lips leaned forward and laid a hand on the older man's shoulder.

"Jed," he said gently, "I know why you're not hungry. Oh, Jed,
what in the world made you do it?"

Jed started back so violently that his chair almost upset. He
raised a hand with the gesture of one warding off a blow.

"Do?" he gasped. "Do what?"

"Why, what you did about that money that Captain Hunniwell lost.
What made you do it, Jed?"

Jed's eyes closed momentarily. Then he opened them and, without
looking at his visitor, rose slowly to his feet.

"So Sam told you," he said, with a sigh. "I--I didn't hardly think
he'd do that. . . . Course 'twas all right for him to tell," he
added hastily. "I didn't ask him not to, but--but, he and I havin'
been--er--chums, as you might say, for so long, I--I sort of
thought. . . . Well, it don't make any difference, I guess. Did
he tell your--your sister? Did he tell her how I--how I stole the
money?"

Charles shook his head.

"No," he said quietly. "No, he didn't tell either of us that. He
told us that you had tried to make him believe you took the money,
but that he knew you were not telling the truth. He knew you
didn't take it."

"Eh? Now . . . now, Charlie, that ain't so." Jed was even more
disturbed and distressed than before. "I--I told Sam I took it
and--and kept it. I TOLD him I did. What more does he want?
What's he goin' around tellin' folks I didn't for? What--"

"Hush, Jed! He knows you didn't take it. He knew it all the time
you were telling him you did. In fact he came into your shop this
afternoon to tell you that the Sage man over at Wapatomac had found
the four hundred dollars on the table in his sitting-room just
where the captain left it. Sage had just 'phoned him that very
thing. He would have told you that, but you didn't give him the
chance. Jed, I--"

But Jed interrupted. His expression as he listened had been
changing like the sky on a windy day in April.

"Here, here!" he cried wildly. "What--what kind of talk's that?
Do--do you mean to tell me that Sam Hunniwell never lost that money
at all? That all he did was leave it over at Wapatomac?"

"Yes, that's just what I mean."

"Then--then all the time when I was--was givin' him the--the other
money and tellin' him how I found it and--and all--he knew--"

"Certainly he knew. I've just told you that he knew."

Jed sat heavily down in the chair once more. He passed his hand
slowly across his chi