hy?"

"You hadn't a suspicion the whole thing was a decoy?"

"What whole thing?"

"The trip an' all."

Willie studied his friend's face in puzzled silence.

"Whatever are you tryin' to say?" demanded he at last.

Janoah swept his hand dramatically round the shop.

"You've been betrayed, Willie!" he announced with tragic intensity.
"Betrayed by them as you thought was your friends, an' who you've
trusted. I warned you, but you wouldn't listen, an' now the thing I
told you would happen has happened." Triumphant pleasure gleamed in
the sinister smile. "They tricked you into leavin'," went on the
malicious voice, "an' then they came here an' stole what was
yours--your invention. I caught 'em doin' it. I hid outside an'
overheard 'em tell how they'd been waitin' days for the chance when
everybody should be gone. 'Twas that Snelling an' another like him, a
draughtsman. They laughed an' said that now the old man was out of the
way they could do as they pleased. Then they took all the measurements
of your invention, made some sketches, an' took its picter."

Willie listened, open-mouthed.

"You must be crazy, Janoah," he slowly observed.

"I ain't crazy," Janoah replied, with stinging sharpness. "The whole
thing was just as I say. It was part of a plot that Snellin' an'
Galbraith have been plannin' all along; an' either they've used this
young feller here [he motioned toward Robert Morton] as a tool, or else
he's in it with 'em."

Bob started forward, but Willie's hand was on his arm.

"Gently, son," he murmured. Then addressing Janoah he asked: "An' what
earthly use could Mr. Galbraith have for--"

"'Cause he sees money in it," was the prompt response.

A thrill of uneasiness passed through Robert Morton's frame. Had not
those very words been spoken both by the capitalist and Howard
Snelling? They had uttered them as a laughing prediction, but might
they not have rated them as true? With sudden chagrin he looked from
Willie to Janoah and from Janoah back to Willie again.

"I've been inquirin' up this Galbraith," went on Janoah. "It 'pears
he's a big New York shipbuilder--that's what he is--an' Snellin' is one
of his head men."

If the mischief-maker derived pleasure from dealing out the fruit of
his investigations he certainly reaped it now, for he was rewarded by
seeing an electrical shock stiffen Willie's figure.

"It ain't true!" cried the little inventor. "It ain't true! Is it,
Bob?"