“Yes, I did, little sister. I hain't a-talkin' much. Mayhew says it's best to sorter lie low until some'n' accurate is found out, an' while I did my level best down thar, I've got to acknowledge I'm as much in the dark as anybody else. In fact, I'm mighty nigh bothered to death over it. Nelson, poor boy, seems to have disappeared clean off'n the face o' the earth. The only thing I have to build on is the fact that--an' I hate to say it, little sister--the fact that he evidently _did_ start to drinkin' again. He told me once that he wasn't plumb sure o' hisse'f, an' that any big trouble or despair might overthrow his resolutions. Now, he's been drinkin', I reckon--an' what could 'a' been his trouble? I went three times to his uncle's, but the doctors wouldn't let me see 'im. The old man's broke down with nervous prostration from business troubles, an' they are afeard he's goin' to kick the bucket. Comin' back on the cars--” Pole's voice died away. He crossed and recrossed his hands on the fence. He avoided her steady stare. His massive eyebrows met on his wrinkled forehead. It was as if he were suffering inward pain. “I say--as I set in the train on the way back tryin' an' tryin' to find some explanation, the idea come to me that--since trouble was evidently what upset Nelson--that maybe you mought be able to throw some light on it.” “_Me_, Mr. Baker?” Pole hung his head; he spat slowly. Was she mistaken, or had he actually turned pale? Was it that, or a trick of her vision in the vague starlight? “Little sister,” he said, huskily, “you could trust me with yore life. I'd die rather than--than not stand to you in anything on earth. You see, if you happened to know any reason why Nelson Floyd--” Pole was interrupted by the loud grunting and squealing of his drove of hogs as they rushed round the fence-corner towards him. “Wait,” he said--“wait till I pour the'r feed in the trough.” He took up the pail and disappeared for a moment behind the cow-house. Cynthia felt a great lump of wondering suspense in her throat. What could he mean? What was coming? She had never seen Pole act so strangely before. Presently he came back to her, holding the dripping paddle with which he had stirred the dregs in the bottom of his slop-bucket. He leaned over the fence again. “You see, it's this away, little sister,” he began, lamely. “You an' Nelson--that is, you an' him was sorter runnin' together. He went with you, I reckon, more, on the whole, than with any other young lady in this section, an', you see, ef anybody was in a position to know any particular trouble or worry he had, you mought be that one.” “But I'm afraid I don't know anything of the kind,” she said, wonderingly, her frank eyes resting blankly on his face.