Kitabı oku: «Betty Gordon in the Land of Oil: or, The Farm That Was Worth a Fortune», sayfa 9

CHAPTER XXII
OFF FOR HELP

Betty’s heart thumped, but she managed to control her voice. She was now convinced that the sharpers had something to do with Bob’s disappearance.

Miss Hope was so beside herself with grief and fear that Betty thought, with the practical wisdom that was far beyond her years, that it would be better for her to occupy herself with searching than to remain in the house and let her imagination run riot.

Miss Charity came tremblingly out with a lantern, and after the milk was strained – for the habits of every day living hold even in times of trouble and distress – they set out, an old lady on either side of Betty, who had taken the lantern.

It was a weird performance, that tramp over the uneven fields with a flickering lantern throwing dim shadows before them and the bushes and trees assuming strange and terrifying shapes, fantastic beyond the power of clear daylight to make them. More than once Miss Charity started back in fright, and Miss Hope, who was stronger, shook so with nervousness that she found it difficult to walk. Betty, too, was much overwrought, and it is probable that if either a jack rabbit or a white owl had crossed the path of the three there would have been instant flight. However, they saw nothing more alarming than their own shadows and a few harmless little insects that the glow of the lantern attracted.

“Suppose the poor, dear boy is lying somewhere with a broken leg!” Miss Hope kept repeating. “How would we get a doctor for him? Could we get him back to the house?”

“Think how selfish we were to sit down and eat supper – we ought to have known something was wrong with him,” grieved Miss Charity. “I’d rather have lost both cows than have anything happen to Bob.”

Betty could not share their fear that Bob was injured. The memory of that one bar down haunted her, though she could give no explanation. Then the cow had come back. Betty had positive proof that the animal had not wandered to the half of the farm she had explored, and Bob’s section had been nearer the house. Why had Daisy stayed away till almost dark, when milking time was at half past five? And the cow had been milked! Betty forebore to call the aunts’ attention to this, and they were too engrossed in their own conjectures to have noticed the fact.

“Well, he isn’t on the farm.” Miss Hope made this reluctant admission after they had visited every nook and cranny. “What can have become of him?”

Miss Charity was almost in a state of collapse, and her sister and Betty both saw that she must be taken home. It was hard work, going back without Bob, and once in the kitchen, Miss Charity was hysterical, clinging to her sister and sobbing that first Faith had died and now her boy was missing.

“But we’ll find him, dear,” urged Miss Hope. “He can’t be lost. A strong boy of fourteen can’t be lost; can he, Betty?”

“Of course we’ll find him,” asserted Betty stoutly. “I’m going to ride to the Watterbys in the morning and telephone to Uncle Dick. He will know what to do. You won’t mind staying alone for a couple of hours, will you?”

“Not in the daytime,” quavered Miss Charity. “But my, I’m glad you’re here to-night, Betty. Sister and I never used to be afraid, but you and Bob have spoiled us. We don’t like to stay alone.”

Betty slept very little that night. Aside from missing Bob’s protection – and how much she had relied on him to take care of them she did not realize until she missed him – there were the demands made on her by the old ladies, who both suffered from bad dreams. During much of the night Betty’s active mind insisted on going over and over the most trivial points of the day. Always she came back to the two mysteries that she could not discuss with the aunts: Who had put the single bar down, and who had milked the cow?

Breakfast was a sorry pretense the next morning, and Betty was glad to hurry out to the barn and feed and water the stock and milk the two cows. It was hard and heavy work and she was not skilled at it, and so took twice as long a time as Bob usually did. Then, when she had saddled Clover and changed to her riding habit, she sighted the mail car down the road and waited to see if the carrier had brought her any later news of her uncle. The Watterbys promptly sent her any letters that came addressed to her there.

There was no news, but the delay was fifteen minutes or so, and when Betty finally started for the Watterbys it was after nine o’clock. She had no definite plan beyond telephoning to her uncle and imploring him to come and help them hunt for Bob.

“Where could he be?” mourned poor Miss Hope, with maddening persistency. “We looked all over the farm, and yet where could he be? If he went to any of the neighbors to inquire, and was taken sick, he’d send us word. I don’t see where he can be!”

Betty hurried Clover along, half-dreading another encounter with the men who had stopped her. She passed the place where she had been stopped, and a bit further on met Doctor Morrison on his way to a case, his car raising an enormous cloud of dust in the roadway. He pulled out to allow her room, recognized her, and waved a friendly hand as he raced by. By this token Betty knew he was in haste, for he always stopped to talk to her and ask after the Saunders sisters.

The Watterby place, when she reached it, seemed deserted. The hospitable front door was closed, and the shining array of milk pans on the back porch was the only evidence that some one had been at work that morning. No Grandma Watterby came smiling down to the gate, no busy Mrs. Will Watterby came to the window with her sleeves rolled high.

“Well, for pity’s sake!” gasped Betty, completely astounded. “I never knew them to go off anywhere all at once. Never! Mrs. Watterby is always so busy. I wonder if anything has happened.”

“Hello! Hello!” A shout from the roadway made her turn. “You looking for Mr. Watterby?”

“I’m looking for any one of them,” explained Betty, smiling at the tow-haired boy who stood grinning at her. “Are they all away?”

“Yep. They’re out riding in an automobile,” announced the boy importantly. “Grandma Watterby’s great-nephew, up to Tippewa, died and left her two thousand dollars. And she says she always wanted a car, and now she’s going to have one. A different agent has been here trying to sell her one every week. They took me last time.”

In spite of her anxiety, Betty laughed at the picture she had of the hard-working family leaving their cares and toil to go riding about the country in a demonstrator’s car. She hoped that Grandma would find a car to her liking, one whose springs would be kind to her rheumatic bones, and that there would be enough left of the little legacy to buy the valiant old lady some of the small luxuries she liked.

“Ki’s home,” volunteered the boy. “He’s working ’way out in the cornfield. Want to see him? I’ll call him for you.”

“No thanks,” said Betty, uncertain what to do next. “I don’t suppose there’s a telephone at your house, is there?” she asked, smiling.

The urchin shook his head quickly.

“No, we ain’t got one,” he replied. “Was you wanting to use Mis’ Watterby’s? It’s out of order. Been no good for two days. My ma had to go to Flame City yesterday to telephone my dad.”

“I’ll have to go to Flame City, too, I think,” decided Betty. “I hope you’ll take the next automobile ride,” she added, mounting Clover.

“Gee, Grandma Watterby says if they buy a car I can have all the rides I want,” grinned the towhead engagingly. “You bet I hope they buy!”

All her worry about Bob shut down on Betty again as she urged the horse toward the town. Suppose Uncle Dick were not within reach of the telephone! Suppose he were off on a long inspection trip!

Flame City had not improved, and though Betty could count her visits to it on the fingers of one hand, she thought it looked more unattractive than ever. The streets were dusty and not over clean, and were blocked with trucks and mule teams on their way to the fields with supplies. Here and there a slatternly woman idled at the door of a shop, but for the most part men stood about in groups or waited for trade in the dirty, dark little shops.

“I wonder where the best place to telephone is,” said Betty to herself, shrinking from pushing her way through any of the crowds that seemed to surround every doorway. “I’ll ask them in the post-office.”

The post-office was a yellow-painted building that leaned for support against a blue cigar store. Like the majority of shacks in the town, it boasted of only one story, and a long counter, whittled with the initials of those who had waited for their mail, was its chief adornment.

Betty hitched Clover outside and entered the door to find the postmaster rapidly thumbing over a bunch of letters while a tall man in a pepper-and-salt suit waited, his back to the room.

“Can you tell me where to find a public telephone?” asked Betty, and at the sound of her voice, the man turned.

“Betty!” he ejaculated. “My dear child, how glad I am to see you!”

Mr. Gordon took the package of mail the postmaster handed him and thrust it into his coat pocket.

“The old car is outside,” he assured his niece. “Let’s go out and begin to get acquainted again.”

Betty, beyond a radiant smile and a furtive hug, had said nothing, and when Mr. Gordon saw her in the sunlight he scrutinized her sharply.

“Everything all right, Betty?” he demanded, keeping his voice low so that the loungers should not overhear. “I’d rather you didn’t come over to town like this. And where is Bob?”

“Oh, Uncle Dick!” The words came with a rush. “That’s why I’m here. Bob has disappeared! We can’t find him anywhere, and I’m afraid those awful men have carried him off.”

Mr. Gordon stared at her in astonishment. In a few words she managed to outline for him her fears and what had taken place the day before. Mr. Gordon had made up his mind as she talked.

“We’ll leave Clover at the hotel stable. It won’t kill her for a few hours,” he observed. “You and I can make better time in the car, rickety as it is. Hop in, Betty, for we’re going to find Bob. Not a doubt of it. It’s all over but the shouting.”

CHAPTER XXIII
SELLING THE FARM

“Don’t you think those sharpers carried off Bob?” urged Betty, bracing herself as the car dipped into a rut and out again.

“Every indication of it,” agreed her uncle, swerving sharply to avoid a delivery car.

“But where could they have taken him?” speculated Betty, clinging to the rim of the side door. “How will you know where to look?”

“I think he is right on the farm,” answered Mr. Gordon. “In fact, I shall be very much surprised if we have to go off the place to discover him. I’m heading for the farm on that supposition.”

“But, Uncle Dick,” Betty raised her voice, for the much-abused car could not run silently, “I can’t see why they would carry Bob off, anyway. Of course I know they don’t like him, and I do believe they recognized him as the boy who sat behind them on the train, though Bob laughs and says he isn’t so handsome that people remember his face; but I don’t understand what good it would do them to kidnap him. The aunts are too poor to pay any money for him, that’s certain.”

“Well, now, Betty, I’m rather surprised at you,” Mr. Gordon teased her. “For a bright girl, you seem to have been slow on this point. What do these sharpers want of the aunts, anyway?”

“The farm,” answered Betty promptly. “They know there is oil there and they want to buy it for almost nothing and make their fortunes.”

“At the expense of two innocent old ladies,” added Mr. Gordon.

“But, Uncle Dick, Bob doesn’t own the farm. Only his mother’s share. And the aunts would be his guardians, he says, so his consent isn’t necessary for a sale. You see, I do know a lot about business.” And Betty glanced triumphantly at her uncle.

He smiled good-humoredly, and let the car out another notch.

“Has it ever occurred to you, my dear,” he said casually, “that, if Bob were out of the way, the aunts might be persuaded to sell their farm for an absurdly small sum? A convincing talker might make any argument seem plausible, and neither Miss Hope nor Miss Charity are business women. They are utterly unversed in business methods or terms, and are the type of women who obediently sign any paper without reading it. I intend to see that you grow up with a knowledge of legal terms and forms that will at least protect you when you’re placed in the position the Saunders women are.”

“Miss Hope said once her father attended to everything for them,” mused Betty, “and I suppose when he died they just had to guess. Oh!” a sudden light seemed to break over her. “Oh, Uncle Dick! do you suppose those men may be there now trying to get them to sell the farm?”

“Of course I don’t know that they were on the place when you left,” said her uncle. “But allowing them half an hour to reach there, I am reasonably certain that they are sitting in the parlor this minute, talking to the aunts. I only hope they haven’t an agreement with them, or, if they have, that the pen and ink is where Miss Hope can’t put her hands on it.”

“Do you think there really is oil there?” asked Betty hurriedly, for another turn would bring them in sight of the farm. “Can you tell for sure, Uncle Dick?”

Mr. Gordon regarded her whimsically.

“Oil wells are seldom ‘sure,’” he replied cautiously. “But if I had my doubts, they’d be clinched by what you tell me of these men. No Easterner with a delicate daughter was ever so anxious to buy a run-down place – not with a whole county to chose from. Also, as far as I can tell, judging from the location, which is all I’ve had to go by, I should say we were safe in saying there is oil sand there. In fact, I’ve already taken it up with the company, Betty, and they’re inclined to think this whole section may be a find.”

Betty hardly waited for the automobile to stop before she was out and up the front steps of the farmhouse, Mr. Gordon close behind her.

“I hear voices in the parlor,” whispered Betty, “Oh, hurry!”

“All cash, you see,” a voice that Betty recognized as Blosser’s was saying persuasively. “Nothing to wait for, absolutely no delay.”

Mr. Gordon put a restraining hand on Betty’s arm, and motioned to her to keep still.

“But my sister and I should like to talk it over, for a day or so,” quavered Miss Hope. “We’re upset because our nephew is missing, as we have explained, and I don’t think we should decide hastily.”

“I don’t like to hurry you,” struck in another voice, Fluss’s, Betty was sure, “but I tell you frankly, Madam, a cash offer doesn’t require consideration. All you have to do, you and your sister, is to sign this paper, and we’ll count the money right into your hand. Could anything be fairer?”

“It’s a big offer, too,” said Blosser. “A run-down place like this isn’t attractive, and you’re likely to go years before you get another bid. Our client wants to get his daughter out into this air, and he has money to spend fixing up. I tell you what we’ll do – we’ll pay this year’s taxes – include them in the sale price. Why, ladies, you’ll have a thousand dollars in cash!”

Betty could picture Miss Hope’s eyes at the thought of a thousand dollars.

“Well, Sister, perhaps we had better take it,” suggested Miss Charity timidly. “We can do sewing or something like that, and that money will put Bob through school.”

“Come on, here’s where we put a spoke in the wheel,” whispered Mr. Gordon, beckoning Betty to follow him and striding down the hall.

“Why, Betty!” Miss Hope rose hastily and kissed her. “Sister and I had begun to worry about you.”

“This is my uncle, Mr. Gordon, Miss Hope,” said Betty. “I found him in Flame City. Has Bob come back?”

Miss Hope, much flustered by the presence of another stranger, said that Bob had not returned, and presented Mr. Gordon to her sister.

“These gentlemen, Mr. Snead and Mr. Elmer,” – she consulted the cards in her hand – “have called to see us about selling our farm.”

Mr. Gordon nodded curtly to the pair whose faces were as black as a thunder-cloud at the interruption.

“I’m sure Mr. Gordon will excuse us if we go on with the business,” said Blosser smoothly. “You have a dining-room, perhaps, or some other room where we could finish this matter quietly?”

Miss Hope glanced about her helplessly. Betty noticed that there was pen and ink and a package of bills of large denomination on the table. Evidently they had reached the farm just in time.

“Why, it happens that I’m interested in a way in your farm, if it is for sale,” announced Mr. Gordon leisurely.

He selected a comfortable chair, and leaned back in it with the air of a man who is not to be hurried. A look of relief came into Miss Hope’s face, and her nervous tension perceptibly relaxed.

“This farm is sold,” declared Blosser truculently. “My partner and I have bought it for a client of ours.”

“Any signatures passed?” said Mr. Gordon lazily.

“Miss Hope will sign right here,” said Blosser, hastily unfolding a sheet of foolscap. “She was about to do so when you came in.”

Miss Hope automatically took up the pen.

“Have you read that agreement?” demanded Mr. Gordon sharply. “Do you know what you are signing? I’d like to know the purchase price. I’m representing Bob’s interest.”

“Oh, Bob!” Miss Hope and Miss Charity both turned from the paper toward the speaker. “We think the money will put Bob through school – a whole thousand dollars, Mr. Gordon, and the taxes paid. We can’t run the farm any longer. We can’t afford to hire help.”

“No farm is sold without a little more trouble than this,” announced Mr. Gordon pleasantly. “You don’t mind If I ask you a few questions?”

“We’re in a hurry,” broke in Fluss. “Sign this, ladies, and my partner and I will pay you the cash and get on to the next town. You can answer this gentleman’s questions after we’re gone.”

“I suppose there is a mortgage?” asked Mr. Gordon, ignoring Fluss altogether.

“Five hundred dollars,” answered Miss Hope. “We had to give a mortgage to get along after Father died.”

“So they’ve offered you fifteen hundred dollars for an oil farm,” said Mr. Gordon contemptuously. “Well, don’t take it.”

“Bob said there was oil here!” cried Miss Charity.

“That’s a lie!” snarled Blosser furiously. “You’re out of the oil section by a good many miles. Are you going to turn down a cash offer for this forsaken dump, simply because a stranger happens along and tells you there may be oil on it? Bah!”

“Keep your temper,” counseled Fluss in a low tone. “Well, rather than see two ladies lose a sale,” he said with forced cheerfulness, “we will make you an offer of three thousand dollars. Money talks louder than fair words.”

“I’ll give you five thousand, cash,” Mr. Gordon spoke quietly, but Betty bounced about on the sofa in delight.

Fluss leaped to his feet and brought his fist smashing down on the table.

“Six thousand!” he cried fiercely. “We’re buying this farm. We’ll give you six thousand dollars, ladies.”

“Seven thousand,” said Mr. Gordon conversationally. He did not shift his position, but his keen eyes followed every movement of the rascally pair. He said afterward that he was afraid of gun play.

“Oh – oh, my goodness!” stammered Miss Hope. “I can’t seem to think.”

“You don’t have to, Madam,” Fluss assured her, his immaculate gray tie under one ear and his clothing rumpled from the heat and excitement. “Sell us your farm. We’ll give you ten thousand dollars. That’s the last word. Ten thousand for this mud hole. Here’s a pen – sign this!”

“Drop that pen!” thundered Mr. Gordon, and Miss Hope let it fall as though it had burned her fingers. “I’ll give you fifteen thousand dollars,” he said more gently.

Fluss looked at Blosser who nodded.

“Seventeen thousand,” he shrieked, as though the sisters were deaf. “Seventeen I tell you, seventeen thousand!”

“Twenty,” said Mr. Gordon cheerfully.

Miss Charity suddenly found her voice.

“I think we’d better sell to Mr. Gordon,” she announced quietly.

CHAPTER XXIV
UNCLE DICK’S BUYER

Miss Hope, who had been wringing her hands, bewildered and hopelessly at sea, hailed this concrete suggestion with visible relief.

“All right, Sister, I think so, too,” she agreed, glad for once not to have to make the decision. “You’re sure you are not cheating yourself, Mr. Gordon, by paying us twenty thousand dollars?”

Mr. Gordon, who had strolled over to the door leading into the hall, assured her that he was well-satisfied with his bargain.

“Well, we’ll be going,” muttered Blosser. “All this comes from trying to do business with women. You had as good as passed us your word that you’d sell to us, and see what’s happened. However, women don’t know nothing about ethics. Come on, Fluss.”

He was too disappointed and angry to notice the slip of his tongue, but Fluss flushed a brick red.

“Just one minute,” said Mr. Richard Gordon, blocking the doorway. “You don’t leave this place until you promise to produce that boy.”

Blosser feigned ignorance, but the attempt deceived no one.

“What boy?” he blustered. “You seem bent on stirring up trouble, Stranger.”

“You know very well what boy,” retorted Mr. Gordon evenly. “You’ll stir up something more than mere trouble if he isn’t brought here within a few minutes, or information given where we may find him. Where is Bob Henderson?”

“Here, sir!” a blithe voice announced, and the door leading into a communicating room was jerked open.

Bob, his clothing a bit the worse for wear, but apparently sound and whole, stood there, brandishing a stout club.

“Oh, Bob!” Betty’s cry quite drowned the exclamation of the aunts, but Bob had no eye for any one but Blosser and Fluss, who were making a wild attempt to get past Mr. Gordon.

“Have they bought the farm?” demanded the boy excitedly. “Did they get my aunts to sign anything for them?”

“I’m your new landlord, Bob,” announced Mr. Gordon, patting himself on the chest. “Don’t think you can put me off when the rent comes due.”

“So that’s all right,” said Bob, with manifest relief. “As for those two scamps, who nearly choked me, well, let me get at them once.”

Whirling his club he charged upon the pair who squealed in terror and tore past Mr. Gordon, down the hall and out into the yard, Bob in pursuit. Miss Hope and Miss Charity ran to the windows, and Betty and her uncle watched from the porch (Betty was going to follow Bob as a matter of course, but Mr. Gordon held her back) as the boy continued the chase. Fluss and Blosser presented a ludicrous sight as they ran heavily, their coats flapping in the wind and their hats jammed low over their eyes. Bob did not try to catch up with them, but contented himself with shouting loudly and swishing his heavy club through the air, while he kept just close enough to their heels to warn them that it was not safe to slacken speed. In a few minutes the watchers saw him coming back, walking, a broad grin on his face.

“Good little Marathon, wasn’t it?” he called from the road. “Did you hear me yelling like an Indian? I chased them as far as the boundary line, and when I saw them they were still running. Gee, Mr. Gordon, I mean Uncle Dick, you got back from the oil fields just in time.”

He came up on the steps and shook hands with Mr. Gordon, and submitted to a hug from each aunt.

“Have you really bought the farm?” he asked curiously. “Or was that just a blind?”

Miss Hope and Miss Charity looked anxiously at Mr. Gordon. They had planned exactly what to do with that twenty thousand dollars.

“We haven’t signed an agreement,” admitted the successful bidder, “but the farm is sold, all right. I’ll give this check to Miss Hope now – ” he hastily filled out a blank slip from his book – “as an evidence of good faith. Then I want to hear Bob’s tale, and then I must do a bit of telephoning. And to-morrow morning, good people, I promise you the surprise of your lives.”

Miss Hope glanced at the check he gave her, gasped, and opened her mouth to speak.

“Sh!” warned Mr. Gordon. “Dear lady, I’ve set my heart on staging a little climax; don’t spoil it. To-morrow morning at eleven o’clock we’ll have all the explanations. Now, Bob, what happened to you? I hear you nearly frightened your aunts into hysterics, to say nothing of Betty, whom I found tearing around Flame City hunting for a telephone.”

Bob was in a fever of curiosity to know about the farm, whether Mr. Gordon thought there was a good prospect of oil or not, but Uncle Dick was not the kind of man to have his decisions debated. Bob wisely concluded to wait with what patience he could until the proper time. He turned to Betty.

“You know when we separated to hunt for Daisy?” he said. “Well, I went through the first field all right, but when I was passing those two old apple trees that have grown together, Fluss and Blosser jumped out and one of ’em threw a coat over my head so I couldn’t shout. They downed me, and then Fluss stuffed his handkerchief in my mouth while Blosser tied my hands and feet. Daisy was behind the tree. I figured out they had come and got her, and I was mighty glad we had agreed to separate. I don’t doubt they would have bound and gagged you, too, Betty, if you had been with me. They wouldn’t stop at anything.

“They carried me to the barn loft – ” Betty jumped a little. “Yes, I was up there when you were milking. Awfully hot up there in the hay it was, too. They were hiding near us when we planned to drop the bar as a signal, and I heard them laughing over that trick half the night. They slept up there with me – I was nearly dead for a drink of water – and once during the night Fluss did go down to the pump and bring me a drink, standing over me with that big club in case I should cry out when they took out the gag.

“This morning they watched and saw you ride off on Clover. They were in a panic for fear you would come back with some one before they could persuade the aunts to sell. I wish you could have seen them brushing each other off and shining their shoes on a horse blanket. They wanted to look stylish and as though they had just come from town instead of sleeping in a hayloft all night.”

“They said they had stayed in Flame City over night,” said Miss Hope indignantly. “The idea!”

“They had several,” grinned Bob. “I certainly put in an anxious hour up there after they had gone down the ladder. You see, I didn’t know Betty was going for Uncle Dick, and I didn’t know that any one else would say there was oil on the place. Fluss had a roll of bills as big as your arm, and I pictured him flashing that and Aunt Hope so anxious to send me to school that she wouldn’t leave a margin for herself and Aunt Charity to live on. If I had known that Uncle Dick was coming, I’d have saved myself a heap of worry.”

“If I had had to telephone to him, it would have been too late,” said Betty. “I just happened to find him in the post-office; didn’t I, Uncle Dick?”

“I’d just got back from the fields and was after mail,” Mr. Gordon explained. “I meant to stop and get directions from the Watterbys how to find the Saunders farm. Well, as it happened, everything was planned for the best.”

“How did you get down from the loft, Bob?” Betty asked curiously.

“Cut the string that tied my wrists on a rusty scythe I found as I was crawling over the floor,” said Bob. “Then, of course, I could pull out that nasty gag and untie my feet. I was a bit stiff at first, and I guess I fell down the hayloft ladder, but I was in such a hurry I’m not sure. The sharpers had left their club, and I brought that along for good luck. And, Aunt Hope, I’m starving to death!”

“Bless your heart, of course you are!” And Miss Hope hurried out to the kitchen, tucking Mr. Gordon’s check into her apron pocket as she went. “I’ll stir up some waffles, I think,” she murmured, reaching for the egg bowl.

Mr. Gordon would not stay for dinner, for he was anxious, he said, to get to a telephone. He would spend the night with the Watterbys and be back the next morning with “an important some one.”

“I’m so excited I can’t walk straight,” declared Betty, skipping between table and stove in an effort to help Aunt Hope with the dinner. “Goodness, it seems forever till to-morrow morning!”

Miss Hope and Miss Charity went about the rest of the day in a daze, and Bob and Betty, who could not settle down to any task, went out to the barn and enacted the scene of Bob’s imprisonment all over again.

They were up at daybreak the next morning, and Miss Hope insisted on dusting and sweeping the whole house, though, as Bob said, it was hardly likely that their visitors would insist on seeing the attic.

“It isn’t the house Mr. Gordon is interested in,” the boy maintained sagaciously. “There’s oil here, Aunt Hope,” and this time Miss Hope did not contradict him.

At ten minutes to eleven Mr. Gordon drove up with a small, sandy-haired man who wore large horn-rimmed spectacles. He was introduced to Miss Hope and her sister as Mr. Lindley Vernet, and then the four went into the parlor and closed the door.

“Children not wanted,” said Mr. Gordon, grinning over his shoulder at Bob and Betty, left sitting on the porch.

“Children!” snorted Betty, shaking an indignant fist in pretended anger. “If it hadn’t been for us, or rather for you, Bob, this farm would have been sold for next to nothing.”

“If it hadn’t been for you, you mean,” retorted Bob. “Who was it went and brought back Uncle Dick? I might have shouted myself hoarse, but those rascals would have beaten me somehow. Do you suppose this Mr. Vernet is going to buy the place?”

“I think he is the head of Uncle Dick’s firm,” said Betty cautiously. “At least I’ve heard him speak of a Lindley Vernet. But I thought Uncle Dick offered a lot of money, didn’t you, Bob? How many acres are there?”

“Ninety,” announced Bob briefly. “What’s that? The door opened, so they must be through. No, it’s only Aunt Charity.”

But such a transformed Miss Charity! Her gentle dark eyes were shining, her cheeks were faintly pink, and she smiled at Betty and Bob as though something wonderful had happened.

“I came out to tell you,” she said mysteriously, sitting down on the top step between them and putting an arm around each. “The farm is sold, my darlings. Can you guess for how much?”