“Watch Thad, and you’ll know,” Giraffe told him.
Thad was bending down, and to all appearances examining the stout cord that had been drawn directly across the trail, mostly hidden by the low scrub. It had been arranged by a master-hand at cunning, and was just high enough to make certain that a careless foot would strike against it, bringing about the immediate result that the one who had placed it there contemplated.
Without even touching the cord the young scoutmaster commenced to follow it along, foot by foot. The sheriff’s posse, including Alligator Smith, the swamp guide, stood there and just watched to see what he would do. Somehow all of them seemed to have taken a strange liking for the patrol leader. Perhaps it was his manly bearing that made Thad friends so quickly; while the errand that had brought him down to Dixieland may have had more or less to do with it; for the hearts of these Southern boys and men are always tender toward one who has suffered; and chivalry toward women and girls still abounds in the South as it can be found nowhere else in this broad land of ours.
But then that was an old story with Giraffe and the rest of the fellows; ever since Thad Brewster had come to Cranford and entered into their sports they had been accustomed to seeing him make new and warm friends as though he might be a wizard.
Meanwhile the scout was apparently nearing the spot upon which his attention had been centered. It was only a dozen or so feet away from the trail and seemed to be where three trees grew up in a queer clump, being shoots of a former swamp king among the oaks.
Here Thad paused and bent still lower.
“He’s struck ile!” one of the posse was heard to say to a companion.
“Reckon as haow he hes, Jed,” another went on to remark.
Bumpus stared as best he could, and waited impatiently to see what would be the result of Thad’s search. He held his breath so long, through eagerness, that his face grew furiously red; and one of the posse even moved a little further away from the fat boy, possibly under the vague suspicion that he was about to have a fit; or from some other reason.
“Bully for Thad!” Giraffe was heard to say, a little louder than discretion might have dictated; at least Allan gave him a nudge in the back, which the tall scout understood to mean “less noise, there!” for he cut his exultant ejaculations short, and wilted.