“It must have fallen out of his pocket as he slept,” Prescott guessed correctly.  “Did you find any papers down there on the floor of the wagon?”

“Yes; some sort of paper stuff,” nodded Dave.  “I took it for rubbish.”

“The money is all here!” cried the old peddler, in a frenzy of joy.  “Oh, how can I thank you young men?  You don’t know what your blessed help means for me!”

“Was it all the money you had?” Dick asked feelingly.

“Yes; all except for few loose dollars that I have in a little sack in my trousers pocket,” replied Mr. Hinman.

“Then it was all you had in the world, outside of your peddling stock and your horse and cart?” Prescott continued.

“All except a little house and barn that I own, and the small piece of ground they stand on,” said the peddler.  “If I had not found my money I would have been obliged to mortgage my little home to a bank—–­and then I am afraid I could not have repaid the bank, and my home would be taken from me.”

“But you would have found the money in the wagon some day soon,” suggested Dick.

“Perhaps,” replied the peddler.  “Who knows?  Perhaps someone else would have rummaged the wagon and found it before I did.  Oh!  It might have been taken a little while ago, even when I was toiling down the road, or talking with you boys at your camp!” he added, with a sudden wave of fright over the thought.

“One thing is certain, anyhow, Mr. Hinman,” Dick concluded.  “Someone may have overheard you talking with us about this money.  You will hardly be safe here.  I urge you to come to our camp, and there spend the night with boys who know how to take care of themselves, and who can look after you at need.  You will not be attacked in our camp.”

Reuben Hinman eagerly agreeing, Dave harnessed the bony horse into the wagon.  After a while the red wagon rested within the confines of the camp of Dick & Co.

In the bright light of the morning, Harry Hazelton was the first to be astir.  He saw Prescott asleep on the floor of the tent, rolled up in a blanket, while another blanket rested on Dick’s cot, brought back to the tent, as though some stranger had slept there.

Outside, attached to the seat of their camp wagon, Hazy found a note that mystified him a good deal at first.  It read: 

"The sun is now well up.  I shall go at once to Hillsboro, and then my great worry will be over.  Boys, you will ever be remembered in the prayers of R.H."

“Now, that’s mighty nice of R.H., whoever he is,” smiled Harry Hazelton, not immediately connecting the initials with the name of the little, old peddler.

Nor was it until Prescott and Reade were astir that Harry was fully enlightened as to the meaning of the words scrawled in pencil on the sheet of paper.

“You boys call me Hazy, and I must look and act the part,” laughed Hazelton shamefacedly, “when we can have such an invasion of the camp, and such an early get-away with a loaded wagon, and all without my stirring.”