“Then I will,” said the cooper. “I have sometimes doubted,” he continued, lowering his voice, “whether Ida's mother really sent for her.”
“And the letter?” queried Mrs. Crump, looking less surprised than he supposed she would.
“I thought—mind it is only a guess on my part—that Mrs. Hardwick might have got somebody to write it for her.”
“It is very singular,” murmured Mrs. Crump, in a tone of abstraction.
“What is singular?”
“Why, the very same thought occurred to me. Somehow, I couldn't help feeling a little suspicious of Mrs. Hardwick, though perhaps unjustly. But what object could she have in obtaining possession of Ida?”
“That I cannot conjecture; but I have come to one determination.”
“And what is that?”
“Unless we learn something of Ida within a week from the time she left here, I shall go on to Philadelphia, or send Jack, and endeavor to get track of her.”