“But they didn’t git my money,” said Mr. Stebbins. “They only tried to get it.”
“I wasn’t thinkin’ about you, neighbor,” was Uncle Ruben’s reply. “There’s been a heap of stealin’ an’ thievin’ goin’ on about the village, an’ if George is the one who done it, I say he had oughter suffer for it, if he is my nephew.”
“But I can’t search the house,” said the sheriff. “I have no warrant.”
“That’s your own fault,” rejoined Uncle Ruben. “I told you, when we was down to the village, to take out a s’arch warrant the very first thing.”
“And I didn’t do it, because I knew I shouldn’t find anything.”
“Never mind the warrant, Mr. Newton,” said George, whose face was red with indignation. “Come right in and go to work. But perhaps you had better let Uncle Ruben do it. He seems very anxious to prove me guilty of something.”
As he spoke, he threw open the door of the cabin and stood aside, so that the officer could enter; but the latter did not seem disposed to do anything of the kind.
CHAPTER XIII.
THE TABLES TURNED.
Uncle Ruben Edwards was so highly exasperated at his nephew, and so fully determined to punish him for his refusal to live with him as a bound boy, that he had thought of nothing else during the past week, and he could think of nothing else now; consequently, he did not notice the peculiar look with which the sheriff regarded him.
Mr. Newton knew very well why it was that George’s relative took so much interest in the boy’s affairs; he did not believe Mr. Stebbins’ story, except in so far as it was corroborated by Dick Langdon’s; and he had already made up his mind that he was wasting time there, and that he would return to the village and look elsewhere for the robbers; but he did not do it, for he was nearer to obtaining a clue than he thought he was.