“Never see such a hammerin’ since Alec Todd fit Mike Kane up to Kane’s Lake twenty year ago,” said Mel Lunt, extracting crushed cigars from his superior’s vest pockets. “But them two fit with feet an’ everything, an’ Ben here didn’t use nothin’ but his hands. I reckon they larn ye more’n joggofy where ye’ve been to school. Dang me if even his watch ain’t stopped!”
The deputy sheriff and the constable drove away fifteen minutes later, the deputy sheriff sagging heavily against his companion’s shoulder.
“Now they’ll maybe let us get along with the haying,” remarked McAllister.
“And perhaps he will get along with his own job of hunting for the man who shot Balenger, instead of wasting his time talking about that pirogue,” said Ben. “How would the pirogue help him? What did he mean by speaking of it as evidence?”
“Old Tim Hood’s put that crazy notion into his head, where there’s plenty of room for crazy notions,” replied the uncle. “Old Tim’s a trouble hunter and always was—a master hand at hunting trouble for other people. And he don’t like the O’Dells and never did. Yer gran’pa gave him a caning once, a regular dusting, for starving an old horse to death.”
“Do you think I’ll have to go to jail for fighting Brown?” asked Ben with ill-concealed anxiety. “It would be a blow to mother—but I don’t see what else I could do but fight him, after the things he said.”
“Now don’t you worry about that,” said McAllister, smiling. “Brown hasn’t much sense but he’s got a lot of vanity—and a little ordinary horse sense too, of course. He and Mel Lunt are busy this very minute making up as likely sounding a story as they can manage between them all about how he fell down on his face.”
Nothing more was seen or heard of the deputy sheriff at O’Dell’s Point. He evidently carried his investigations farther afield. No further inquiries were made concerning the fate of the big, red pirogue. Nothing more was heard of Louis Balenger or Richard Sherwood.
But more bread vanished from the pantry and again the red dogs failed to give the alarm. And the stolen books reappeared in their exact places on the library shelves.
The little girl was kept in ignorance of the suspicions against her absent father and also of the thefts of food and the mysterious borrowing of the books. The others discussed the situation frequently, but always after she had gone to bed. Ben was of the opinion that Richard Sherwood was in hiding somewhere within a few miles of the house and that it was he who had helped himself from the pantry and library. He held to this opinion in spite of the behavior of the dogs.