ace.

"That's all true enough, Tom, but tell me what you mean by saying that
in the way you did? What could Mr. Culpepper have to do with the
vanishing of that paper?"

"Oh! perhaps nothing at all," pursued the other, "but all the same he
has more interest in its disappearance than any other person I can
think of just now."

"Because his name was signed at the bottom, you mean, Tom?" cried the
startled Carl.

"Just what it was," continued Tom. "Suppose your mother could never
produce that receipt, Mr. Culpepper would be under no necessity of
handing over any papers. I don't pretend to know much about such
things, and so I can't tell just how he could profit by holding them.
But even if he couldn't get them made over in his own name, he might
keep your mother from becoming rich unless she agreed to marry him!"

Carl was so taken aback by this bold statement that he lost his breath
for a brief period of time.

"But Tom, Amasa Culpepper wasn't in our house that morning?" he
objected.

"Perhaps not, but Dock Phillips was, and he's a boy I'd hate to trust
any further than I could see him," Tom agreed.

"Do you think Mr. Culpepper could have hired Dock to _steal_ the
paper?" continued the sorely-puzzled Carl.

"Well, hardly that. If Dock took it he did the job on his own
responsibility. Perhaps he had a chance to glance at the paper
and find out what it stood for, and in his cunning way figured
that he might hold his employer up for a good sum if he gave
him to understand he could produce that receipt."

"Yes, yes, I'm following you now, go on," implored the deeply
interested Carl.

"Here we are at your house, Carl; suppose you ask me in. I'd like to
find out if Dock was left alone in the sitting room for even a minute
that morning."

"Done!" cried the other, vehemently, as he pushed open the white gate,
and led the way quickly along the snow-cleaned walk up to the front
door.

Mrs. Oskamp was surprised as she stood over the stove in the neat
kitchen of her little cottage home when her oldest boy and his chum,
Tom Chesney, whom she liked very much indeed, entered. Their manner
told her immediately that it was design and not accident that had
brought them in together.

"I've been telling Tom, mother," said Carl, after looking around and
making certain that none of the other children were within earshot;
"and he's struck what promises to be a clue that may explain the
mystery we've been worrying over."

"