d how are all the Sweetbriars?" demanded the good old physician,
their staunch friend and confidant. "Ah, Tom, my fine fellow! have they
drilled that stoop out of your shoulders?"

"We're all right, Dr. Davison--and awfully glad to see you," cried
Ruth, leaning out of the tonneau to shake hands with him.

"Ah! here's the sunshine of the Red Mill--and they're needing sunshine
there, just now, I believe," said the doctor. "Did you bring my Goody
Two-Sticks home all right?"

"She's all right, Doctor," Helen assured him. "And so are we--only
Ruth's been in the lake."

"In Lake Osago?"

"Yes, sir--and it was wet," Tom told him, grinning.

"I suppose she was trying to find that out," returned Dr. Davison.
"Did you get anything else out of it, Ruthie Fielding?"

"A girl," replied Ruth, rather tartly.

"Oh-ho! Well, _that_ was something," began the doctor, when Ruth
stopped him with an abrupt question:

"Why do you say that they need me at home, sir?"

"Why--honey--they're always glad to have you there, I reckon," said
the doctor, slowly. "Uncle Jabez and Aunt Alviry will both be glad to
see you----"

"There's trouble, sir; what is it?" asked Ruth, gravely, leaning out
of the car so as to speak into his ear. "There _is_ trouble; isn't
there? What is it?"

"I don't know that I can exactly tell you, Ruthie," he replied, with
gravity. "But it's there. You'll see it."

"Aunt Alviry----"

"Is all right."

"Then it's Uncle Jabez?"

"Yes, my child. It is Uncle Jabez. What it is you will have to find
out, I am afraid, for _I_ have not been able to," said the doctor, in
a whisper. "Maybe it is given to you, my dear, to straighten out the
tangles at the Red Mill."

He invited them all down to sample Old Mammy's cakes and lemonade the
first pleasant afternoon, and then the car sped on. But Ruth was silent.
What she might find at the Red Mill troubled her.

CHAPTER V

THE TINTACKER MINE

It was too late to more than see the outlines of the mill and connecting
buildings as the car rushed down the hill toward the river road, between
which and the river itself, and standing on a knoll, the Red Mill
was. Ruth could imagine just how it looked--all in dull red paint and
clean white trimmings. Miserly as Jabez Potter was about many things,
he always kept his property in excellent shape, and the mill and
farmhouse, with the adjoining outbuildings, were painted every Spring.

A lamp burned in the kitchen; but al