“In that way all of the 101 ‘Patrick Mullen’s’ he made came back to him, save one. There is one of the complete number still missing and no one seems to know where it is. This is more remarkable because the missing gun is a flint-lock rifle of the style of seventy years ago. That gun has always struck me as being a valuable clue in our search, because it is the only rifle ever made by the old gunsmith and I have a feeling that that missing ‘Patrick Mullen’ may have been given to your father by the brother, and that may account for the fact that among the papers of Patrick Mullen there is no record of its whereabouts; this is in a measure confirmed by the report that the man outfitting at Spokane had a long old-fashioned rifle, and collectors say there used to be an expert in antique arms by the name of Mullen.” The suggestion made me tremendously excited. Beyond a doubt in my mind that missing “Patrick Mullen” was my father’s gun. I imagined him parting with everything else save the unique gun his famous brother had made for him. Why he should wish for a flint-lock rifle was an unanswerable question, but someone wanted that sort of a gun or it would not have been made, and my father’s letters showed him to be a man of sentiment, and impractical, just the sort of fellow to use a flint-lock when he might just as well have had a modern breech-loading high-power rifle. “I believe you’ve hit it, dad. Hot dog!” I exclaimed. “Bet a cookie that that gun does belong to my father and if we can find it we will probably find him too—would not that be bully?”