Lysander Letts wanted to get married and settle down in a home of his own. He had received and banked the five thousand dollars for discovering the dwarf, and was, now, looking forward confidently to his marriage with Tessibel Skinner. He was quite sure his wealth would overcome the objections the squatter girl had hitherto opposed to his suit.
He grew quite sentimental thinking of her. He'd buy a real house, and put some fancy furniture in it, plush sofas in the parlor and lace curtains at the windows,--not any squatter's shack or pecking-box hut on the Rhine for him. His face darkened at a disturbing thought. He'd make the girl give up that kid! He wouldn't tolerate another man's brat in his home. But Lysander had a wholesome fear of Deforrest Young, and he didn't venture down the lake until the second day after he'd heard Tess had returned from Auburn.
On his way along the railroad tracks, he concluded he'd better go to Brewer's and find out just how the land lay. The talk in the Rhine saloons, the night before, had been that the dwarf'd returned from Auburn, pardoned. He wanted to know the details, and was sure Jake Brewer would be able to tell him. He passed through the woods and scrambled down the steps the fisherman had cut roughly in the cliff side. Mrs. Brewer answered his knock and invited him into the house. Recognizing Sandy's voice, Jake shouted from the back room: "Heard about Andy Bishop gettin' free?"
When Brewer came into the kitchen a moment later, Letts had taken a seat. Beside him on the floor lay a large tissue-wrapped package and in his hands he held a shiny new hat.
"Sure, I've heard he's back," he grinned, brushing a little flower-pollen from a very loud trouser leg. "How'd it happen?"
Sandy handed Brewer a cigar and stuck one, jauntily, in his own mouth.
"Smoke that, while ye're tellin' me 'bout Andy," he suggested. "It air the best money'd buy."
When the cigars were burning satisfactorily, Brewer sat down on the doorstep and cleared his throat loudly. His news was the biggest thing that'd happened in the Silent City since Orn Skinner escaped the rope. Glad of another opportunity to recount the story of the dwarf's liberation, he began: "Well, ye see, Sandy, in the first place, yer tellin' old Eb, an' gettin' the little feller sent back to Auburn air the best thing ever happened to the kid. Tess and the Professor went with 'im. When they got to the prison, Owen Bennet were dyin' in the horspitle. The brat seen 'im, an' sung to 'im an' talked to 'im, an' he confessed; said Andy didn't do the shootin' but was tryin' to stop it, just as the kid allers claimed."