"Huh!" sneered the sparrowlike Ezra, "they couldn't very well take 'em away with them, could they?"
Tobias gave him no further heed. He was "studying."
"Mr. Compton," he said again, "I've noticed them winder bars. They are master thick."
"You are right, Tobias."
"Nobody could saw through one of them—not with a meat saw—in a short time. And I have read that them sort of saws is made out o' watch springs. Mighty flimsy they must be. 'Twouldn't be like cutting cheese with a dull knife."
"I believe you, Tobias."
"If Bill Purvis," went on the lightkeeper reflectively, "went for his lunch about 'leven, then them burglars couldn't have been sawin' on the bars much before midnight. Humph! Let's go 'round there and take a squint."
Tobias and the storekeeper, with Ezra Crouch tagging them, entered the lane between the bank building, which was built of cement blocks, and the post-office, which was a frame structure. The window in question overlooked a stableyard at the back.
"I give it as my opinion," said the lightkeeper, "that them burglars couldn't have worked here till after Bill was dead to the world in that shed yonder. Else he'd have seen 'em."
"You're right, Tobias."