"What have you got to sell?"

"Nuth'n, jest now. But ef ye'll buy I kin git 'most anything."

"Don't go to any trouble on our account, sir; we are quite content with
our splendid farm."

"Shoo! Thet ain't no good."

"Captain Wegg thought it was," answered Louise, quickly seizing this
opening. "Otherwise he would not have built so good a house upon it."

"The Cap'n were plumb crazy," declared the agent, emphatically. "He
didn't want ter farm when he come here; he jest wanted to hide."

The girls exchanged quick glances of intelligence.

"Why?"

"Why?" repeated McNutt. "Thet's a thing what's puzzled us fer years,
miss. Some thinks Wegg were a piret; some thinks he kidnaped thet pretty
wife o' his'n an' took her money; some thinks he tried to rob ol' Will
Thompson, an' Will killed him an' then went crazy hisself. There's all
sorts o' thinks goin' 'round; but who _knows_?"

"Don't you, Mr. McNutt?"

The agent was flattered by the question. As he had said, the Weggs had
formed the chief topic of conversation in Millville for years, and no