ringing his chair down from its
tilted position and looking around upon the group in a bewildered way.

"Lester is right," said Ross, who had risen to his feet and stretched
out his hand. "My name is Ross Montgomery, and I want to thank you with
all my heart for what you did for my father. I've never had the chance
to do it before."

His voice was shaken with emotion at this meeting with the man who had
played so large a part in the tragedy of his family so many years
before.

Mark grasped the extended hand and shook it warmly.

"So it was your pa that I picked up that day," he said. "I hed a sort of
feelin' to-day that I had seen you somewheres, an' I s'pose it's because
you favored him some. You have the same kind of hair an' eyes, as near
as I kin rec'lect."

"Of course I was only a little chap when it all happened," said Ross,
"but I've often heard mother tell how kind you were to him after you
found him adrift."

"Oh, pshaw! that was nothin'," replied Mark deprecatingly, as he resumed
his seat. "I only did fur him what any man would do fur an' unfo'tunit
feller-man. He was nearly all gone when I come across him. The doc said
he would 'a' died ef he'd floated around a few hours longer."

"Do you remember anything he said to you while you were taking care of
him?" asked Lester.

"Oh, he said a heap o' things, jest like any man does when he is out of
his head," was the answer. "I didn't pay much attention like. I was too
busy holdin' him down when he got vi'lent, as he did pretty often the
first few days. After that he kind of settled down an' only kep'
a-mutterin' to himself."

"Yes, but didn't he say anything that would give you a hint of what had
happened to him and how he came to be adrift?" asked Fred.

Mark ruminated for a full minute, evidently doing his best to tax his
memory.

"I ain't got the best memory in the world," he said apologetically, "an'
I couldn't make out fur certain all he said. But I got the idee thet
there'd been a fight of some kind an' thet he'd lost a pile of money. He
kep' a talkin' of 'gold' an' some 'debts' he owed. Course I thought it
was only the ravin's of a crazy man an' I didn't take much stock in it."

"Wasn't there anything else?" prodded Fred.

"N-no," replied Mark hesitatingly, "nothin' thet I remember on. Oh,
yes," he went on, as a sudden flash of memory came to him, "I do
rec'lect he kep' sayin': 'It's where the water's comin' in.' But of
course there wasn't n