"this is curious. Here I've just been answering
the gentleman up stairs a heap of questions concerning that self same
old place, and now you come along with another batch of them; just as
if that rickety old den was the only spot of interest we had in these
parts."

"Perhaps that may be the truth," I laughed. "Just now when the papers
are full of these rogues, anything concerning them must be of superior
interest of course." And I pressed him again to give me a history of the
house and the two thieves who had inhabited it.

"Wa'al," drawled he "'taint much we know about them, yet after all it
may be a trifle too much for their necks some day. Time was when nobody
thought especial ill of them beyond a suspicion or so of their being
somewhat mean about money. That was when they kept an inn there, but
when the robbery of the Rutland bank was so clearly traced to them,
more than one man about here started up and said as how they had
always suspected them Shoenmakers of being villains, and even hinted at
something worse than robbery. But nothing beyond that one rascality has
yet been proved against them, and for that they were sent to jail for
twenty years as you know. Two months ago they escaped, and that is the
last known of them. A precious set, too, they are; the father being only
so much the greater rogue than the son as he is years older."

"And the inn? When was that closed?"

"Just after their arrest."

"Has'nt it been opened since?"

"Only once when a brace of detectives came up from Troy to investigate,
as they called it."

"Who has the key?"

"Ah, that's more than I can tell you."

I dared not ask how my questions differed from those of Mr. Blake, nor
indeed touch upon that point in any way. I was chiefly anxious now
to return to New York without delay; so paying my bill I thanked the
landlord, and without waiting for the stage, remounted my horse and
proceeded at once to Putney where I was fortunate enough to catch the
evening train. By five o'clock next morning I was in New York where I
proceeded to carry out my programme by hastening at once to headquarters
and reporting my suspicions regarding the whereabouts of the
Schoenmakers. The information was received with interest and I had
the satisfaction of seeing two men despatched north that very day with
orders to procure the arrest of the two notable villains wherever found.

CHAPTER VIII. A WORD OVERHEARD

That evening I had a talk with Fann