father had a note, or any paper to prove his claim, he could collect from your uncle's estate."
"That's th' trouble," said Sandy. "There wasn't no estate."
"But he must have left something! What became of the money he got from your father?"
"Nobody knew. You see poor Uncle Isaac went crazy before he died, and was put in th' asylum. In fact, that's where he died. He was clean out of his mind."
"But did you try to find what he had done with the money? I should have thought you could do that."
"We did try, and even got a lawyer to try," replied Sandy. "But it was no use. Uncle Isaac would only laugh at us. Poor fellow, he meant all right, but his head give way. He wouldn't have cheated pa for the world. It was jest an accident—that's all."
"You see he was near our threshing machine one day when there was an accident. Somethin' broke and Uncle Isaac was hit on th' head. Not hard enough to kill him, but it made him forget things, and he died that way."
"But couldn't you tell from the papers he left where he had invested the money—his own, as well as your father's?"
"That's th' odd part of it. We couldn't find
