"Besides, I've given them my word I'd shut up--they made me."

"Then how do you expect us to help?"

"So far as I can see, you can only report the matter to your bosses."

The constable felt inclined to agree with this. He asked for the names
of the ladies, and Beamish hesitated.

"I was too taken up with Mrs. Nelson to notice the rest, and the place
was rather dark. Anyway, about half of them were foolish girls with
notions; I don't want to drag them in."

"You blame somebody for setting them on?"

"I do," said Beamish, without a trace of rancor. "There's Mrs.
Nelson--everybody knows she's a crank--and Hardie, the Methodist
minister. They've been trying to make trouble for the hotels for quite
a while."

The constable made a note of this and presently called on Hardie, who
had just returned to town after visiting a sick farmer. The former
listened to what the minister had to say, but was not much impressed.
Beamish had cleverly made him his partizan.

After supper George and Grant called on Hardie and found him looking
distressed.

"I'm much afraid that the result of three or four months' earnest work