"What hole?" asked the squire.
"Do you dare to say I didn't take you by the ear?" cried Bevy with threatening fingers lifted toward that aching member.
"The hole where Katy had her money," explained Edwin.
"It was stolen," cried Aunt Sally.
"I didn't!" protested Alvin again, his face green with fright. He blamed his own greediness for the discovery. On Sunday evening he had taken all Katy's hoard; why had he been so mad as to return to seek more?
"A mule is a mule," proclaimed Bevy Schnepp. "A Koehler is a Koehler. They steal; you cannot better them by education; they are all the time the same, they—"
"Be still, Bevy!" commanded the squire.
But Bevy would not be still. She gave another scream and began to dance up and down in her grasshopper-like fashion.
"Look at him, once! He says he didn't, does he? Look once what he has in his hand!"
At once all eyes turned with closer scrutiny upon Alvin. He still held in his hand the implement with which he had coaxed Katy's dollars and half-dollars from the depths of the putlock hole. It was only a bit of twisted wire, but it had done its work well.