"It's only a theory, remember, and it doesn't hitch up in every detail," went on Hal, quite serious now. "But it is worth considering."
"Tell us!"
"Well, it isn't much of a story, so don't get your hopes up. But the fact is that when we emptied our basket I turned it upside down——"
"Because you were still hungry!" cut in Carl.
"Exactly! How well you read me. Yes, being still famished, I thought I'd see if some last morsel of food did not lurk under the papers. So I emptied out everything and what should I find scrawled in pencil across the bottom of the basket but the word 'Coulter.'"
"Coulter!" shouted the McGregors in disappointed accents.
"What has that to do with it?" Carl demanded.
"Why"—Hal looked crestfallen—"why, Mr. Coulter of Davis and Coulter is one of my bosses, isn't he?"
"Y-e-s, I suppose he is. But he isn't mine. The two baskets were exactly alike and must have come from the same person; and certainly Mr. Coulter wouldn't send us a basket. Oh, you'll have to guess again, Sherlock Holmes," concluded Carl with a shrug.
"Your father used to work for Mr. Coulter at the mill," Mrs. McGregor put in in a subdued voice.