Page:Top-Notch Magazine, May 1 1915 (IA tn 1915 05 01).pdf/50

 "My girl did that for me," he explained softly. "You can understand her feelings, I think, when duty to her father ran so contrary to her own character and—and ideas of loyalty to Summerfield. But we were planning only temporary deception; after the tools were out of our hands and in Morrison's again, we had already made our preparations to turn on the scheming crook. Lois," he admonished, "if you would not break my heart, be brave."

She flung up her head, tears sparkling on her cheeks. "I will, father," she answered. "Go on."

"In my haste to get rid of the burglar kit," proceeded McKenzie, "I had left out a jimmy, a special contrivance of Morrison's. It was necessary to get it into the counterfeit package. How was I to do that? I knew the location of the express storeroom, and I also knew that outgoing packages were usually put there when kept overnight. About four in the afternoon, with the original package under my coat, I skulked down the alley and came up to the rear of the express office. I could look through the window and see the package containing the kit of tools—it lay on a shelf within easy reach. The window was open. It was barred with cross rods, but I slipped one package through between the bars and removed the other in the same way."

"That," commented Ruthven excitedly, "left the six-pound package in the storeroom, and you had the eight-pound package once more in your possession. That is how the package was at the original weight when Reeves returned, and, at Summerfield's instigation, placed it on the scales. But that night," he added, "I called at the office to meet Miss McKenzie, and when the package was weighed by all three of us, it weighed nine pounds."

"The jimmy I had added accounts for the further increase in weight."

"How was that substitution made?"

"After I had placed in the package the instrument I had left out, in my hurry, I went back to the rear of the express office. I was alarmed and disappointed when I saw that the original package was not in the storeroom, and it was impossible to make the substitution there and then. I was at my wits' end—but again Lois helped me out."

"I remember," murmured Ruthven. "Summerfield had left the package out in the front office to investigate it further after he had finished his evening's work."

"Mr. Summerfield left me alone in the office when he went for ice cream," explained Lois, her eyes lowered, "and I handed the six-pound package out to father, who was on the sidewalk in front, and took from him the nine-pound parcel, placing it just where Joe had left the other.

"Oh, it was hard, hard!" she said chokingly; "I was there with you and Joe when the package was weighed and found to have increased to nine pounds, and I saw you place the penciled cross on it for purposes of identification. You both trusted me, and—and I was not worthy of that trust. But," she finished resolutely, "it was all for father—and his cause was a righteous one. I had to play the part I did."

"Lois told me later of the identification mark," proceeded McKenzie, "and I placed it on the original package. I was alarmed, of course, to learn that the Barton shipment was causing so much discussion in the office. If I could, I would have given up the whole thing then and there, and have substituted the original six-pound parcel for the last time and thrown the burglar's kit into a cistern, or got rid of it in some other way. But I dared not. I had gone too far, you understand, and there was a lingering hope that I might save Wylie and myself from the vengeance of Morrison.

"It was necessary to go on," he said