“No.  Isaac Bolum declares every day that he is going to, but when the time comes he breaks down.  Every other means of finding out has been taken.”

“Josiah Nummler told me to-day he believed Weston was a detective.”

“That was Elmer Spiker’s theory.  But, as Theop says, who is he detecting?”

Theophilus settled that theory conclusively, in my mind, at least, for I knew every man, woman, and child in the valley; and taking a mental census, I could find no one who seemed to require watching by a hawkshaw.

“Perry Thomas guessed he was an embezzler,” said Tim, putting the last dish in the cupboard and sitting down to his pipe.  “Perry says Weston is the best-learned man he ever met, and that embezzlers are naturally educated or they would not be in places where they could embezzle.”

“A truly Perryan argument,” said I; “and after all, a reasonable one, for no one would think of looking here for a fugitive.”

“That’s just what Perry says,” rejoined Tim.  “But Theop has read every line in the papers for weeks, and he swears that no embezzlers are missing now.”

“Perhaps his crime is still concealed,” I ventured.

“That was just what Isaac Bolum thought,” Tim answered.  “But Henry Holmes says no missing criminal is likely to have a setter dog shipped to him.  He says such a man might send for his clothes, but he would draw the line on dogs.”

“Perhaps he has deserted his wife,” I said, seeing at last a possible solution of the mystery.

“That’s what Arnold Arker suggested just a few days ago,” returned Tim; “but Tip Pulsifer allowed that no fellow would have to come so far to desert his wife.”

“Tip ought to know,” said I, “for he deserts his once a year, regularly.”

“He always comes back the next day,” retorted Tim stoutly.

My brother has always been Tip’s champion in his matrimonial disagreements, and whenever Pulsifer flees across the mountain, swearing terrible oaths that he will never return, Tim goes straight to the clearing on the ridge and talks long and seriously to the deserted wife about her duty.

[Illustration:  Swearing terrible oaths that he will never return.]

But there was reason in Tip’s contention regarding Weston.  Indeed, from Tim’s account of events, I could see that the store had very thoroughly threshed out the whole case and that the problem was not one that could be solved by abstract reasoning.  There was only one person to solve it, and that was Robert Weston himself.

I knew enough of the world to know that it was not an unheard-of thing for a man to settle for a time in an out-of-the-way village.  I knew enough of men to understand that he might consider it nobody’s business why he cared to live among us.  I had enough sense of humor to see that he might find amusement in enveloping himself in mystery and sparring with the sly sages of the store and tavern.  By right