those two
strangers were up to to-day?" remarked Paul who, tired of fanning the
wounded man, had managed to exchange with Dave.

Not far from where they turned into the highway, it veered southward,
leaving the railroad to the right, and a mile further crossed the old
road along which the boys had motored that morning on their way to the
old tavern.

To say that they were cordially received by Mr. Feeney would be only the
truth. At sight of the bareheaded man in gray, his visored cap somewhere
among the things in the car, Pat eyed him perplexedly, saying:

"Holy Moses! Little did I think to see the likes of you back again!"

The wounded man opened his eyes slowly and blinked the lids when he saw
they were carrying him to the house from the car.

"Dippy done it--yes--Dippy--he done it." Then he fainted away again.

After the wounded man was placed on a cot in a small shed room attached
to Feeney's not very commodious house, Pat took Phil and Worth aside,
while Dave and Paul remained with the stranger. It was felt intuitively
that the man should be closely watched. Why none of them knew exactly,
except that their methods with Billy and the taking of the car indicated
that something was wrong, somewhere. What it might be, of course none of
them as yet had any distinct idea. Feeney scratched his head
meditatively, as he said to Phil:

"Them two fellers come here about night, afore you boys appeared. They
wanted to stay all night and after breakfast they had my wife put up
some grub; quite a lot of it. But when you came in, all at once they
took a notion to leave, sudden-like. After they was gone my woman found
the stuff we'd packed up, which they seemed to have forgotten. That's
all we seen of 'em until you came in here with that one in the fix he's
in now."

"It all does look mysterious," remarked Phil. "From a hasty look we took
in the old tavern we saw what looked like a forge and some tools. I
thought I glimpsed some dies but I might have been mistaken."

"Wait a minute," broke in Pat, going to the door of the kitchen. "Ma,"
he called out, "any sign of Nan and Dan yet?"

A broad-bosomed, red-faced woman appeared for a minute at the open
doorway, as she replied:

"No, Pat, I ain't seen nothin'. I went to the bend of the road, too.
It's time they was here onless something's bothered them."

Coming back to the two boys, Feeney explained:

"Last night, ruther late, Bill Spivee, our nearest neighbor to the wes