When they were ready to part Sidney said, in a friendly way, "I am glad to have made your acquaintance. Come and see me to-morrow afternoon if you feel like it. I should like to ask you something of your life and adventures, for I suppose you have had adventures." "Thank you; I will come," answered Robert. But circumstances arose which prevented his keeping his engagement. CHAPTER XVIII. THE CANVAS MAN FINDS A BONANZA. Fitzgerald had put a new idea into the head of the canvas man—an idea which the man's unscrupulous and cruel nature readily welcomed and adopted. It was with malicious satisfaction that he thought it over, and considered how he should carry it out. There was, however one circumstance that interfered with his cheerfulness—the want of money. He had never been a saving man, and now that he was discharged, and without an income, his fortunes were at a low ebb. He foresaw that after carrying out his purpose it would be necessary for him to leave Crampton, but as his purse contained but seventy-five cents it did not seem possible to go far unless he walked. "If I had only got that boy's $200, I should be all right," he said to himself. "It would have been better for him and for me, too, for in that case I wouldn't do him any harm." [Illustration: THE ACCIDENT IN THE RING.] Carden had no friends of whom he could ask a loan with any hope of success—in fact, it is doubtful whether he had any friends at all. While in this perplexity he chanced to recall a conversation he had heard some days before in a billiard saloon. It ran thus: "Yes, Tarbox has more money than any farmer in town. He is mean and close-fisted, and so spends next to nothing. Of course when that is kept up year after year a man can't help getting rich." "Where does he invest his money—in savings banks?" "No, he is afraid of them. He is of a suspicious nature, and I shouldn't wonder if he follows the example of an old uncle of his who died twenty years ago." "How is that?" "Why, the old man lived in a miserable way in a poor hut, and after he died it was found that he had secreted large sums in various places in and about the hut. I don't know how many thousand dollars." "Did Nathan Tarbox inherit any of his uncle's money?" "Yes, he came in for a third of it." "You think he hides his money in the same way?" "I think it very probable. Of course it is very silly, for he gets no interest, and he is really in more danger of losing it than if it were earning dividends of interest in some good bank. However, that's the man's nature." In his necessity Carden recalled this conversation, and, having no conscientious scruples, he pondered how he should turn it to account. "If I could find one of the farmer's hiding-places for his money," he thought, "I might make a good thing out of it. The money isn't doing him any good. I might as well have it."