"I'm here to investigate this burglary," interposed the detective.
"Investigate all you dern please!" exclaimed Tobias. "But don't you come here and try to trip me up, fur I'm purt' sure-footed. I've gone as far as I'm going to. That is, until I know more than I do now. That there book probably belongs to Mr. Ralph Endicott. That leetle gold knife may belong to him, too. Further than that I can't and won't say."
"They tell me down at the village that he's skipped out."
"I don't know nothing about that."
"Is that the house his folks live in—that second one up there on the bluff?"
"Yes."
"Well, I'll go up there and see what they know about him. I guess I'll learn something."
"I cal'late you will," rejoined Tobias, with scorn. "I cal'late that if you see Professor Henry Endicott and tell him his nephew is a bank burglar you—an' Arad Thompson, too—will l'arn more than you expect. I shouldn't wonder."
The detective tramped away across the sandflat. Tobias secured his bandana and mopped his heated brow.
"Oh, sugar!" he murmured. "I ain't got no business bein' all het up this a-way. Won't nothing come of it. I give it as my opinion that fellow is purt' near half a fool!"