Chapter VIII: A Peg to Hang Suspicions on

"Vell, oof dot don'd grab der banner!" mumbled Carl, when he was finally able to speak. "I hat dot in my bocket und don'd know nodding aboudt it! Somepody must haf put him dere for a choke."

"That's a nice way to explain it!" growled Burton. "It cooks your goose, all right. Anything in the bag, McGlory?"

"Nary a thing," answered the bewildered cowboy, turning the bag inside out.

"Go on with the search," ordered Burton.

Mechanically the cowboy finished looking through the Dutch boy's clothes, and all the money he found consisted of two ten-cent pieces and a couple of nickels.

"Where did you hide that money?" demanded Burton sternly, stepping in front of Carl.

"I don'd hite it no blace," cried Carl. "You make me madt as some vet hens ven you talk like dot. Ged avay from me or I vill hit you vonce."

"Carter," went on Burton in a voice of suppressed rage, "call a policeman."

The ticket man had scrambled to his feet, and he now made a move in the direction of the tent door.

"Hold up, Carter!" called Matt; then, turning to Burton, he went on: "You're not going to arrest Carl, Burton, unless you want this outfit of aviators to quit you cold."

The red ran into Burton's face.

"Are you trying to bulldoze me?" he demanded. "I've got eighteen hundred dollars at stake, and I'm not going to let it slip through my fingers just because you fellows threaten to leave the show and take the aëroplane with you. I tell you frankly, King, I don't like the way you're talking and acting in this matter. We've got good circumstantial evidence against your Dutch friend, and he ought to be locked up."

"I admit that there's some evidence," returned Matt, "but you don't know Carl as well as I do. It isn't possible that he would steal a nickel from any one. If there was ten times as much evidence against him, no one could make me believe that."

"You're allowing your friendship to run away with your better judgment. What am I to do? Just drop this business, right here?"

"Of course not. All I want you to do is to leave Carl alone and let the motor boys find the thief."

"I want that money," said Burton, with a black frown, "and I'm satisfied this Dutchman knows where it is."

"And I'm satisfied he doesn't know a thing about it," said Matt warmly.

"How did that bag get into his pocket?"

"If you come to that, why isn't there some of the stolen money in the bag? Do you think for a minute, Burton, that Carl would be clever enough to plan such a robbery, and then be foolish enough to carry around with him the bare evidence of it? You don't give him credit for having much sense. Why should he keep the bag, and then come in here with it in his pocket?"

Burton remained silent.

"Furthermore," proceeded Matt, "if Carl is one of the thieves, or the only thief, why did he come in here at all? Why didn't he make a run of it as soon as he got his hands on the money?"

"Every crook makes a mistake, now and then," muttered Burton. "If they didn't, the law would have a hard time running them down."

"I'll tell you what I'll do," said Matt. "Leave Carl alone. If I can't prove his innocence to your satisfaction, I'll agree to stay four weeks with your show for nothing. You'll be making more than two thousand dollars, and you've only lost eighteen hundred by this robbery."

Burton's feelings underwent a change on the instant.

"Oh, well, if you put it that way," he said, "I'm willing to let the Dutchman off. I only want to do the right thing, anyhow."

"You vas a skinner," averred Carl contemptuously. "I knowed dot from der fairst time vat ve met."

"Sing small, that's your cue," retorted Burton. "Remember," and he whirled on Motor Matt, "if you don't prove the Dutchman's innocence, you're to work for me for four weeks without pay. I'm willing to let it rest in that way."

With that Burton took himself off. His show was doing well and he was not pressed for funds. As for the rest of it, he had shifted everything connected with the robbery to the shoulders of Motor Matt.

McGlory was a bit dubious. He had not known Carl as long as Matt had, and had not the same amount of confidence in him.

"Matt," remarked the Dutch boy with feeling, "you vas der pest friendt vat I efer hat, und you bed my life you don'd vas making some misdakes ven you pelieve dot I ditn't shdeal der money. I don'd know nodding aboudt der pag, nor how it got in my bocket. Dot's der trut'."

"I know that without your telling me, pard," said Matt. "The thing for us to do now is to find out who the real thieves are."

"There must have been only one," said McGlory.

"There must have been two, Joe."

"How do you figure it?"

"Why, because both Carl and Carter were knocked down at the same time. Neither saw what had happened to the other. Two men must have done that."

"Vat a headt it iss!" murmured Carl. "Modor Matt vould make a fine tedectif, I tell you dose."

"You've got a bean on the right number, pard, and no mistake," exulted McGlory.

"Did you see any one near the wagons when you led the ticket man in between them?" asked Matt, turning to look at the place where he had last seen the ticket man standing.

But Carter had left. Presumably, he had followed after Burton.

"I don'd see nopody aroundt der vagons," answered Carl. "Der t'ieves vas hiding, dot's a skinch. Day vas hid avay mit demselufs in blaces vere dey couldt handt Carter und me a gouple oof goot vones. Ouch again!" and Carl rubbed a gentle hand over the red cotton handkerchief.

"Take us to the place where you and Carter were knocked down, Carl," said Matt. "We'll look the ground over and see if we can find anything."

The Dutch boy conducted his two friends toward the rear of the circus tent. Here there were two big, high-sided canvas wagons drawn up in a position that was somewhat isolated so far as the tents of the show were concerned. The wagons had been left in the form of a "V," and Carl walked through the wide opening.

"Dis iss der vay vat ve come in," said he, "I in der lead oof der dicket man. Ven I ged py der front veels oof der vagon, I turn around, und den--_biff_, down I go like some brick puildings had drowed demselufs on dop oof me. Shiminy grickeds, vat a knock! I don'd know vere Carter vas shtanding, pecause I ditn't see him, I vas hit so kevick."

Matt surveyed the ground. The turf had retained no marks of the violent work. He examined the rear tires of the wagons. The rims, for the whole of their circumference that was off the ground, were covered with a coating of dried mud; and this caking of mud was not broken at any place.

"Carter must have stood here, in this position," observed Matt, placing himself between the two rear wheels. "He says that he fell against one of the wheels and cut his cheek on the tire. I can't find any trace of the spot where Carter came into such rough contact with either of the tires."

"Don't you think he was telling the truth, pard?" asked McGlory in some excitement. "Is it possible he was using the double tongue, just to----"

"Easy, there," interrupted Matt. "Carter was dazed when he fell, and could hardly have known whether he struck against the tire or against something else. He may have dropped on a stone----"

"No stones here," objected McGlory, with a quiet look over the surface of the ground.

"Well, then it was something else that caused the injury to his cheek. He----"

"Here's something," and McGlory made a dive for the ground and lifted himself erect with an object in his hand. "I reckon it don't amount to anything, though."

"Let's see it," said Matt.

McGlory handed the object to the young motorist. It was a peg, perhaps half an inch thick by three inches long, and had a knob at one end as big as a marble.

"Great spark-plugs!" exclaimed the king of the motor boys, staring from the peg to McGlory and Carl.

"What's to pay?" queried McGlory. "You act as though we'd found something worth while."

"We have," declared Matt, "and everything seems to be helping us on toward a streak of luck in this robbery matter."

"How vas dot?" queried Carl.

"This peg belongs to the Hindoo," said Matt. "It's the contrivance he used for fastening down the lid of that flat basket in which he carries the cobra."

McGlory went into the air with a jubilant whoop.

"He's the thief!" he cried. "I've had a feelin' all along that he was a tinhorn. This proves it! Sufferin' blackguards, Matt, but you've got a head!"

"Vere iss der shnake?" came from Carl, as he looked around in visible trepidation. "Oof der pasket iss oben, den der copra is loose on der grounds. Vat a carelessness!"

"And remember," said Matt, addressing the cowboy, "that I had set Ping to watch the Hindoo before the robbery took place. If Dhondaram is the robber, then Ping was on his trail at the time and must know something about it."

"Speak to me about that!" exulted the cowboy. "Our friend the Hindoo has been putting in some good licks since he joined the Big Consolidated! He hasn't let any grass grow under his feet."

Motor Matt whirled around and walked out from between the wagons.

"Let's find Ping," he called back, "and get a report from him. That ought to settle everything."

McGlory and Carl, feeling that something important was about to be accomplished, hurried after Matt as he moved off across the show grounds.