While she was upstairs, Mr. Manning inquired:  “Where did you get the box, Luke?”

“If you identify it as the box taken from the bank,” answered Luke, “I will tell you.  Otherwise I should prefer to say nothing, for it is a secret of another person.”

“Matters look very suspicious, in my opinion, gentlemen,” said Squire Duncan, turning to his associates.

“Not necessarily,” said Mr. Beane, who seemed inclined to favor our hero.  “Luke may have a good reason for holding his tongue.”

Here Mrs. Larkin presented herself with the missing box.  Instantly it became an object of attention.

“It looks like the missing box,” said the squire.

“Of course, I can offer no opinion,” said Mr. Beane, “not having seen the one lost.  Such boxes, however, have a general resemblance to each other.”

“Have you the key that opens it?” asked the squire.

“No, sir.”

“Squire Duncan,” asked Mr. Beane, “have you the key unlocking the missing box?”

“No, sir,” answered Squire Duncan, after a slight pause.

“Then I don’t think we can decide as to the identity of the two boxes.”

The trustees looked at each other in a state of indecision.  No one knew what ought to be done.

“What course do you think we ought to take, Squire Duncan?” asked Mr. Bailey.

“I think,” said the bank president, straightening up, “that there is sufficient evidence to justify the arrest of this boy Luke.”

“I have done nothing wrong, sir,” said Luke, indignantly.  “I am no more of a thief than you are.”

“Do you mean to insult me, you young jackanapes?” demanded Mr. Duncan, with an angry flush on his face.

“I intend to insult no one, but I claim that I have done nothing wrong.”

“That is what all criminals say,” sneered the squire.

Luke was about to make an angry reply, but Mr. Beane, waving his hand as a signal for our hero to be quiet, remarked calmly:  “I think, Duncan, in justice to Luke, we ought to hear his story as to how the box came into his possession.”

“That is my opinion,” said Mr. Bailey.  “I don’t believe Luke is a bad boy.”

Prince Duncan felt obliged to listen to that suggestion, Mr. Bailey and Mr. Beane being men of consideration in the village.

“Young man,” he said, “we are ready to hear your story.  From whom did you receive this box?”

“From a man named Roland Reed,” answered Luke.

The four visitors looked at each other in surprise.

“And who is Roland Reed?” asked the president of the bank.  “It seems very much like a fictitious name.”

“It may be, for aught I know,” said Luke, “but it is the name given me by the person who gave me the box to keep for him.”

“State the circumstances,” said Mr. Beane.

“About two weeks since I was returning from the house of Miss Almira Clark, where I had gone on an errand for my mother.  To shorten my journey, I took my way through the woods.  I had nearly passed through to the other side, when a tall man, dark-complexioned, whom I had never seen before stepped up to me.  He asked me my name, and, upon my telling him, asked if I would do him a favor.  This was to take charge of a tin box, which he carried under his arm.”