“The same old warm-hearted Tom as of old!” responded Dick.  “All right, have your own way about it.”

After the former gardener had departed the boys went upstairs to join Dora, and then Tom and Sam sat down to write letters of explanation to Nellie and Grace; and these epistles were posted before the youths retired for the night.

“Oh, how glad Nellie must be to have this weight off her shoulders!” exclaimed Dora.  “It must have been awful to be suspected of taking a ring.”

“I guess Miss Harrow will be relieved, too,” answered Tom.  “I wonder where she is stopping in Asbury Park.”

“I think I know,” returned Dick’s wife.  “She and some of the other teachers usually go to the Claravale House.”

“I’ll take a chance and telegraph to her,” went on Tom.  “It won’t cost much and it may relieve her mind.  Those folks up at the seminary may wait to send a letter.”  And going downstairs once more, Tom wrote out another brief telegram, and asked that it be sent off immediately.

“If only we could clear up this mystery of the missing bonds as easily as we did this ring business!” came from Sam, when he and Tom had said good-night to Dick and his wife.

“I’m afraid that’s not going to be so easy, Sam.  Sometimes I think that we’ll never hear a word more about those bonds;” and Tom heaved a deep sigh.

“Oh, but, Tom, if we don’t get those bonds back we’ll be in a hole!” cried the youngest Rover, in dismay.

“We may not be in a hole exactly, Sam; but we’ll have a tough job of it pulling through,” was the grim response.

Tom had worried more about the missing ring than he had been willing to admit to his brothers, and now that this was off his mind, he, on the following morning, pitched into business with renewed vigor.  He and Dick had their hands full, going over a great mass of figures and calculations, and in deciding the important question of how to take care of certain investments.  Sam did what he could to help them, although, as he frankly admitted, he did not take to bookkeeping or anything that smacked of high finances.

“I was not cut out for it, and that is all there is to it,” he declared.  “But I am willing to help you all I can.”

Sam had gone off on an errand, leaving his brothers deep in their figures, when the office boy announced a visitor.

“Mr. Mallin Aronson,” said Dick, glancing at the visitor’s card.  “Oh, yes, I’ve heard of him before.  He and father had some stock dealings a year or so ago.  Bring him in.”

Mr. Aronson proved to be a small, dark-complexioned man, with heavy eyebrows and a heavily-bearded face.  He bowed profoundly as he entered.

“Mr. Richard Rover, I believe?” he said, extending his hand.

“Yes, Mr. Aronson.  And this is my brother Tom,” returned Dick.

“Very glad to know you;” and the visitor bowed again.  “I presume you know what brought me here,” he went on, with a bland smile.