prepared over two oil stoves. Mr. Page made
an effort to eat, but was not highly successful.

The hours dragged on, but none thought of going to bed. At last
quick steps were heard outside.

"That must be Colquitt and Hibbert!" cried Mr. Page, starting
up, trembling, though he soon recovered his self-control.

"Don't go out in the rain. Wait for another moment, sir," begged
Dick, placing a hand on the man's shoulder.

"Do you think I could wait another minute?" demanded Mr. Page
excitedly. Then he darted out into the downpour.

"Hibbert, is that you?" he screamed.

CHAPTER XIX

SEEN IN A NEW, WORSE LIGHT

"It's Hibbert," was the reply from the darkness.

Then two figures came tramping through the rain, over the soggy
ground, next splashing into the tent, the flaps of which Dick
and Harry held aside.

As they came in Mr. Page almost tottered toward them.

"Well," he demanded impatiently. "What did you learn?"

"I guess the boy is yours, Mr. Page," Colquitt answered. "Bill
Mosher told us a pretty straight story. He found the child at
the railway wreck, and he and his wife took it home, expecting
that parents or friends would soon claim it. Bill says his wife
was a good woman, and, when no one claimed the boy, she kept it
and loved it as her own. Bill admits that his part in the transaction
was due to the hope of receiving a reward. After his wife died,
Bill, it seems, went to the dogs, followed his naturally shiftless
bent, and, from a common vagrant, became a drunkard and common
thief. Yet Bill claims, with an air of a good deal of virtue,
that he never stole anything he didn't really need, and that he
brought Tag up the same way."

Mr. Page, white-faced and trembling, listened to the detective's
dry recital.

"You have taken pains to find further verification of the fact
that this unhappy boy is my son, haven't you?"

"Oh, yes," the detective went on. "Bill described with great
minuteness the clothing the child wore when found, even to the
embroidered letter 'p' on the underclothing. And Bill tells me
that his sister has kept that clothing ever since, in the hope
that something might come of it. The sister also has two pictures
of Tag, taken when a baby."

"Where does that sister live?" cried the father. "Take me to
her home at once!"

"She lives in another state, some four hundred miles from here,"
smiled Tom Colquitt. "Mr. Page, I advise that you find the boy,
first.