Dobbinsville, a well-dressed stranger stepped from the platform of the
coach and made inquiry as to the location of a hotel. A lanky-looking
lad who leaned against a pole directed the stranger to the Dobbinsville
Inn, across the street. A person of this man's evident rank and
importance was not a familiar sight in the streets of Dobbinsville. His
mysterious presence set a peaceful town all agog. He became the subject
of much exaggerated conjecture. Every fellow was overly eager to tell
precisely what he did not know; namely, where this stranger came from
and what his business was. Uncle Hezekiah Evans, the sixty-year-old
newsboy who peddled the Post around over the village, said this stranger
was evidently a rich man from the East who had come to buy the whole
town out. "Fatty" Jones, whose chief employment was that of sitting on a
baggage truck at the depot, had the opinion that this stranger was the
son of a St. Louis millionaire who, having much time and money, had come
out to an up-to-date country to spend both. It was the candid opinion of
old "Doc" Greenwich that this stranger had committed a crime somewhere
and was lounging around in this secluded nook to evade the officers of
the law. "Dad" Brunt, the honored proprietor of the Dobbinsville Inn,
had an advantage over his fellows, as the stranger was staying with him.
He was sure that this man was interested in timberlands in the Mount
Olivet neighborhood, as he had known the man to make two trips out here
during his stay at the Inn.

The stranger spent a week in Dobbinsville, during which time he made
frequent calls at the People's State Bank. When he had gone, the
cashier, to the great relief and surprise of his fellow townsmen,
explained to them that he was an officer of the law whose business was
to investigate the circumstances connected with the burning of Deacon
Gramps' barn.