“I am so glad,” murmured Mrs. Bayne. “Your father did come yesterday, though I had not the opportunity to tell you. It seems strange but natural that he should have come here. Then the officers came, and knowing he was again a hunted man, he concealed himself in the opening made in the old chimney for that very purpose by his eccentric uncle, Timothy Bayne.” “What your mother says is true, my son,” said the father. “At last I am free from the law, and no longer a fugitive. I sought for you and your mother in the big city till I was forced to give up. Then I came here simply because Uncle Tim lived here when I was a boy, and I was naturally attracted hither. I reached the village in the night to see these miscreants here just as they left the store on their depredation. It proved that I was wretched, and, instead of hunting for the real culprits, I was again made a fugitive. But I did not know this until I had reached here. “You may judge of my surprise and pleasure at finding your mother here.” The others were deeply moved by the simple story of a man who had been more wronged than guilty. He was a man still in the prime of life, with a stalwart form and clear, fearless manner. “Now that I have found you,” he resumed, “I mean to stay by you, unless you drive me away, or the law does. At any rate, I shall consider myself a fugitive no longer.” “Neither are you,” spoke up Dr. Menter. “If I mistake not, these men in captivity here have a story to tell which will lift much of the cloud that hangs over you. At any rate, I am not going to let Rob remain any longer the victim of a man who has persecuted him out of a matter of a little spite against another.” “You are very kind,” replied Rob. “Not half as kind, nor one-hundredth part as brave as you were when you staked your life to save my dear boy and girl.” “This is a happy moment,” said Aunt Vinnie, “and if my boys were only here I could enjoy it with the rest of you.” “And my Mary,” said Mrs. Little. “Mary will be with us again before another night,” spoke up Larry. “Only this evening I learned of a strange thing, and I was coming to tell you of it. Lucy Howlitt was up to Deacon Cornhill’s this afternoon, and Mrs. Cornhill told how Mary, as she thought, had been taking things, and it wasn’t half an hour after that before Lucy caught a tame crow belonging there carrying off a silver spoon in its bill. She called Mrs. Cornhill, and they watched the crow go straight to a place where he had hidden all the things that had been lost. Then Mrs. Cornhill knew that the crow, and not Mary, had stolen what she had missed, and she cried, she felt so bad over it.” “That will set Mary free, and Mrs. Cornhill is willing to do anything she can to be forgiven.” “I am so glad,” murmured the mother. “I knew my daughter could not be guilty of such a thing as stealing.” “It looks as if we were coming out all right,” said Rob.