not going to let him get the worst of this."

"Sit me up in a chair, can't you?" asked Matt. "I want to talk a little, and I'm not very comfortable, lying here like this."

"It's nothing to me," snarled Murgatroyd, "whether you're comfortable or not."

Without a word, Newt went to the prisoner and helped him get to his feet and drop into a chair.

"Leave his ropes alone," called Murgatroyd sharply.

"I'm not touching his ropes—yet," returned Newt. "What have you got to say?" he asked, facing Matt.

"How many I O U's for gambling debts did you leave in Jamestown, Prebbles, when you left there?"

A lighted bomb, hurled suddenly into the shack, could not have startled either of the two men more than did this question.

It was a random shot on Matt's part. He wanted both Newt and Murgatroyd to understand that he was well equipped with information.

"I didn't leave a single gambling debt behind me," asserted Newt, with rising indignation.

The broker became visibly uncomfortable.

"He's talking wild, Newt," said he.

"Then," continued Matt, "how did it happen that Murgatroyd had several duebills, signed by you?"

"He didn't have any signed by me."

"Of course not," agreed Murgatroyd, laughing derisively, but there were demons rising in his sharp eyes.

"Too bad your father didn't know that, Newt," said Matt. "He's been slaving, and denying himself necessities of life, to take up a lot of I O U's which, Murgatroyd told him, had been given by you for gambling debts."

Newt, his face full of rage, whirled on the broker in a fury.

"Is that the truth?" he cried.

"Not a word of truth in it," answered the broker coolly. "From what I've told you about Motor Matt, Newt, you ought to understand that he's cunning. He's working some sort of a dodge, now. Don't let him fool you."

Newt was quieted somewhat but not convinced.

"Who told you about those duebills?" he demanded.

"Your father."

"When did you see him? And how did he happen to tell you anything like that?"

"Just a minute," said Matt, playing with the spark before he advanced it fully. "There's a point about George Hobbes that I'd like to have settled. Which of you uses that name? Or have you a partnership interest in it? Newt plays cards at the Tin Cup Ranch as George Hobbes, and Murgatroyd does business in that name and receives letters in Bismarck when they are so addressed. Now——"

With a hoarse exclamation of astonishment and anger, Murgatroyd flung himself from the chair and started toward Matt. Newt jumped in front of him.

"You'd better sit down, Murg," said Newt.

The two men stared at each other, the broker furious, and the younger man defiant.

"He knows too much!" flared Murgatroyd.

"He says so much I know to be true that I'm inclined to believe everything he tells us. We'll hear him out, and if you try to lay your hands on him you'll settle with me."

The spark was working splendidly. It would not be long, now, before it set off an explosion.

"You wrote a letter to Murgatroyd, Newt," said Matt, "and posted it in Steele, North Dakota. Murgatroyd hasn't found it healthy to be in his Jamestown office for some time, and the only person there, when your letter was received, was your father. He recognized your handwriting, and he opened the letter and made a copy of it before he sent it on to Murgatroyd, in Bismarck."

The broker's face became fairly livid. He tried to talk, but the words gurgled in his throat.

"Your father knew I was a friend of his," pursued Matt, "and he came to Fort Totten to see me. He got there yesterday afternoon, driving over from Minnewaukon in a heavy rain. When he showed me the copy of your letter, I started for this place in the aËroplane."

"What were you intending to do here?" inquired Newt.

"I was hoping to persuade you to go back to Totten and see your father. He wants you."

Newt shook his head.

"It won't do," he answered. "The old man and I had a tumble, and it's better for us to keep apart."

"You don't dare to go!" stormed Murgatroyd. "What have I been paying you, for? Tell me that. You'll stay away from Fort Totten, Newt. I've brought money enough to take you to South America, and that's where you're going."

Newt's eyes brightened a little.

"I wonder if you really mean to shell out enough to take me that far?" he asked.

"Yes," cried the broker, "and I'll pay you well for going, too."

"You won't go, Newt," put in Matt. "You're not going to let this scoundrel wheedle you into leaving the country just to get you out of the way and prevent you from telling what you know about the accident to Harry Traquair."

Silence followed the launching of this bolt, silence that was broken only by the startled breathing of the two men. Both of them kept their eyes riveted on the prisoner.

"Traquair, the inventor of the aËroplane," continued Matt, "tried out his machine in Jamestown, several weeks ago, and an accident happened. Some part of the mechanism broke. Why did it break?" Matt's voice grew solemn as he turned his eyes on Murgatroyd. "Why did it break?" he asked, again.

The broker's face turned ashen. Drops of sweat stood out on his forehead, his hands clinched spasmodically, and his lips moved without sound.

"Murgatroyd," Matt pursued mercilessly, "had a mortgage on Harry Traquair's homestead, in Wells County. For some reason of his own, Murgatroyd wants that piece of prairie land. If Traquair had lived, he would have sold his aËroplane to the government, and have paid off the mortgage. But he didn't live, because a supposed accident happened to his aËroplane."

The broker's lips were dry, and again and again he moistened them with his tongue. The demons grew harder, and brighter, and more merciless in his eyes.

The spark was doing well, but it had not yet been advanced to the limit. It was the spark of friendship, but it was coming into its own through devious ways. The friendship was to be between poor old Prebbles and his son; but it was to result in something else between Newt and Murgatroyd, and prove powerful enough to force the two apart.

"Murgatroyd has been paying you money, Newt," resumed Matt, "to keep in the background and remain silent about what you know. Is the scoundrel worth protecting? Is it worth while to take hush money from him? The bribes he has been giving you, he collected from your father by means of duebills to which he had forged your name."

Fierce anger flamed in Newt's face. Matt, seeing that an explosion was close, hastened on.

"Your father is now lying ill at Fort Totten. It is doubtful whether he can live—and he certainly cannot unless you go back with me and be to him what you have not been in the past—a son."

The red faded from Newt Prebbles' face and a deathly pallor came in its stead. Stepping over to Matt, he dropped both hands on his shoulders and looked him steadily in the eyes.

"Motor Matt," said he, "are you telling me the truth about my father? He is dangerously sick at Fort Totten? Don't you lie to me," he warned fiercely.

"I am telling you the truth."

"And those forged I O U's—where did you learn about them?"

"From your father, as I have already told you."

"It's like Murgatroyd," said Newt, between his teeth. "He did want Traquair's homestead, because he happened to discover that there is coal under the soil, and the railroad company will buy the hundred and sixty at a fancy price and run a spur track to it, so——"

The explosion came, at that moment, but it was not as Matt expected. While Newt Prebbles stood facing Matt, his back to the broker, there came the sound of a blow.

Pain convulsed Newt's face for the fraction of a second, his eyes closed, and he dropped senseless, overturning Matt and his chair with the force of his fall.

Lying bound and helpless, Matt heard sounds of quick footsteps, and saw Murgatroyd bending down over him.