“That’s what I thought,” said Charlie Jamieson, innocently, but Bessie was sure that he had winked at her.

The wagons drove up, however, to the very front of the crumbling old house.

“Everybody out!” called Jamieson.  “Here Holmes, where are you going?  Stay with us, man!  The fun is just going to begin.”  For he had seen Holmes trying to slip off to the back of the house, and, smiling, he had seized the retired merchant’s arm.

“Here’s something I want you to hear,” he said.  “Eleanor, start the girls to singing that song I like so much—­that ‘Wohelo for Aye’ song, you know.”

In a moment the clear voices were raised in the most famous of all the Camp Fire Songs, and Holmes, with a savage wrench, got himself free.  But it was too late.  For, as the first notes rose, a window above was flung open, and a voice that Bessie knew as well as she did her own joined in the chorus.  In a moment the singing stopped, and every pair of eyes was turned up, to see Zara leaning from a window!

“Oh, Bessie—­Miss Mercer—­please take me away from here!  I’m so frightened!”

“The game’s up, Holmes,” said Jamieson, in a changed voice.  “Did you really think we’d take your word against those two girls you treated so shamefully today?  Come on, now, I’m not going to stand for any nonsense!  Will you take me upstairs to where you’ve got Zara hidden?  You played a cool game, and you thought you could get away with it because you were so respectable.  But we’ve got a complete case against you.  It was in your automobile that Zara was taken from Miss Mercer’s house, and as soon as you played that trick today I was sure that you had had a hand in the game.”

Holmes looked at him darkly.  His face was working with anger, but he evidently saw that the game was up, as Jamieson said.

“I guess you win—­this time,” he said at last, coolly enough.  “But remember, I haven’t been beaten very often.  And you don’t know what’s back of this.  If you knew when you were well off, you’d keep out of this, Jamieson.  There’d be something in it for you—­”

“Don’t try to bribe me,” said Jamieson, with a gesture of disgust.  “It’s no use.  I win, as you say.  There may be a next time—­but I’m not afraid of you, Holmes.  Take me up there right now.”

“Oh, all right,” said Holmes.

And three minutes later Zara was in Bessie’s arms, while Holmes looked on, sneering.

“I’ll not deny that you did a pretty clever job here,” he said.  “How did you find out about this house?”

“I happened to be searching some records yesterday, and I saw, quite by accident, the deed recording your purchase of this property,” Jamieson answered.  “That didn’t mean much—­until I heard of the way you acted to-day.  Then, of course, I put two and two together, and decided you got hold of this place to keep Zara hidden.

“You knew there was a good chance that we could upset that order making old Weeks her guardian, and I knew, of course, that she hadn’t been produced in court in the other state.  Pretty risky work, Holmes.  Now get out.  You can stay here, of course, or you can walk to the station.  There won’t be room for you with us, I’m sorry to say.”