"I shouldn't be surprised. What do you think we had better do?"

Neither of them yet recognized Wakely as Tupper.

"I think we'd better get out of this place before they come back with reinforcements," said Roy with a laugh. He was cool, despite what he had gone through, for he was somewhat used to meeting danger and doing his best to escape.

"I'll slide down my rope again," he went on, "come up the stairs, and open the door. Then we can talk it over. I must get my baggage away from here."

It did not take the boy long to repeat his feat with the lariat, and soon, having found a key, he opened the door from without, releasing Mortimer De Royster.

CHAPTER XXIII

A LAWYER'S ADVICE

"Now, what's the first thing to be done, my dear chap?" asked De Royster, as Roy loosed the la.s.so from the bed and coiled it up.

"Arrange to get my stuff away from here. I reckon, and back to my hotel. Then I want to hear how you traced me."

"I'll tell you. But I agree with you that we had better leave this place. Let's go down to the street and engage an expressman."

They found one who agreed to take Roy's baggage back to the hotel.

After seeing it safely in the wagon, during which time a few of the tenants in the house looked on curiously, but said nothing, the two friends started for the hotel, where Roy had been stopping.

"As soon as I called at your hotel that night, and found you had been taken away, sick, by a man who had only recently come to the place, I suspected something was wrong," explained Mr. De Royster, on the way.

"The clerk told me about you going away in a cab, and gave me a fairly good description of the driver, whom he had a glimpse of. It was a cab seldom seen in this part of the city.

"I knew my best plan, don't you know, would be to find that driver, and learn where he had taken you and your baggage. My idea was that some sharpers had gotten you into their power to rob you. I never suspected there was such a deep plot."

"Neither did I," replied Roy, "and I don't believe we have seen the last of it."

"Well," went on De Royster, "I had quite a time tracing that cabman. I must have interviewed nearly fifty drivers before I found one who knew a fellow that answered the description of the one who had taken you away. But at last I located him, and, though he was reluctant at first, to tell me what I wanted to know, he did, after I threatened to call in the police."

"Would you have done so?"

"Certainly. I felt that you were in danger, for you know little of New York."

"That's so, and I'm afraid it will take me a long time to learn. I'm pretty green."

"Well, you may be in some things, but you can go ahead of New Yorkers in lots of ways. That was a great trick, sliding down that la.s.so."

"It was lucky I had it with me."

"Indeed it was, and it was a good thing those scoundrels took your baggage as well as you, or you might have been there yet."

"No, for you would have helped me, I reckon. You arrived just a few minutes after I had started to escape. How did you manage it?"

"Well, as I said, my dear chap," replied De Royster, adjusting his one eye gla.s.s, which had fallen out during the struggle with Wakely, "I made the cabman tell me where he took you, and, after that it was an easy matter to locate you. I got to the tenement right behind Wakely and I followed him up the stairs, though, then, I didn't know who he was, and I rushed into the room as soon as he opened the door, for he forgot to close it when he looked at the bed and saw it empty. I suspected you had been in here, when I saw what a lonesome sort of place it was. I pulled him back, just as he had his knife out, ready to cut the la.s.so."

"I hardly believe he would have dared to cut it," said Roy. "He only wanted to scare me into coming back."

"Perhaps he did. But I was not going to take any chances; I just grabbed him."

"That was fine on your part."

"Oh, that's nothing. Look what you did for me. I only paid you back a little."

"Nonsense. As if I wanted pay."

"Of course you didn't, but I was glad of the chance. I only wish I could have held Wakely. Now, I suppose he'll go and tell Annister, and they'll keep right after you."

"Do you think so?"

"I believe so, from what you tell me of the men."

"Then what would you advise me to do?"

"Let me think it over a bit. Suppose we go to your room?"

"All right."

There was considerable surprise on the part of the clerk at the hotel when Roy came back. On the way he and Mortimer De Royster had agreed it would be better not to say anything about the reason for the taking away of the boy from the ranch--a veritable kidnapping in fact. So it was explained that Roy had recovered from his temporary illness, and had simply been away on business, which was true enough in its way,--though it was not very pleasant business.

"Now," said De Royster, when he and Roy were once more back in the former's room. "This is what I would do. I would consult a good lawyer, and let him advise me. I think this is too much for you to handle alone."

"I believe you are right. Do you know a good lawyer?"

"I can introduce you to the one who does business for our firm. He is very reliable, and his charges are reasonable."

"Then we will go see him, after I have changed my clothes. Sleeping in them hasn't made them look exactly as new as they were."

"That's a good idea. Have you heard from your father since writing to him about Annister?"

"I don't know. Perhaps a letter came while I was away. I wonder where they would send it?"

"They would keep it here until you gave them some instructions for forwarding it. I'll inquire at the desk for you while you are changing your clothes."

As Roy had purchased two suits on coming to New York, he had a new one to put on, while the other was sent to be pressed. He had not finished dressing when De Royster came back.

"No letters, but there's a telegram," he said, handing Roy the yellow envelope.

The boy tore it open and read:

"Letter received. No doubt Annister is swindler. You are doing right.

Keep after him. Don't spare expense. Take property from his control, and give to some good man. I leave it to you. Answer when you get this."

"Why this came yesterday," said Roy. "Dad will be wondering why he doesn't hear from me."