CHAPTER XIII.
THE JUDGE TAKES A HAND.
Clancy did not return to the Red Star Garage that night. He went to a hotel with Jimmie Fortune, and the two of them slept late the next morning, had breakfast at a restaurant at nine o’clock, and, when ten strokes boomed from the courthouse clock, made their way to the garage.
The judge and Rockwell were alone in the office when the two youths entered the place.
“Get out of here, both of you!” shouted Rockwell. “I know that young scalawag, Fortune, and I don’t want him around, on general principles. As for you, Clancy, I have no use for a fellow who can’t be trusted. You didn’t stay in the back room last night, and you didn’t show up here in time for work this morning. That’s what lets you out.”
“Just a minute,” interposed the judge, taking a long wallet from his pocket. “Before Clancy leaves this place, Rockwell, you’d better settle your account with him.” He took the note from the wallet and laid it down on the desk in front of the garage owner. “Give him a check for a thousand dollars,” finished the judge, “and no words about it.”
Rockwell appeared astounded. His startled eyes traveled to the judge and then returned to the note.
“I—I told Clancy I’d take this up in a week or two,” he muttered shiftily.
“You’re going to take it up now,” said Judge Pembroke. “I know you have the money in the bank, and that note is long past due. Be sure and add the interest when you make out the check.”
“You don’t know about this note, judge,” continued Rockwell. “I don’t reckon I owe the money or——”
“Why did you just say you had told Clancy you’d pay it in a week or two, if you questioned the validity of the note?”
“Well, I—I——”
“Don’t hem and haw and side-step with me,” said the judge sternly. “You have been trying to beat young Clancy out of the money. Do you want me to tell your customers how you hired Hibbard to steal that note from Clancy so you could get out of paying it? Would that sound well?”
Rockwell fell back in his chair, limp and dumfounded. His lips moved, but no sound came from them.
“You see,” pursued the judge relentlessly, “that I know what I am talking about. I’ll publish your contemptible methods far and wide if you don’t instantly settle this debt. I’m not here to waste words on you. Write that check!”
With his face ashen and his hands trembling, Rockwell, thoroughly cowed, bent over his desk. Fishing a check book out of a pigeonhole, he opened it, picked up a pen, and did a little figuring on a scratch block. When he wrote the check, it was for one thousand one hundred and twenty dollars.
“There, Clancy,” said the judge, handing the check to Owen. “Now you are square with Rockwell, and need have nothing more to do with him. There is a young fellow in this town who has recently opened a garage. He is square as a die, and I happen to know that you can buy a half interest in his place for that money. Of course,” and the judge smiled, “it isn’t a big place like this, but the business is growing. I’d advise you to buy in with Lafe Wynn.”
“Wynn?” murmured Rockwell. “He’s one of my competitors. I didn’t think, judge, that you’d do anything to help Lafe Wynn.”
“I’ll do everything to help Lafe Wynn,” said Judge Pembroke, getting up from his chair. “Clancy will buy a half interest, give a job to his friend, Jimmie Fortune, and it won’t be many months, Rockwell, until Clancy & Wynn run you out of business. They’ll treat their patrons on the square—and that’s a principle that will help them to grow. Don’t think for a minute,” he added, “that I don’t know how I have been robbed here. I’ve suspected what was going on, and now I’m no longer in doubt. My two cars are going over to the Square-deal Garage—and I guess I know a few more cars that will follow them.”
“You might be easy with me,” whimpered Rockwell, “now that I’ve given Clancy that money.”
“Easy with you for paying an honest debt?” returned the judge contemptuously. “Why, man, if you had your deserts you would be in jail.” He moved toward the door. “Come on, Clancy,” said he, “you and Fortune. We’re through here.”
The judge left the place, Clancy and Fortune trailing along behind him. The two pards were smiling happily, and Fortune was hanging to Clancy’s hand and working his arm up and down like a pump handle.
Rockwell watched them through the dingy window of his office.
“We’ll see about this,” he muttered, between his teeth, shaking his fist. “I’ll break that new firm of Clancy & Wynn. You’re a keen one, Pembroke, but you’ll find that I can go you one better. I—I reckon I shouldn’t have trusted that fellow, Hibbard, after all,” he added, as he turned heavily away from the window.
THE END.
Continuing to follow the fortunes of Owen Clancy, Burt L. Standish has written a cracking good story, which you will find in the next issue of this weekly. It is entitled “Owen Clancy’s Square Deal; or, The Motor Wizard and the Black Thunderbolt.” Owen buys a half interest in Lafe Wynn’s garage and settles down to make good. The Black Thunderbolt is an automobile, and it is “some car.” There are some mighty exciting doings in it, too. The issue in which this story will be found will be out next week, on January 24th. It is No. 78.