Page:Betty Gordon in Washington.djvu/68

58 Mrs. Peabody cleared her throat, usually a sign of coming speech on the rare occasions when she did open her mouth in her husband's presence.

"What you lost, Joseph?" she asked eagerly. "Something missing out o' your pocket?"

"Yes, something out of my pocket!" said her husband savagely. "You wouldn't know if I told you, but it's an unrecorded deed and worth a good deal of money. And I'll bet I know who took it&mdash;that measly runaway, Bob Henderson! By gum, he carried the coat up to the house for me from the barn the day before he lit out. That's where it's gone. I see his game! He'll try to get money out of me. But I won't pay him a cent. No sir, I'll go to Washington first and choke the deed out of his dirty pocket."

"Did Bob go to Washington?" quavered Mrs. Peabody, her mind seizing on this concrete fact, the one statement she could understand in her husband's monologue. "How'd you find out, Joseph?"

"Not through Betty," returned Peabody grimly. "She's willing to take the scoundrel's part against honest folks any time. Jim Turner told me. Leastways he told me of some old duffer who runs a crazy shop down there, and he thinks Bob's gone looking him up to find out about his parents.