inion declared on this occasion that the lost
man was the victim of foul play, and held one or both of the brothers
Meadowcroft responsible for his disappearance. Later in the day, the
reasonableness of this serious view of the case was confirmed in the
popular mind by a startling discovery. It was announced that a
Methodist preacher lately settled at Morwick, and greatly respected
throughout the district, had dreamed of John Jago in the character of a
murdered man, whose bones were hidden at Morwick Farm. Before night the
cry was general for a verification of the preacher's dream. Not only in
the immediate district, but in the town of Narrabee itself, the public
voice insisted on the necessity of a search for the mortal remains of
John Jago at Morwick Farm.

In the terrible turn which matters had now taken, Mr. Meadowcroft the
elder displayed a spirit and an energy for which I was not prepared.

"My sons have their faults," he said, "serious faults; and nobody knows
it better than I do. My sons have behaved badly and ungratefully toward
John Jago; I don't deny that, either. But Ambrose and Silas are not
murderers. Make your search! I ask for it; no, I insist on it, after
what has been said, in justice to my family and my name!"

The neighbors took him at his word. The Morwick section of the American
nation organized itself on the spot. The sovereign people met in
committee, made speeches, elected competent persons to represent the
public interests, and began the search the next day. The whole
proceeding, ridiculously informal from a legal point of view, was
carried on by these extraordinary people with as stern and strict a
sense of duty as if it had been sanctioned by the highest tribunal in
the land.

Naomi met the calamity that had fallen on the household as resolutely
as her uncle himself. The girl's courage rose with the call which was
made on it. Her one anxiety was for Ambrose.

"He ought to be here," she said to me. "The wretches in this
neighborhood are wicked enough to say that his absence is a confession
of his guilt."

She was right. In the present temper of the popular mind, the absence
of Ambrose was a suspicious circumstance in itself.

"We might telegraph to New York," I suggested, "if you only knew where
a message would be likely to find him."

"I know the hotel which the Meadowcrofts use at New York," she replied.
"I was sent there, after my father's death, to wait till Miss
Meadowcroft coul