“She is right,” Scott said. “Are you going down with us?”
Hopwood blushed a little. “No, I am going to stay here and see if I can be of any help to Vic.”
“Do you want me to send for a doctor?” Scott asked. “I would be glad to get one from Asheville for Jarred.”
Hopwood shook his head. “Jarred would not like it.”
So they left Hopwood standing contentedly on call beside the door, and started slowly for the village.
“Tell me,” Scott exclaimed, “why did Hopwood wear that iron hat? I have been wondering about it ever since I came and he has always told me he would tell me later.”
“He wanted to make his family think he was crazy,” Sewall explained. “Did he fool you?”
“At first,” Scott admitted, “but not for long.”
Sewall laughed. “He has more brains than anybody else in the family. He was crazy for a while after Foster struck him that time, and he began wearing the iron hat for protection. He soon got all right, but he was shrewd enough to see that he could hear a lot more and go wherever he pleased if they thought he was crazy.
“Of course you know how crazy he is about Vic and Jarred. Well, he kept right on pretending to be crazy, and he did it so well that he fooled them all completely. All the time, he was working tooth and nail to help Jarred.”