Mr. Kinsey lifted some of the bills from one of the two stacks and riffled the edges with a square thumb, nodding. These were tens; the other pile held twenties. He passed one of the oblong slips of crisp paper to the sheriff. ‘Rotten job,’ he said contemptuously. ‘Wouldn’t fool a child. Look at the lathe work! And the threads, done with a fine pen; no silk there. These are some of the same lot, Sheriff, as the ones the banks picked up. I’d like mighty well to know who made the plates. He must be a fool to think he could get away with anything as crude as that!’ ‘Well, now, I don’t know,’ said the sheriff slowly. ‘I reckon if some one was to hand me one of those I wouldn’t suspect anything wrong with it. ’Course, if I was on the lookout for queer money I might be leery.’ He handed the bill to the policeman. ‘I’d take it in a minute,’ said the latter, ‘if I didn’t know there was bad ones around.’ Mr. Kinsey smiled and shook his head. ‘It will pay you to get a genuine bill and study it,’ he said. ‘It’s a good thing to know what a real ten-dollar bank-note looks like, Casey. Then maybe you won’t ever get stung.’ He placed the bill back and retied the package. ‘Want to run up there, Sheriff, and look things over?’ he asked as he climbed back into the other boat. ‘Well, I dunno,’ was the reply. ‘Think there’s enough of us?’ ‘Oh, there won’t be any trouble,’ answered Mr. Kinsey. ‘They’ve skipped by this time. I’d just like to look the place over. Might find something that would help me a bit.’ ‘Well, if they’ve gone,’ objected the sheriff, ‘we’d better go back to town, maybe, and work the ’phone.’ ‘No hurry. I’d rather find out who they are first. I’m pretty sure about Thorbourn, but this “Cocker” has me guessing. And there may have been others in the gang.’ ‘There was one more,’ said Pud, and he told about the man who ‘talked funny.’ ‘Italian, probably,’ commented Mr. Kinsey. ‘He was the engraver, I guess. Well, let’s go.’ ‘You come in here,’ directed the sheriff, ‘and we’ll pick up your friends. Your boat will be all right, I reckon, till we get back.’ Pud obeyed, and the police launch, with Mr. Casey in charge, jumped forward. That was, as Pud told himself, ‘some launch.’ It was long and slender, with a sharp, high bow, and it gleamed with white paint and mahogany and shining brass. The engine was housed in a compartment to itself, well forward, and beyond that, perched on the bow deck, was something concealed in a waterproof canvas cover that engaged Pud’s curiosity tremendously until he finally realized, with a thrill, that it was a small machine-gun. To his surprise, the police launch, which bore no name, but had the letters ‘L. P. D.’ painted on the bow, turned almost instantly into a broad creek which the sheriff told him was Two-Pond Run. ‘That’s Second Pond there, son; where you spent the night. First Pond’s two miles below.’ ‘Gee,’ muttered Pud, ‘if I’d known that last night――’