"You mean they must be worse than game poachers; is that it?" continued Thad.
"I just reckon they are, Thad. Game wardens are hired by the State; and seems to me it don't interest the common police if a man chooses to take a few deer out of season, or net black bass against the law."
"Sounds like good logic, Davy," Thad continued; "and anybody could see that you're all fixed to follow in the footsteps of your father, when you get through law school. That settles it, in my mind. After this I don't expect to run across any nets in the lake, or snares for partridges in the woods around here."
"You mean there might be something stronger than that to be found, if only we could run up against the place they use for a hideout; is that it, Thad?"
"I certainly do; but I wish you could tell me one thing," the other remarked.
"Try me and see," grinned Davy. "I'm loaded with information, like a gun is, to the muzzle; and all you have to do is to pull the trigger."
"Try and remember if that boy said anything about this Malcolm Hotchkiss that would describe him—was he tall or short; did he wear a beard or had he a smooth face; were his eyes blue or black?"
Davy screwed up his eyebrows as though he might be cudgeling his brain to remember. Then he grinned again, showing that the result had at least been satisfactory from his point of view.
"I caught on to it, Thad," he declared with the air of a victor.
"Well, what do you think about it now, Davy?"