rgit, an' when I
gets cryin' an' nervous he knows I've been thinkin' 'bout the
old trouble."

Louise was disappointed, but changed the subject adroitly.

"And Miss Mary, who was afterward Mrs. Wegg. Did you love her, Nora?"

"Indeed I did, child."

"What was she like?"

"She were gentle, an' sweet, an' the mos' beautiful creetur in
all--in--in the place where we lived. An' her fambily was that proud an'
aristocratic thet no one could tech 'em with a ten-foot pole."

"I see. Did she love Captain Wegg?"

"Nat'rally, sense she married of him, an' fit all her fambily to do it.
An' the Cap'n were thet proud o' her thet he thought the world lay in
her sweet eyes."

"Oh. I had an idea he didn't treat her well," remarked the girl,
soberly.

"That's wrong," declared Nora, promptly. "Arter the trouble come--fer it
come to the Weggs as well as to Tom an' me--the Cap'n sort o' lost heart
to see his Mary cry day arter day an' never be comforted. He were hard
hit himself, ye see, an' that made it a gloomy house, an' no mistake."

"Do you mean after you moved here, to the farm?"

"Yes, deary."

"I hear Captain Wegg was very fond of Ethel's grandfather," continued
Louise, trying to find an opening to penetrate old Nora's reserve.

"They was good friends always," was the brief reply.

"Did they ever quarrel, Nora?"

"Never that I knows of."

"And what do you suppose became of their money?" asked the girl.

"I don't know, child. Air we gettin' near home?"

"We are quite near, now. I wish you would open your heart to me, and
tell me about that great trouble, Nora. I might be able to comfort you
in some way."

The blind woman shook her head.

"There's no comfort but in forgettin'," she said; "an' the way to forgit
ain't to talk about it."

The unsatisfactory result of this conversation did not discourage
Louise, although she was sorry to meet with no better success. Gradually
she was learning the inside history of the Weggs. When she discovered
what that "great trouble" had been she would secure an important clue in
the mystery, she was sure. Nora might some time be induced to speak more
freely, and it was possible she might get the desired information from
Old Hucks. She would try, anyway.

A dozen theories might be constructed to account for this "great
trouble." The one that Louise finally favored was that Captain Wegg had
been guilty of some crime on the high seas in which his boatswain, Old
Hucks, was lik