"The big negro---he wanted something to eat, and then he got saucy
and he picked up your watch from the mantelpiece-----"

"My watch!" The miserly farmer sprang to the mantelpiece. "It's
gone, sure enough!" he groaned.

"I saw the negro!" cried Snap. "He jumped that fence out there
as we came up."

"That's right," put in Whopper. "He was running like a house
afire, too."

"Where did he go?"

Nobody knew, but some thought he might have taken to the road.
Finding his wife had not been harmed, only badly scared, Simon
Lundy ran out to the road and gazed up and down, and the boys
did the same.

"I don't see nuthin'," said Pop Lundy.

"Let us run down the road a bit, fellows," suggested Shep.

"Will ye come back?" asked the farmer, anxiously. "I---er---I
won't say nuthin' about them apples."

"Yes, we'll be back," answered Snap.

The boys spent the best part of an hour on the road, hunting up