ver strike pay dirt in that
quarter. There never was, and never would be again, quite such a
paragon as Toby Farrell. It would be wasting time to try and bark up
this tree. The scent had evidently led him in the wrong quarter.

Accordingly, he turned toward the butcher's, and here he fully
anticipated getting on the track of something. Gabe lived in an
outlying quarter, and when he went home in the evening, or at noon, he
took a short-cut through Ramsey's woods, where there was a convenient
path.

Now it happened that Fred knew this fact, for he had many a time seen
the butcher's boy going and coming. Gabe had a big whistle, and used to
amuse himself as he walked to and from home in trying to get the airs
from the popular ragtime songs of the day.

Fred had heard it said that the boy who whistles is generally an honest
fellow, and that guilt and this disposition seldom, if ever, go hand in
hand. How much truth there was in this saying he did not know; but it
was on his mind now to try and find out.

Perhaps the fact that it was about ten minutes of twelve influenced
Fred in what he set out to do.

First he passed all the way through the strip of woods. It was not very
thickly grown, and there was really only a stretch of about one hundred
feet where he did not find himself in sight of some house or other.

Fred secreted himself about midway here. It was rather a gloomy spot,
considering that it happened to be so near a town. The trees grew
pretty thick all around the rambling path; and one big, old, giant oak
in particular caught Fred's attention, on account of the fact that it
seemed to be rapidly going into decay, being full of holes, where
perhaps squirrels, or it might be a raccoon, had a den.

Then he heard the whistle from the factory in town, immediately
followed by the ringing of the church bells. Noon had come, and if Gabe
carried out his regular programme he would soon be coming along the
trail.

Yes, that must be his whistle right now, turning off the latest air
that had caught his fancy. Fred wanted to see him at close quarters.
Perhaps he even had some faint idea of stepping out, and walking with
Gabe, to judge for himself whether the other had a guilty air or not.

But if such were his plans he soon found cause to change them. Gabe
came whistling along, looking behind him occasionally, and then all
around. Fred became deeply interested. He fancied that this must mean
something; and it did.

Su