"Anything I can tell him, Billy?" asked Erie, noticing his reluctance.
"No, but there's somethin' I ought'a tell you, I guess," he answered. "I've jest come from old Swanson's boardin' house, at the foot. Mr. Maddoc an' the specialist doctor are goin' to leave there an' stay at teacher's, as you likely know?"
Erie nodded. "They told me all about it. How they are going to shoot from your Mud Point, and how good it was of you to let them," she smiled.
Billy grinned. "Say!" he murmured, "as if there was anythin' any of us wouldn't do fer them now. Well, Mr. Maddoc, who's havin' Joe Scraff drive down fer their stuff tonight, was comin' along up with me when we met Hinter, 'bout a mile back on the road."
He paused and searched the girl's face. "You see, Erie," he said slowly, "I'd been tellin' Mr. Maddoc all about how Hinter an' Scroggie had been tryin' to find water fer us, an' how they had had a barrel of oil explode, an' every thin'. Somehow he didn't seem a bit like a stranger. I didn't mind tellin' him at all. Why, I even told him about the Twin Oaks store robbery, an' about Hinter wantin' to get hold of Lost Man's Swamp, an' everythin'.
"He was awful interested, an' asked me to show him the fenced-in well. So we took 'cross the fields an' he saw it. He went all around the walls an' even climbed up one side of 'em, an' looked over. When he came down he said: 'Jest as I thought, Billy. That explosion you spoke of was a charge of nitro glycerine.' We struck back fer the road an' I guess he was thinkin' hard, 'cause he didn't talk any more. Then, as we was climbin' the fence to the road he asks: 'What kind of a chap is this man, Hinter, Billy?"
"'Why,' I says, 'there he is now.' Hinter had jest climbed the opposite fence an' stepped into the road. Mr. Maddoc slid down an' went right up to him. Hinter's face turned white when he saw Mr. Maddoc. He couldn't speak fer a minute, an' then all he did was mumble somethin'.
"'Billy,' Mr. Maddoc says to me, 'would you go on a piece an' leave me alone with this man. You see we've met before an' I want'a ask him some questions.'
"So I come on an' I guess Mr. Maddoc had a whole lot of questions to ask fer he ain't come yet."
Erie was standing against the gate, her arms stretched along its top, hands clenching its rough pickets.