“I’ll lock it up in the safe for you,” said the clerk.  “Is there much?”

“Several hundred dollars.”

“You were very fortunate in escaping as you did,” said the clerk.

“True for you,” said Andy.  “He may come back when he finds out how he has been fooled.”

“If he does, I’ll call a policeman.  We’ll make short work with him.”

The reader has already heard how Fairfax (or Marvin) did return, and how he met with a reception he had not calculated upon.  Andy was informed in the morning that it would be necessary for him to appear as a witness against him in order to secure his conviction.  This he did the next day, but the judge delayed sentence, on being informed that the accused was charged with a more serious offense, that of stopping a traveler on the highway.  His trial on this count must come before a higher court, and he was remanded to prison till his case was called in the calendar.  Andy was informed that he would be summoned as a witness in that case also, as well as Colonel Preston, and answered that he would be ready when called upon.

We will so far anticipate events as to say that the testimony of Andy and the colonel was considered conclusive by the court, and, on the strength of it, Mr. Fairfax, alias Marvin, was sentenced to several years’ imprisonment at hard labor.

Andy met with no further adventures in his present visit, but had the satisfaction of delivering the money he had been sent to collect to Miss Priscilla Grant.

Now, advancing our story some three months, we come to an afternoon when Miss Sophia Grant, returning from a walk, with visible marks of excitement, rushed, breathless and panting, into her sister’s presence.

“What’s the matter, Sophia?” asked Priscilla.

“Such an awful thing!” she gasped.

“What is it?”

“You won’t believe it.”

“Tell me at once what it is!”

“It seems so sudden!”

“Good heavens!  Sophia, why do you tantalize me so?”

“Just so!” gasped Sophia.

“If you don’t tell me, I’ll shake you!”

“Colonel Preston’s dead—­dropped dead in the store ten minutes ago.  I was there, and saw him.”

This startling intelligence was only too true.  Suddenly, without an instant’s warning, the colonel had been summoned from life—­succumbing to a fit of apoplexy.  This event, of course, made a great sensation in the village, but it is of most interest to us as it affects the fortunes of our young hero.

CHAPTER XXX COLONEL PRESTON’S WILL

Mrs. Preston was a cold woman, and was far from being a devoted wife.  She was too selfish for that supreme love which some women bestow upon their husbands.  Still, when Colonel Preston’s lifeless form was brought into the house, she did experience a violent shock.  To have the companion of nearly twenty years so unexpectedly taken away might well touch the most callous, and so, for a few minutes, Mrs. Preston forgot herself and thought of her husband.