"No, I believe he is guilty, for you say you were pretty sure of his voice, but it won't do to be too certain. As to the other man, who misled you when you met him in the lane, it is a hard thing to say who he is."
"Why, mother, I'm surer of him than I am of Bud, and I'm dead sure of him, you know."
"What are your reasons?"
Fred gave them as they are already known to the reader. The wise little woman listened attentively, and said when he had finished:
"I don't wonder that you think as you do, but you once was as sure, as I understand, of Mr. Kincade, the one who paid you the reward."
"That is so," assented Fred, "but I hadn't had so much time to think over the whole matter."
"Very probably you are right, for they are intimate, and they are staying in the neighborhood for no good. Tell me just what you heard them say last night, when they sat on the rock by the roadside. Be careful not to put in any words of your own, but give only precisely what you know were spoken by the two."
The boy did as requested, the mother now and then asking a question and keeping him down close to the task of telling only the plain, simple truth, concerning which there was so much of interest to both.
When he was through she said the words of the two showed that some wicked scheme was in contemplation, though nothing had been heard to indicate its precise nature.