"But even Sid might talk in his sleep, or let a hint fall," Kate insisted; "and you know he's got a sister, Mame, who loves to gossip a little—I kind of think all girls do," she added, with a little giggle, and shrug of her shoulders.
"Won't Hiram have a story to tell when he gets back again?" observed Fred, who, boy-like, thought of the adventures the kidnapped miner must have passed through during his long enforced absence.
"I imagine," Mr. Fenton observed, "that the harsh treatment he has endured at the hands of those who are in the pay of the company his uncle controls must have had just the opposite effect upon Hiram to what they intended. He feels very bitter toward them, and is more determined than ever to beat them at their game. I was always told that when evil men fall out honest ones get their due, and I believe it now."
"I don't believe Hiram can be so very wicked," interposed Mrs. Fenton, gently. "When he came down here from Alaska to help his uncle by giving false testimony, he must have been laboring under some wrong notion of how things stood. Since then he has seen a great light, and his better nature has come to the front."
"Then it was what Fred did for him when he first came, that opened his eyes," declared Kate. "You remember, mother, if it hadn't been for our Fred, Mr. Masterson would have found himself in serious trouble."
"Yes, that must have been the entering wedge," Mr. Fenton remarked, nodding his approval of the girl's idea. "It set Hiram to thinking; and once a wavering man does that, the good in him gets a chance. But come, this doesn't look like supper. I didn't think I was one bit hungry; but now I'm fairly ravenous."
"And the splendid news has taken my desire to eat away," Mrs. Fenton said; but she immediately started to get the meal on the table, her face radiant with the new happiness that had come.
At the table Fred was seized with a sudden thought, pursuing which he turned to his sister to ask a few questions.
"Do you remember who gave the letter to you at the office, Kate; was it that red-headed clerk, Sam Smalling?"
"Why, to be sure; he always hands out the mail at the General Delivery window," she replied, without hesitation.