Connecticut western news., 1920-03-11

out two things-frst, what has be- come of your father and, second, who did steal that money. I don't see 1t yet, but there's some link between the two things. I mean between the rob bery and his disappearance"
 How do you meanr Kate asked.
 "We'll say the robbers were his ene- mies-some of the Soapy Stone outfit. maybe. They have got him out of the way to satisfy their grudge and to make people think he did 1t. Unfortu- nately there Is evidence that makes 1t look as if he might have done It. what they call corroboratIng testi-' mony."
 What does Sheriff Bolt think?"
 Curly waved the sheriff aside. "It don't matter what he thinks, Miss Kate. He says he thinks Luck was mixed up in the holdup. Maybe that's what he thinks, but we don't want to forget that Cass Fendrick made him sheriff and your father fought him to a fare-you-well."
 "Pd like to talk with Bolt" the young woman announced.
 "All right" Mackenzie assented. Tomorrow mo'ning-"
 -No, tonight, Uncle Mac"
 The cattleman looked at her In sur prise. Her voice rang with decision. energy and resolution. Was this the girl who had been In helpless tears not ten minutes before7
 "Tll see if he's at his office. Maybe he'll come up." Curly said.
 "No. I'll go down to the courthouse if he's there"
 At the office of the sheriff Kate cut to essentials as soon as the introduc- tions were>over.
 Do you think my father robbed the ". & S. Express company, Mir. Boltr' she asked.
 Her plainness embarrassed the ofts- cer. -.
 Let's look at the facts, Miss Gull lison," he began amiably. "Then you tell me what you would think in my place. Your father needed money mighty bad. There's no doubt at all about that. Here's an envelope on which he had written 6 list of his debts. You'll notice they run to just little more than twenty thousand. I round this In his bedroom the day he disappeared. Turn that envelope over, Miss Cuilison. Notice how he has written there half dozen times In a row, '$2O,0O0,' and just below it twice. & v .l. word, Tonight"
 She read 1t all, read 1t with heart heavy as lead, and knew that there he had left in his own strong, bold hand writing convincing evidence against himself. Still, she did not doubt him in the least, but there could be no question now that he knew of the in- tended shipment, that absent-mIndedly he had jotted down this data while he was thinking about 1t In connection with his own debts.
 The sheriff went on tightening the chain of evidence in a voice that, for all its kindness seemed to her re- morseless as fate. Tt turns out that Mir. Jordan of the Cattleman's Nation al bank mentioned this shipment to your father that morning. Mir. Gull lison was trying to raise money from him, but he couldn't let him have 1t. Every bank in the city refused him loan. Yet next morning he paid off two thousand dollars he owed from poker game"
 "He must have borrowed the money from some one," she said weakly.
 "That money he paid in twenty-dol- lar bills. The stolen express package was in twenties. You know yourself that this Is a gold country. Bills aln't so plentiful"
 The girls hand went to her heart. Faith in her father was rock not to be washed away by any amount of evidence. What made her vince was the amount of clrcumstantial testi- mony falling into place so ineXorably against him.
 ''Is that all?" she asked dcspairingly.
 "I wish 1t were Miss Culllson. But it's not. A man came round the corner and shot at the robber as he was es- caping His hat fell off. Here It is."
 As Kate took the hat something seemed to tighten around her heart. It