of how the two cadets had been dismissed by Colonel Colby.

"This certainly is wonderful!" exclaimed the old lumberman, when they
had finished. "I had no idea you boys knew anything about those men. I
reckon your opinion of their honesty is just about as high as mine is,"
and he smiled grimly.

"Asa Lemm claims to have lost quite a fortune," said Jack; "but we
certainly did not think that part of it was located in this island."

"It isn't located in this island--at least it isn't so far as I am
concerned!" cried Uncle Barney. "If those men bought what they thought
were the rights to this island, they were defrauded, that's all! And
that has absolutely nothing to do with my rights to this land!"

"I should think if you got a good deed to the land from that Luke
Martinson--and his folks had a good deed from somebody else--that ought
to be proof enough that you own the island."

"Well, I've got the deed from Martinson, and I've got the old deeds he
used to have, too! I've got them placed away in a tin box and in a safe
place, too!" answered the old man.

"Then, if you've got those deeds, why do they bother you?" questioned
Fred.

"As I've said before, they won't admit that the deeds old Mrs. Martinson
had were any good. The fact of the matter is, Slogwell Brown wants to
get those deeds away from me. He has been at me to let him look at the
deeds several times, but I've always refused, for I was afraid that if
he got the deeds away from me I would never see them again."

"I thought they recorded deeds at the Court House," said Jack, who had
heard this fact mentioned between his father and his uncles.

"They do record deeds, and I suppose that one was recorded at some time
or other; but the Court House in this county was burnt down some years
ago and all the records went up in smoke."

"But you could get the deeds recorded now--I mean have it done over
again," remarked Randy.

"I suppose so. But that wouldn't do me any good, because they would
probably try to prove that the deeds I brought in were not the
originals. You see, the date when a deed is recorded has a good deal to
do with it. Anyway, I'm not going to let anybody have those deeds until
I am sure of what I'm doing," went on Uncle Barney. It was easy to see
that the old man was peculiar and wanted to do things in his own
manner.

"Did you ever ask a lawyer about this?" questioned Fred.

"No! I ain't got no use for lawyers!" was the quick reply. "I h