"Like enough, Tom," said Jasper, mildly. "What do you reckon on doing with it?"
"You don't claim it to be yours, then?" demanded Tom, in some surprise.
"No-o," said Parloe, slowly.
"It has your initials on it," said Helen, quickly.
"That's odd, ain't it?" returned Parloe, standing where he was and not offering to touch the box. "But other people have the same initials that I have." His grin grew to huge proportions, and he looked so sly that nothing but his high, bony nose kept his two little eyes from running together and making one eye of it. "Jabe Potter, for instance."
"Then you think this is likely to be Mr. Potter's?" queried Tom.
"Couldn't say. Jabe will probably claim it. He would take advantage of the initials, sure enough."
"And why don't you?" asked Helen.
"'Cause me and Jabe are two different men," declared Parloe, righteously. "Nobody ever could say, with proof, that Jasper Parloe took what warn't his own."
"This is my uncle's cash-box, I am very sure," interposed Ruth, with some anger. "It was not swept away the day of the flood. You were there in his little office at the very moment the waters struck the mill, and we saw you running from the place as though you were scared."