about it. You know how Jabez is. I dunno as he knows I know what I know"
"That sounds just like a riddle, Aunt Alvirah!" laughed Ruth.
"And I reckon it is a riddle," she said. "I only know from piecin' this, that, and t'other together; but I reckon I fin'ly got it pretty straight about the Tintacker Mine—and your uncle's lost a power o' money by it, Ruthie."
"What's the Tintacker Mine?" demanded Ruth, in wonder.
"It's a silver mine. I dunno where it is, 'ceptin' it's fur out West and that your uncle put a lot of money into it and he can't git it out."
"Why not?"
"'Cause it's busted, I reckon."
"The mine's 'busted'?" repeated the puzzled Ruth.
"Yes. Or so I s'pect. I'll tell ye how it come about. The feller come along here not long after you went to school last Fall, Ruthie."
"What fellow?" asked Ruth, trying to get at the meat in the nut, for Aunt Alvirah was very discursive.
"Now, you lemme tell it my own way, Ruthie," admonished the old woman. "You would better," and the girl laughed, and nodded. "It was one day when I was sweepin' the sittin' room—ye know, what Mercy Curtis had for her
