hildren. We might as well call things
by their right names. 'Bije forged that certificate."

"I'm afraid there is no doubt of it."

"Dear! dear! dear! Why, they put folks in state's prison for that!"

"Yes. But a dead man is beyond prisons."

"That's so. Then I don't see--"

"You will. You don't grasp the full meaning of this affair even yet. If
the Bradley certificate is a forgery, a fraud from beginning to end,
then the presumption is that there was never any such person as Bradley.
But _someone_ paid ten thousand dollars for one hundred Akrae shares
when the company was formed. _That_ certificate has never been turned
in. Some person or persons, somewhere, hold one hundred shares of Akrae
Rubber Company stock. Think, now! Suppose that someone turns up and
demands all that he has been cheated out of for the past seventeen
years! Think of that!"

"Well ... I am thinkin' of it. I got the scent of what you was drivin'
at five minutes ago. And I don't see that we need to be afraid. He could
have put 'Bije in jail; but 'Bije is already servin' a longer sentence
than he could give him. So that disgrace ain't bearin' down on us.
And, if I understand about such things, his claim is against the Akrae
Company, and that's dead--dead as the man that started it. Maybe he
could put in a keeper, or a receiver, or some such critter, but there's
nothin' left to keep or receive. Ain't I right?"

"You are. Or you would be, but for one thing, the really inexplicable
thing in this whole miserable affair. Your brother, Captain Warren, was
dishonest. He took money that didn't belong to him, and he forged that
certificate. But he must have intended to make restitution. He must have
been conscience-stricken and more to be pitied, perhaps, than condemned.
No doubt, when he first began to withhold the dividends and use the
money which was not his, he intended merely to borrow. He was always
optimistic and always plunging in desperate and sometimes rather shady
speculations which, he was sure, would turn out favorably. If they
had--if, for instance, the South Shore Trolley Combine had been put
through--You knew of that, did you?"

"I've been told somethin' about it. Go on!"

"Well, it was not put through, so his hopes there were frustrated. And
that was but one of his schemes. However, when the sale of the Company
was consummated, he did an extraordinary thing. He made out and signed
his personal note, payable to the Akrae Company, for