“Slain!” Marmaduke repeated, aghast.
“Yes; and I’ve brought along a knife that once killed a deer and a lion.”
“George, this is going a little too far; what business have you to tote around a hunter’s weapon?” Stephen inquired. “Why, if you had fallen into the river with that horrible knife hitched fast to you, you would have been ruined.”
“Don’t be jealous, Steve,” George said, sarcastically. “You know there isn’t a boy in the State that owns such a knife as this; you know it has a romantic history; you know my grandfather willed it to me; you know it once saved Seth Warner’s life; you know an old Turk once——”
“Yes,” interrupted Steve, “I know; I’ve heard you talk about that knife ever since I first knew you. But if you don’t look out, it will come to grief like all your other wonderful knives—you’ll lose it.—Well, never mind, George; I was only surprised to think you could bring along that keepsake—no, relic—to dig up sods! So,” mildly, “go on, George.”
George “went on,” and soon the sods were raised, and a circle of earth exposed. Then the paddles were used very laboriously, first by one and then by another. It was hard work, but at last a hole was scooped out, and Steve, in despair, took up the spade and dug with ease.
“How do you suppose Herriman came to be in that tree?” George asked.
“That’s a mystery,” Steve replied. “Likely he was prowling around, and saw us coming, and scrambled into the tree to hide himself. Well, I never hankered to make a squirrel of myself in an evergreen.”
“Let me dig,” George now said.
Stephen handed over the spade to him, and after a vigorous attack with it, with a thud that startled the three, he struck something very hard.