Though slow to anger, Elsie was a little firebrand when roused. And the more she thought over the matter the more furious she grew at the game that had been played on her. The fact that she brought it all upon herself only made her more angry.
And, yet, she didn’t blame herself utterly, for she had felt so sure that only by following instructions implicitly, could she accomplish her end.
She didn’t for a moment believe that some one had tricked her who knew nothing of Kimball Webb, for she had his own letter to disprove that. She concluded they had tricked him, too, and had forced him to write the note and then had cheated him as they had her.
Still, he might come home yet; the day might bring him or news of him.
But when the slow hours passed and morning melted into afternoon, poor Elsie gave up hope.
By the time Coe came in the evening, Elsie had decided to tell him the whole story, assuming that since the money was paid, it was now no breach of trust.
Coley Coe stared at her as she unfolded the surprising tale.
“You chump! You Easy Mark!” he cried, angrily, quite forgetting in his astonishment to whom he was speaking.
“I beg your pardon,” he said, as he noted her rising colour. “I oughtn’t to say such things,—but, oh, Miss Powell, how could you go off on such a wild-goose chase,—and a dangerous one, too?”
His thatch of hair bobbed wildly about in his excitement, and he clutched at it as if almost frenzied.
Then he calmed down, and looked at the thing squarely. His blue eyes seemed to grow darker as their concentrated gaze fell on Elsie’s troubled face.
“It’s outrageous!” he cried, “it’s a shame, but, Miss Powell, the villains may have overreached themselves. They may have started something that will lead to their own undoing. We’ve learned a heap from this experience of yours. Now, tell me all over again,—every smallest detail.”
So again Elsie went over the whole story, and told of every step of the way.
“Clever! clever!” was Coe’s grudging tribute to the ability of the abductors.
“You see the first taxicab was a real one. They engaged the driver to do just what he did do. The second was a fake one,—their own car and one of their own men. Then when the time came, the car was abandoned,—and so were you. They knew you’d get a lift back to the city,—and they didn’t care whether you did or not! In one way, I can’t blame you, Miss Powell, for I see you didn’t dare tell me. Yet, you might have known they’d not release their prisoner.”