"The young fellow looks all right," Chet said. "He looks as if he has a sweet life here with those men." Phil said: "I thought Stummer told us there were three men running the mill." "They said something about Markel," Frank pointed out. "He's the man who is waiting for them inside the mill. That must be the other partner." "Let's go up and talk to the kid," suggested Joe. "Perhaps we can dig something out of him about those men. They don't seem to treat him very well, anyway." The boy was walking along the side of the old mill race. The waters were very swift at this point, for the current was strong and the river was deep. The boy was trudging along the weatherbeaten planks, with his hands in his pockets, looking very disconsolate. "Lonely looking boy," observed Tony. "They told him to run away and play. He looks as if he'd never played in his life." "We'll go over and talk to him," Frank decided. "If those old chaps say anything to us about being around here we'll ask them to quote some prices on having some milling done." "I can do that!" exclaimed Chet. "Dad's a farmer, and he's often said he wished the old Turner mill was running again so he wouldn't have to haul his grain so far." The boys emerged from the bushes and crossed the weed-grown open space near the front of the mill. The other lad had not yet seen them. He was standing by the mill race, some distance below, gazing into the water, now and then raising his head to look at the clacking wheel that turned monotonously in showers of dripping water. "I'm curious about this patent food story," Frank said. "It's queer there wasn't anything in the papers about it. Nobody except the farmers, like Stummer, seems to have heard about the mill being taken over." "Oh, probably they want to keep it to themselves until everything is ready," Jerry pointed out. "I'll bet you're beginning to see some kind of mystery in this already, Frank. Chances are we'll just get kicked off the premises for our pains." "Oh, I don't think there's any mystery about it," said Frank, with a smile. "But I'm just curious to know what it's all about." "No law against that," Phil agreed. "If this breakfast food invention of theirs turns out to be something wonderful that makes us all live about twenty years longer, we can say we were among the very first to know about it." By this time they had drawn closer to the mill race, and the boy standing there had raised his head and seen them. He was a good-looking fellow, not unlike Joe Hardy in appearance, as Carl Stummer had pointed out. But his face was pinched and drawn and there was a melancholy expression in his eyes. "Looks as if he hadn't had a square meal in a month," Jerry remarked. The boy turned and began to move toward Frank and Joe. He had gone only a few paces, however, when they saw him suddenly stumble. He had stepped upon a loose stone that had rolled from beneath his foot.