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Rh my stepfather and the family or—or anyone else you like." There was a sort of quiet desperation in his tones, with no trace of bravado. "Ever since I can remember I have been able to copy people's handwriting without any practice, and so nearly perfect that they could not themselves tell it from their own. I used to do it for fun at school when I was a kid. It was a gift from the devil, I guess; but I never thought of turning it to account in any dishonest way until Drew found out about my freakish ability in that line and put the idea into my head.

"Don't misunderstand me, Sergeant; I'm not trying to hide behind his skirts. I forged my mother's name to that check, and I am willing to take the consequences. Drew had me in a hole; racing, and gambling, and chits signed at restaurants for supper parties, and all the rest of it. He had a stack of I. O. U. paper of mine about a foot high. My stepfather had paid up my debts twice; and he refused to do so again, and I knew he meant it.

"Of course I shall be of age in another month and master of my inheritance from my own father; but Drew wouldn't wait. The notes were long overdue; and he was pressing me, and threatening until I was almost crazy."

Only another month? Odell's thoughts were far afield. Mrs. Lorne had refused to sign away her rights to certain property, and she had died; Julian had demanded an accounting of his estate, and he also had perished. Gene would be of age in four short weeks; and it was obvious that he, too, would want control of his inheritance—and that portrait had all but crushed out his life when it fell! All this capital had been intrusted to Richard Lorne's keeping. … With an effort the detective forced himself to con-