Page:Harry Castlemon - The Steel Horse.djvu/143

 serious," soliloquized Roy, as he moved toward the house in company with Willis and Mrs. Moffat, one walking on each side of him. "But I don't know that I care so very much. I'll see how it looks in the morning." Then aloud he said: "I don't want anything to eat, Mrs.—beg pardon, I didn't quite catch the name."

"Good laws! Just listen at the child," exclaimed the housekeeper, throwing up her hands and looking the picture of astonishment.

"He's been going on that way ever since we found him, Mrs. Moffat," said Willis in a low tone. "He don't know me nor Babcock nor the captain nor nobody. He acts as if he had lost all his senses."

"That's just what I have been afraid of for a long time," answered the housekeeper in a loud, shrill whisper. "No boy who was in his right mind would want to run away and leave a kind uncle and a beautiful home like this. I've suspected it, and so have others whose names I could mention."

Willis started when he heard this, and so did Roy. The woman's words suggested an idea to both of them.