Larry Barlow's ambition

It is well said that strange happenings often bunch themselves, and so it proved upon the present occasion.

As the train for Jersey City upon which Larry and the officer were riding pulled into Elizabethport station, our hero caught sight of a familiar figure lounging near the news stand.

“Well, I never!” he gasped. “Lank Possy!”

“Who is it?” questioned the officer.

“Lank Possy, the fellow who helped Sluggers at the tenement house fire.”

“You are sure?” asked the officer, who had heard our hero’s story in detail.

“Positive.”

“Then he should be arrested.”

Just then a policeman hove into sight, and Larry ran out of the car and called to him.

“Arrest that fellow!” he cried, and pointed at Lank Possy.

The bully of Ferryville was dumfounded on seeing Larry, but he quickly recovered and started to run. But Larry was after him, and like a flash he tripped the rascal up.

The Elizabethport policeman wanted to know what was the matter, and Larry called the Perth Amboy officer to help explain matters.

Lank Possy begged hard to be let go, but Larry would not listen to it. Possy was in tatters and looked like a tramp.

“I just came in from a tramp through Pennsylvania,” he said. “Ain’t had a square meal in a month. What a fool I was to go wrong!” And he almost began to blubber.

“Perhaps you can turn State’s evidence against Sluggers and the rest,” suggested Larry, and in the end Lank Possy jumped at the chance. He said he would go on to New York willingly, and the Perth Amboy officer took him in charge.

As soon as the metropolis was gained, the party hurried to the police station, and there Larry told his story again, and the Perth Amboy officer told what he knew.

The police captain had heard of Larry’s gallant work as a fireman, and listened to what was said with close attention.

“If your story is true, Martin Pollox is certainly a thorough villain,” he said, when Larry had finished. “He must be arrested without delay.”

“That’s just what I want.”

“Do you want to go with the officers who make the arrests?”

“Yes. I want them to bring away those drawings which belong to my father.”

“Very well, you shall go.”

Two experienced detectives were called in and matters were quickly explained. Larry had had no sleep and no breakfast, but he did not think of these things in the excitement.

When the party reached the Pollox mansion they found it apparently closed up.

“It may be a bluff,” said Larry. “One of you had better go to the door and ask to see Mr. Pollox on important business.”

“A good idea,” answered the leader of the detectives, and hurried on, leaving Larry and the second officer crouching behind some stone steps further up the block.

A servant answered the detective’s summons.

“Sorry, sir, but Mr. Pollox isn’t at home,” she said.

“And when will he be home?”

“I can’t say, sir.”

The servant closed the door again, and the detective joined Larry and his fellow officer once more.

“We might——” he began, when Larry clutched his arm.

“Here he comes, down the street!” whispered our hero. “Check Sluggers is with him. Make sure they don’t slip us. Sluggers can run like a deer.”

They waited until the rascals were directly in front of the steps, and then Larry confronted the pair.

“Stop!” he cried, and Martin Pollox and Sluggers fell back as if they had seen a ghost.

“Yo—you!” gasped Pollox. “Whe—where did you—er—come from?”

“You know well enough, Martin Pollox,” answered Larry. “Officers, make them both prisoners.”

“The game is busted!” muttered Sluggers, and started to run.

But one of the detectives was too quick for him. Then Pollox tried to run also, but Larry and the second detective collared him.

“It is all a—a—mistake,” gasped Martin Pollox, when he was being handcuffed.

“It’s too late to talk about mistakes now,” said Larry, coldly. “You can think it over when you are doing time in prison.”

“Doing time in prison!” shrieked Martin Pollox. “No! no! Do not send me to prison, I beg of you. I—I will make it all right! You shall have all that is coming to you!”

He clutched Larry, and begged and pleaded, but our hero was obdurate.

“You have played the villain, Martin Pollox, and you must suffer the consequences,” he said. “I hope you get the full limit of the law, for you have not only committed crimes against my father and me, but you were trying your best to cheat Mary Vern out of her inheritance.”

“I—I was crazy! I did not know what I was doing! Sluggers tempted me!” went on the rascal, desperately.

“I tempted him!” roared Sluggers. “He tempted me—the sneak. If I had my way I’d fix you!” And he raised his manacled hands threateningly.

The detectives would allow no more talking, and Pollox was marched to his mansion.

Here a search was made, and not only the drawings, but a number of important agreements were found, proving how Pollox had tried to cheat Walter Barlow, and how he had had the man kidnapped and sent to Ponce, and also how he had had old Caleb Backstay carried off.

“You’re in for a good term at Sing Sing,” said one of the detectives to Pollox.

“I’ll turn State’s evidence,” put in Sluggers, eagerly.

“We won’t need you,” answered Larry, dryly. “We have got witnesses enough. Lank Possy is under arrest.”

This was the last straw to break the camel’s back, and Check Sluggers said no more.

An hour later found the evildoers behind the bars, and then Larry started for home to tell his sister Kate of all the wonderful things which had happened.

As he entered the kitchen he heard joyful talking in the parlor. Kate was speaking.

“Won’t Larry be surprised,” she was saying. “He’ll think it too wonderful for anything.”

Larry hurried into the parlor, and stopped near the doorway, spellbound. There, in an easy chair, sat—yes, it was—his father!

“Father!” he fairly shouted, and at that word, Mr. Barlow leaped up. “Is it really you?”

“Yes, Larry,” answered the parent, and embraced his son.

“How did you get here?” went on our hero. “I thought you were in Porto Rico?”

“How did you learn he was in Porto Rico?” questioned Kate.

“It’s a long story. Pollox is under arrest, and so are Check Sluggers and Captain Naxon.”

“Arrested!” cried both Kate and Walter Barlow.

“Yes, arrested, and from them I learned, father, that you were on a plantation in Porto Rico, a place attached to an asylum.”

“I was there, but I watched my chances and escaped a month ago.”

“Of course, you were not insane?”

“No, Larry, but they tried to make me think so. It was an awful plot, and if those rascals are under arrest it shall go hard with them,” continued Mr. Barlow.

And then he told his story in detail, of how he had been robbed and carried away, and how he had tried to get back or to send word home. He had been on a plantation kept by a wicked Spaniard, but the Don was dead, having been shot down by a Cuban he had flogged.

It was a joyful family party that gathered at the Barlow home that night. Each one had to tell his story several times, and Kate had much to tell, too. But the young housekeeper did not forget her duties, and spread a feast for her father and brother which made their eyes glisten.

“You’re like your mother, Kate,” declared Mr. Barlow. “God bless you!”

A few words more, and I will bring my tale to a close.

In due course of time Martin Pollox and his companions in crime were tried and found guilty of their various offenses. For what they had done, Pollox was sent to prison for twelve years, and the others for almost as long.

Lank Possy turned State’s evidence and was, consequently, not tried for what he had done to aid Check Sluggers. But he overreached himself when he thought the law would not touch him afterwards, for he was later arrested for the Printing Works robbery, and for this was sentenced to two years’ imprisonment.

During Martin Pollox’s trial it came out that he had become the executor of Richard Vern’s will by fraud, and, consequently, his executorship, so called, was set aside, and Mary had a new guardian appointed, Fire Commissioner Kessenger, her father’s old friend.

The new guardian found Richard Vern’s memorandum book, and in this an entry leaving our hero five hundred dollars for his bravery at the hotel fire, so Larry received three hundred dollars in addition to what Pollox had so grudgingly turned over to him.

Several years later Caleb Backstay was heard of at San Francisco, and was assisted by both Mr. Barlow and Larry.

The patent elevator lift was found to be the sole property of Walter Barlow, and this was afterward sold to an elevator company for twenty thousand dollars. The elevator company also took hold of Larry’s patent ladder, and inside of three years our hero received nearly fifteen thousand dollars in royalties.

Mary Vern was glad enough to part company with Laura Pollox, who was now practically a beggar, and who had to earn her living by going out to sew among the very persons with whom she had once associated socially. She made very little, and out of the goodness of her heart, Mary helped her in many ways, but it is doubtful if Laura Pollox ever appreciated this kindness.

Larry did not stop at one invention, but resigned his position as a fireman and devoted all of his time to his patents, and inside of five years was comfortably fixed for life. In the meantime Mary Vern and he remained the warmest of friends, and nobody was surprised when the invitations for their marriage came out.

“I thought so all along,” said Kate. “Well, Larry couldn’t do better, and Mary couldn’t do better, either.”

It was a happy affair all around, and one long to be remembered, and here we will leave them, wishing them the best of good luck.