He turned into the house, and the two boys, after a moment of hesitation, followed. They did not yet quite understand. The lineman whispered to them, when out of earshot of his cousin.
“You must humor poor William,” he said. “He is all right except on the subject of mud turtles. He thinks he has the greatest collection of them in the world. I don’t in the least doubt that he went in the school by stealth to look at some. In fact, I heard from Professor Long about a visit he paid to him one day, when he wanted to see the school collection. Professor Long had heard of my cousin, and knew him to be harmless, but William got so excited on the subject of turtles that the professor concluded it would not be best to exhibit the school collection, so he refused. This made William suspicious, and very likely he made up his mind to sneak in, and get a night-view of the reptiles. I have no doubt but that he did so.”
“He certainly did,” answered Bart. “We saw him come out. Then, when the diamond bracelet was missed, we naturally concluded that he was the person who had taken it.”
The lineman shook his head.
“William would not do such a thing,” he said. “There must be some other explanation. But humor him now by looking at his turtles. You may get a clew.”
The boys did so. The eccentric man, who was somewhat insane on the subject of turtles, had quite a collection of the queer reptiles—larger even than Fenn’s, or the one in the High School. He talked of them interestedly. By degrees Bart led to the subject of his visit to the school, and touched on the diamond bracelet, but the man’s replies showed that he knew nothing of it.
“I remember you boys,” William Lang went on. “I recollect now that I saw you as I hurried away from the school, and I thought you would chase me, but you didn’t. Then I saw you in the shooting gallery, but I didn’t know you at first. I’m a fine shot, you know, but I couldn’t shoot well that night, after I recognized you,” and he nodded at Bart. “By this time I had learned of the missing bracelet, and I was afraid you might have me arrested for taking it, so I hurried away. But I never saw it.”
He paused to replace in the cage a turtle that was crawling out, and the lineman took occasion to say in a whisper:
“That’s another of William’s odd notions. He thinks he is a crack rifle shot.”