Danny’s first thought was that he would go to Mr. Peter Conant’s next door and find out where his little wife was and what was the matter with things in general, but he felt it would be an imposition on the kind neighbors to rouse them at such a late hour. He himself was weary with a fatigue that was staggering. He had had a long and tiresome journey from the Pacific coast with but little sleep owing to the excitement of getting back to the United States and the possibility of once more seeing his darling Mary Louise. He might go dig out Bob Dulaney and spend the rest of the night with him. There was Billy McGraw—always glad to see him! There were many friends who would surely welcome him back with enthusiasm, but Danny felt he had better snatch a nap before trying to tackle anything more. He had the terrible let-down feeling natural after the strain he had been on for months. He remembered the room in the garage where he had lived when he first came to work for Colonel Hathaway. Why not go there until daylight? The door of the garage was locked, but Danny knew of old how easy it was to draw the hasp without disturbing the padlock. He accordingly did it and entered the garage from the rear. The arc light in the alley made the place quite light as the doors swung open.

“Golly Moses! Where’s the big car? Nothing but the Colonel’s old time-honored rattle-trap left! Jacked up as though they meant to keep it forever, too!”

He mounted the stairs to the tower room. The place was bereft of furniture and swept clean. Mary Louise had given Aunt Sally and Uncle Eben all of the things that had been there.

“Humph! I guess I’ll have to curl up in the ‘old reliable’,” he grinned.

Danny Dexter had a passion for any kind of an automobile. Even Colonel Hathaway’s old relic had its appeal for him. He gave it an affectionate pat.

“I wonder if the old fellow has come to his senses,” he said to himself. “I sure do hope so, but there is something mighty mysterious going on around here. Who in the dickens was that woman who spoke to me from the upstairs window? The Colonel’s window at that! Why did the chink say there was no lady in the house? I wish I wasn’t so dead tired. I feel as I used to in the trenches when I’d drop asleep under fire. It would take a big explosion to rouse me now. I wonder why the cushions have been all busted up. I bet the old gentleman raised some Cain about that. Are the tires any good yet? They haven’t been used for an awful long time I fancy. Mary Louise never was much on running this old car except to please her grandfather.”

He caught hold of the front wheel and gave it a shake. “Gee it rattles! Flabby on top—and Jumping Jupiter! What’s that?”

There was a strange rattle and then a kind of crash and something began to pour from the tire over Danny’s feet. He jumped back and, thanks to the light from the alley, he could see what was happening. From the tire, which had broken at the bottom, there came a stream of gold, twenty-dollar gold pieces.

“This is something awful!” he cried. “I’ve the delirium tremens without ever having a drop to drink. I’ll have to let somebody know about this, though, because it might be so and maybe I haven’t ’em after all. If that chink knew, he’d be out here raking it in. I wonder what the lady with the rich voice would do if she knew! I’ll be bound she wouldn’t be quite so indifferent about a poor wanderer’s comfort nor so snappy about calling the police. Jimminy crickets! I know whose voice it was—Hortense Markle’s! It has just come to me! The plot thickens and deepens. No more thought of sleep for you, Danny Dexter! You’ve got to get a move on you.”

He found a gunny sack hanging on a nail behind the door and he carefully shoveled up the gold pieces into this. He did not stop to count them nor will I endeavor to say how many there were, but it was a bag full and so heavy that he could swing the load to his back only with difficulty.

Gently Danny lowered it to the floor.

“I’m not man enough to carry it,” he groaned, “not until I get some eats, at least. If I leave it here, the chink and the woman will come and get it and, if I try to carry it off, I’ll faint by the wayside. I wonder if the other tires are gold mines too.”

Cautiously he felt of the others, but fortunately the rubber had held better in those and, although they too were full of something, it did not come rolling out on the feet of the young man. He found a slot had been cut in each tire just large enough for a twenty-dollar gold piece to be slipped in.

“I wish I could get hold of Josie O’Gorman. She’s got sense to burn. I’ll run there as fast as I can but, before I go, I’ll hide the treasure.” He carefully lifted the bag into the car and covered it with the old cushions and horse hair that had been pulled from them.

Closing the door carefully and sticking the hasp back into the holes from which he had drawn it, he began to run down the alley.

“Stop!” called out a voice from the shadows of the opposite fence. “Stop or I fire!”

“Well, I’ve stopped, now what do you want? Can’t a gentleman run down an alley without getting shot?”

The man stepped from the shadow and, turning back the lapel of his coat, disclosed a star. It was Slater, who still had his eye on the Hathaway house, for his week was not quite finished. Slater was a creature of habit and did not like to break in on a week.

“A cop! Bless me if I’m not glad to see you!”

“See here, none of your gaff, young man! What would you be glad to see me about? Why would a man who was evidently running away from somebody be after being glad to see a policeman? You come along here and report to headquarters.”

“Gee, Captain, don’t stop me now, for the love of Mike! There is going to be something doing at the Hathaway house before so very long and you stay here and guard the premises. Don’t let anybody get out of the house back or front and don’t let anybody go in the garage. I tell you it is mighty important.”

“No doubt, but you come and tell your tale to the chief. He knows what’s important and what’s not. March!”

Danny had a feeling he had best obey the man when he felt something poking in his ribs. He was furious at the occurrence, but deemed it wiser to keep quiet as to his real reason for wanting the garage watched. The man was so stolid one could not tell whether he was to be trusted or not.

“Well, hurry up! I’ve got a lot of things to do to-night besides call on Chief Lonsdale. I’ll be glad to see the old boy, however.”

“You won’t see him until morning. The chief doesn’t spend the night in his office.”

“Thunderation! Then let me telephone Miss Josie O’Gorman! Morning may be too late.”

“Well, since Miss O’Gorman is on the case as it were, I’ll take you by and let you have a look in on her.”

“On what case?”

“The Hathaway case! You don’t know so much after all if you don’t know about that.”

“No, I don’t know a thing. I just got here about an hour ago.”

“Humph! You seemed to know how to get in and out of a strange garage pretty well for some one just got to town,” sneered Slater.

“Tell me what the Hathaway case is.”

“Never! What you don’t know won’t hurt you. What do you want with Miss O’Gorman?”

“What you don’t know won’t hurt you either,” retorted Danny.

“It’s a bit irregular for me to be taking you around to little O’Gorman’s before reporting at the police station. I’ve changed my mind. Just turn in here, young man, and you can call on the ladies tomorrow. I’ve got a sure thing against you. I saw you come out of the garage and carefully put the hasp back in the door and then turn and run down the alley.”

“Well, one thing, Mr. Policeman, if you don’t get a move on you and put me in communication with either Miss O’Gorman or the chief of police, I bet you lose your job.”

They entered the police station. Contrary to his usual habits, Chief Lonsdale was in his office, although it was after one o’clock. Danny was taken in to him immediately, much to the relief of that young man.

“Hello, Chief Charley!” he cried.

“And who are you, young man? By golly if it ain’t a ghost! Danny Dexter, what in the name of heaven! Why boy, we have been mourning you for drowned. What’s your charge against this man, Slater!” he asked, his eye twinkling.

“House breaking, your honor! I found him sneaking out of the Hathaway garage and then running down the alley like he’d done something he hadn’t oughter.”

“Umhum! Well, you can leave him with me, Slater. You did quite right according to your lights. The Hathaway garage happened to belong in his family, but you didn’t know that. This is Colonel Hathaway’s grandson-in-law.”

“Well, why didn’t you say so?” Slater asked Danny sullenly.

“Because what you didn’t know wouldn’t hurt you,” retorted Danny. “But see here, Chief,” he said turning to Lonsdale, “the Hathaway garage ought to be watched and the house has some very doubtful inmates that should not be allowed to escape. I’m hunting my wife and I’m so tired and hungry I’m ready to fall down.”

“Well, well! Slater, get two more men and run back double quick to the Hathaway house and do what this young man says is necessary. Don’t let anybody in or anybody out without keeping track of them. Guard the garage carefully. Go!”

Slater, a bit bewildered, left in a hurry to execute his chief’s orders. “And now, Danny, tell me all about it,” asked Lonsdale, his hand resting affectionately on the young man’s shoulder.

“First, tell me about my wife, about Mary Louise.”

The story was quickly told. Danny was deeply moved at the news of Colonel Hathaway’s death. He was relieved to hear that Mary Louise was with Josie, of whose heart and sense he thought highly.

“And she is well?” he asked eagerly.

“She has been until the last few days, but I heard she was a little under the weather lately,” confessed Mary Louise’s old friend.

Danny then told the chief of the shower of gold that had greeted him when he shook the automobile tire.

“Well, by golly, all of us missed it!” exclaimed Lonsdale. “Little O’Gorman made a thorough search and some treasure hunters went through the garage and I sent two of my best men to go over the whole place again and here you come hastening back from a watery grave and the stuff knocks you down. I’ll send immediately and have it gathered up. You must go along too, Danny.” “Not until I see my wife!” rebelled Danny.

“Well, you’d hardly wake her up this time of night when she’s been ailing, besides.”

“Of course not!” Danny agreed ruefully.

“By the way, our old friend Markle has broken jail and is at large again,” said the chief. “That’s one reason why I am down here to-night. There is reason to believe he is headed this way. We are on the lookout for him.”

“Well, I bet you I know where he is,” cried Danny.

“I bet you don’t,” the chief retorted incredulously.

“He is in the Hathaway house, at least his wife is.”

“No! A blind man and his son and a Chinese cook are the only inmates of the old house.”

“Well, if I didn’t hear Hortense Markle’s voice this night from an upstairs window, I’m a Dutchman. That is one reason I wanted your excellent Slater to let me come by myself to report things and have him stay and watch the premises but he was so pig-headed he would come along.”

“Slater was doing his duty as he saw it,” rumbled the chief. “But now we’d best get busy. I tell you it would be a big feather in the cap of the police force of Dorfield if they got the Markles, man and woman, and also unearthed the Hathaway fortune the same night.”

Danny laughed. “Well, Chief, you can catch the Markles, but I must say that the treasure wasn’t buried and it simply gave itself away. I don’t think we can give anybody credit for it. I certainly don’t want to claim credit. I simply was going to bunk in the old car for the rest of the night and the twenty-dollar gold pieces just rolled out over my feet. We’d better go carry them off, however, or the Markles will do it for us, since you won’t let me go wake up my wife yet. You haven’t got a bit of hot dog about you, have you? I’m starving.”