"That is all right, Mrs. Ma.s.sey," said Hopewell, in his gentle way. "I can change it. Have to give you a gold piece--there."

"What's going to be done about this liquor selling, anyway?" demanded Nelson Haley, in a much more serious mood, it would seem, than usual.

"I think Janice has the right of it--although I did not think so at first. 'Live and let live,' is a good motto; but it is foolish to let a mad dog live in a community. Lem Parraday's bar is certainly doing a lot of harm to innocent people."

Janice clapped her hands softly, and her eyes shone. The school teacher went on with increased warmth:

"Polktown is really being vastly injured by the liquor selling. To think of those boys becoming intoxicated--one of them of my school, too----"

The young man halted suddenly in this speech. In his earnestness he had forgotten that it was his school no longer.

"It is a disgraceful state of affairs," 'Rill hastened to say, kindly covering Nelson's momentary confusion.

But Janice beamed at the young man. "Oh, Nelson! I am delighted to hear you speak so. We are going to hold a temperance meeting--Mr.

Middler and I have talked it over. And I have obtained Elder Concannon's promise to be one of those on the platform. Polktown must be waked up----"

"What! _Again_? Haw! haw! haw!" burst out Walky. "Jefers-pelters, Janice Day! You've abeout give Polktown insomnia already! I sh'd say our eyes was purty well opened----"

"_Yours_ are not, old fellow," said Nelson, good-naturedly, but with marked earnestness, too. "You're patronizing the barroom side of the hotel altogether more than is good for you, and if you don't know it yourself, Walky, I feel myself enough your friend to tell you so."

"Nonsense! nonsense!" returned the expressman, reddening a little, yet man enough to accept personal criticism when he was so p.r.o.ne to criticizing other people. "What leetle I drink ain't never goin' ter hurt me."

"Nor anybody else?" asked Janice, softly, for she liked Walky and was sorry to see him go wrong. "How about your example, Walky?"

"Shucks! Don't talk ter me abeout 'example.' That's allus the excuse of the weak-headed. If my example was goin' ter hurt the boys, ev'ry one o' them would wanter be th' town expressman! Haw! haw! haw! I ain't never seen none o' them tumblin' over each other fer th' chance't ter cut me out on my job. An' 'cause I chaw terbaccer, is ev'ry white-headed kid in town goin' ter take up chawin' as a habit?

"Jefers-pelters! I 'low if I had a boy o' m' own mebbe I'd be a lettle keerful how I used either licker, or terbaccer. But I hain't. I got only one child, an' she's a female. I reckon I ain't gotter worry about little Matildy bein' inflooenced either by her daddy's chawin', or his takin' a snifter of licker on a cold day--I snum!"

"Unanswerable logic, Walky," said Nelson, with some scorn. "I've used the same myself. And it serves all right if one is utterly selfish. I thought _that_ out after Janice, here, opened my eyes."

"You show me how my takin' a drink 'casionally hurts anybody or anything else, an', jefers-pelters! I'll stop it mighty quick!"

exclaimed the expressman, with some heat.

"I shall hold you to that, Walky," said Janice, quickly, interfering before there should be any further sharp discussion.

"And," muttered Nelson, "she's as good as got you, Walky--she has that!"

At the moment the door opened with a bang, and Mr. Ma.s.sey plunged in.

He was without a hat and wore the linen ap.r.o.n he always put on when he was compounding prescriptions in the back room of his shop. In his excitement his gray hair was ruffled up more like a c.o.c.katoo's topknot than usual, and his eyes seemed fairly to spark.

"Hopewell Drugg!" he exclaimed, spying the storekeeper. "Was my wife just in here?"

"Hul-_lo_!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Walky Dexter. "Hopewell hasn't been sellin' her Paris green for buckwheat flour, has he? That would kinder be in your line, wouldn't it, Ma.s.sey?"

But the druggist paid the town humorist no attention. He hurried to the counter and leaned across it, asking his question for a second time.

"Why, yes, she was here, Mr. Ma.s.sey," said Hopewell, puzzled.

"She changed a bill with you, didn't she?"

"Jefers-pelters! was it counterfeit?" put in Walky, drawing nearer.

"A twenty dollar bill--yes, sir," said the storekeeper.

"Did you give her a gold piece--a ten dollar gold piece--in the change?" shot in Ma.s.sey, his voice shaking.

"Why--yes."

"Is this it?" and the druggist slapped a gold coin down on the counter between them.

Hopewell picked up the coin, turned it over in his hand, holding it close to his near-sighted eyes. Nothing could ever hurry Hopewell Drugg in speech.

"Why--yes," he said again. "I guess so."

"But look at the date, man!" shouted Ma.s.sey. "Don't you see the date on it?"

Amazed, Drugg repeated the date aloud, reading it carefully from the coin. "Why, yes, that's the date, sir," said the storekeeper.

"Don't ye know that's one of the rarest issues of ten dollar coins in existence? Somethin' happened to the die: they only issued a few,"

Ma.s.sey stammered. "Where'd you git it, Hopewell?"

"Why--why--Is it valuable?" asked Hopewell. "A rare coin, you say?"

"Rare!" shouted Ma.s.sey. "Yes, I tell ye! It's rare. There ain't but a few in existence. Mr. Hobart told me when he brought them coins over here that night. And he pointed one of them out to me in that collection. Where did you get this one, Hopewell--where'd you get it, I say?"

And on completing the demand he turned sharply and stared with his blinking, red eyes directly at Nelson Haley.

CHAPTER XX

SUSPICIONS

"Why--why--why----" stammered Hopewell Drugg, and could say no more.

The others had noted Ma.s.sey's accusing glance at the schoolmaster; but not even Walky Dexter commented upon it at the moment.

"Come, Hopewell!" exclaimed the druggist; "where did you get it?"

"Where--where did I get the gold piece?" repeated the storekeeper, weakly.

"Yes. Who paid it in to you? Hi, man! surely you don't think for a moment I accuse you of having stolen the coin collection--or having guilty knowledge of the theft?"

"Oh, Mr. Ma.s.sey! what are you saying?" cried the storekeeper's wife.

"The coins?" whispered Hopewell. "Is that one of them?"

"Jefers-pelters!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Walky, "Here's a purty mess."