Pam nodded her head sadly.
“That is just how I feel about it. But there are two sides to think of, and if we were not here just think how the place would go to ruin! We are doing our best for him, and keeping the home together. If we can be happy while we are doing it, so much the better for us, and our happiness does not injure him if he is alive, nor is it any disrespect to him if he has gone.”
Jack gave a non-committal grunt, and then sat in silence, staring at the mighty trees which walled in the trail, or stood singly or in groups here and there, the lesser growths crowding about the big trunks like children round a mother’s knee.
“There is Mrs. Buckle, and that is her house,” Pam exclaimed presently, as they emerged from the forest and began to cross the fields. “Is it not strange that she has been one of my kindest friends?”
“Yes, it seems to me against nature,” he answered shortly. “It is one of the things that make me think that perhaps after all Grandfather had no hand in hurting Sam Buckle; for if he had, her instinct would have been dead against her being friends with you. And a woman usually follows her instinct, while a man trusts to his judgment. You need not laugh; I told you I should be springing all sorts of silly theories upon you about every ten minutes or so.”
“I am not going to laugh at you,” said Pam, turning a face that was deeply troubled upon him. “But, Jack, if Grandfather did not hurt the other man, why did he disappear? Where is he now? And why was his axe found beside the poor fellow? Why, too, did Sam Buckle keep muttering that it was his right?”
“I’m not a blooming detective!” growled Jack, who looked every bit as troubled as his sister. “But this I do know, that there are mostly two ways of explaining everything—a wrong way and a right. It is possible that all, or nearly all, your reasonable explanations are wrong ones, after all.”
“What solemn faces you have both got!” exclaimed Mrs. Buckle, as she hurried to meet them. She told Jack that he was a great acquisition, that the forest wanted young men more than it wanted anything, and that she was very glad indeed to see him there.
“Thank you, ma’am: I am sure that I am very glad to be here,” said Jack politely; and then he followed Mrs. Buckle round her small domain, listening in interested silence to all she had to say about things. He was as fond as most boys of talking and giving his opinion on this and that. But he was up against a most complete ignorance of the things she was discussing, so he had the sense to keep quiet until he knew something about it all.
Then Pam came along from the barn, where she had been to unhitch the horse; but because he was unwilling to go just yet, Jack pulled out his watch to see the time.