had set her heart on having Ham and
Miranda's house "ready for them" on their return; and now Ham seemed to
be so pleased about it, she actually began to cry. She said, too,--

"I'm so sorry about the barn!"

Ham only laughed, in his quiet way, as he kissed his portly
mother-in-law, and said,--

"Come, come, mother Kinzer, you didn't set it afire. Can't Miranda and I
have some supper? Dab must be hungry, too, after all that
roof-sweeping."

There had been a sharp strain on the nerves of all of them that day and
evening; and they were glad enough to gather around the tea-table, while
all that was now left of the old barn smouldered peaceably away with
half the boys in the village on guard.

Once or twice Ham or Dab went out to see that all was dying out rightly;
but it was plain that all the danger was over, unless a high wind should
come to scatter the cinders.

By this time the whole village had heard of Dab's adventure with the
tramp, and had at once connected the latter with the fire. There were
those, indeed, who expressed a savage wish to connect him with it
bodily; and it was well for him that he had done his running away
promptly, and had hidden himself with care, for men were out after him
in all directions, on foot and on horseback. Who would have dreamed of
so dirty a vagabond "taking to the water"?

"He's a splendid fellow, anyway!"

Odd, was it not? but Annie Foster and Jenny Walters were half a mile
apart when they both said that very thing, just before the clock in the
village church hammered out the news that it was ten, and bedtime. They
were not either of them speaking of the tramp.

It was long after that, however, before the lights were out in all the
rooms of the Morris mansion.

CHAPTER XVII.

DAB HAS A WAKING DREAM, AND HAM GETS A SNIFF OF SEA-AIR.

Sleep? One of the most excellent things in all the world, and very few
people get too much of it nowadays.

As for Dabney Kinzer, he had done his sleeping as regularly and
faithfully as even his eating, up to the very night after Ham Morris
came home to find the old barn afire. There had been a few, a very few,
exceptions. There were the nights when he was expecting to go
duck-shooting before daylight, and waked up at midnight with a strong
conviction that he was late about starting. There were, perhaps, a dozen
of "eeling" expeditions, that had kept him out late enough for a full
basket and a proper scolding. There, too, was