“Yes,—­ not for always, you understand, but temporarily.”

“Well, all they can do is to watch him, Sam.  And you keep close by, in case anything more happens,” added Dick, and then told his brother of what had been done in the metropolis towards straightening out the business tangle.

Mr. Powell was to see some people in Brooklyn regarding the land deal in which Anderson Rover held an interest, and he had asked Dick to meet him in that borough at four o’clock.  At three o’clock Dick left the Outlook Hotel to keep the engagement.

“You had better stay here until I get back, in case any word comes in about Tom,” said he to his father.

“Very well, Dick; I shall be glad of the rest,” replied Anderson Rover.

He had already given the particulars of how he had been kidnapped while on his way to meet Japson.  The broker had come up accompanied by the disguised Crabtree, and he had been forced into a taxicab and a sponge saturated with chloroform had been held to his nose.  He had become unconscious, and while in that condition had been taken to some house up in Harlem.  From there he had been transferred to the Ellen Rodney on the evening before the boys had discovered his whereabouts.

“They treated me very harshly,” Mr. Rover had said.  “Mr. Crabtree was particularly mean.”

“Well, he is suffering for it,” Dick had answered.  “Sam telephoned that his leg was in very bad shape and the doctors thought he would be a cripple for life.”

To get to Brooklyn Dick took the subway, crossing under the East River.  He did not know much about the place, but had received instructions how to reach the offices where he was to meet Mr. Powell and the others.

There was a great rush on the streets, owing to a small fire in the vicinity.  Dick stopped for a minute to watch a fire engine at work on a corner, and as he did so, somebody tapped him on the shoulder.

“Dick Rover! of all people!” came the exclamation.  “What are you doing in Brooklyn?”

Dick turned quickly, to find himself confronted by a tall, heavy-set youth, dressed in a business suit.

“Dan Baxter!” he cried.  “How are you?” and he shook hands.

As my old readers well know, Dan Baxter was an old acquaintance of the Rover boys.  When at Putnam Hall he had been a great bully, and had tried more than once to get the best of our heroes.  But he had been foiled, and then he had drifted to the West and South, and there the Rovers had found him, away from home and practically penniless.  They had set him on his feet, and he had gotten a position as a traveling salesman, and now he counted the Rovers his best friends, and was willing to do anything for them.

“Oh, I’m pretty well,” answered Dan Baxter, with a grin.  “My job agrees with me.”

“What are you doing, Dan?”

“Oh, I’m still selling jewelry—­ doing first-rate, too,” added the former bully, a bit proudly.