d worried and nearly heart broken the
farmer did then.

"It's sure enough gone, every cent of it!" he groaned, as he reached the
scouts.

"Your money, I suppose you mean?" Paul asked, sympathetically; while
Fritz and Seth pricked up their ears eagerly at the prospect of another
chapter being added to the little excitement of the evening.

"Yes, three thousand dollars that was to pay off my mortgage next week.
I had it hid away where I thought no thief could even find it; but the
little tin box, and everything has been carried off. And now I know why
the barn was fired--so as to keep the missus and me out there, while the
rascal made a sneak into the house, and laid hands on my savings. All
gone, and the mortgage due next week!"

CHAPTER VI

THE HOME-COMING OF JO DAVIES

"Whew! that's tough!" observed Seth.

One or two of the other scouts whistled, to indicate the strained
condition of their nerves; and all of them pressed up a little closer,
so as not to lose a single word of what was passing.

"But if as you say, sir, that you had this money securely hidden, it
doesn't seem possible that an ordinary tramp would know the place where
you kept it, so that he could dodge right into the house, and in a
minute be off with it; isn't that so?"

Paul was the greatest hand you ever heard of to dip deeply into a thing.
Where most other boys of his age would be satisfied to simply listen,
and wonder, he always persisted in asking questions, in order to get at
the facts. And he was not born in Missouri either, as Seth often
laughingly declared.

The farmer looked at him. There was a frown beginning to gather on his
forehead as though sudden and serious doubts had commenced to take a
grip on his mind.

"If he took my money I'll have the law on him, as sure as my name is
Sile Rollins," Paul heard him mutter, half to himself.

"Then you've thought of some one who might have known that you had three
thousand dollars under your roof, is that it, sir?" he asked.

"Y-yes, but it's hard to suspect Jo, when I've done so much for him
these years he's been with me," admitted the owner of the farm; though
at the same time his face took on a hard expression, and he ground his
teeth together furiously, while he went on to say, "but if so be he has
robbed me, I ain't called upon to have any mercy on him, just because
his old mother once nursed my wife, and I guess saved her life. Jo has
got to hand my money back, or take