"Yes, something out of my pocket!" said her husband savagely. "You
wouldn't know if I told you, but it's an unrecorded deed and worth a
good deal of money. And I'll bet I know who took it--that measly
runaway, Bob Henderson! By gum, he carried the coat up to the house
for me from the barn the day before he lit out. That's where it's
gone. I see his game! He'll try to get money out of me. But I won't
pay him a cent. No sir, I'll go to Washington first and choke the
deed out of his dirty pocket."

"Did Bob go to Washington?" quavered Mrs. Peabody, her mind seizing
on this concrete fact, the one statement she could understand in her
husband's monologue. "How'd you find out, Joseph?"

"Not through Betty," returned Peabody grimly. "She's willing to take
the scoundrel's part against honest folks any time. Jim Turner told
me. Leastways he told me of some old duffer who runs a crazy shop
down there, and he thinks Bob's gone looking him up to find out about
his parents. Just let him try blackmailing me, and he'll learn a
thing or two."

Betty had kept still as long as she could.

"Bob is no thief!" she said bravely. "You ought to be ashamed to
say such a thing about him. I know he didn't take your old deed. What
earthly use would it be to him? Besides, Bob would never touch a
thing that wasn't his!"

"I don't believe he would take anything, Joseph," urged Mrs. Peabody
with perfectly amazing temerity. As a rule she took neither side in a