“Maybe, maybe,” muttered his companion. “And maybe to take something else away in. Let’s see where they went.”
The tracks could be followed without difficulty in the soft earth. They led to a break in one of the fences and on through the strip of woodland to a road on the farther side. There they turned westward and were lost amid the ruts of the road.
“Well,” said Stanley, stopping and looking along it, “I think, if you don’t mind, that I’d like to spend a day or two trying to run those fellows down. I don’t see that I’m needed back at Wadsworth—everything’s quiet there, and my men know their business. Besides, you can keep an eye on them. This affair kind of worries me. There’s more in it than appears on the surface. What do you say?”
“All right,” Allan agreed. “I’d like to have this thing cleared up. Do you think you can do it?”
“I can try, anyway,” said Stanley. “And I’ll start right away. I don’t want the trail to get any colder. Good by.”
“Good by,” said Allan; “and good luck.”
He stood watching Stanley’s gaunt figure until it disappeared around a turn in the road, wishing absurdly that he could go along; then he turned eastward toward the little station of Schooley’s, a mile or more away. The road was one evidently not much used, for it was rutted and uneven and in poor repair. The fall and winter rains had washed it badly, and evidently no effort had been made to repair it. In fact, it soon grew so bad that Allan began to doubt whether it was anything more than a private road. The trees on either side grew closer and closer to it, there was no vestige of a fence, and after a time it became apparent that its direction had changed so that it was not leading him toward Schooley’s at all. A glance at the sun showed him that it was past midday, and his stomach began to warn him that he had eaten nothing since breakfast early that morning.
He stopped for a moment in perplexity and considered what he would better do. He might strike off into the woods in the direction in which he thought Schooley’s to be, but he was by no means certain of the direction, and the most probable result of such a course would be to get lost and miss his way entirely. The road he was following must certainly lead to a house; there were wagon tracks and hoof-prints on it which seemed fresh, so he concluded that the best thing he could do was to push forward as rapidly as possible, find the house to which the road led, and then, if he was any considerable distance from Schooley’s, hire a vehicle of some sort to take him on to his destination.
He walked on more rapidly, after that, following the road as it turned and twisted among the trees. The ground grew uneven and at last actually hilly, and the road grew worse and worse. Allan began to fear that it led only to a wood-lot or outlying field, and was more than once tempted to turn back, seek the railroad track and follow it into Schooley’s. But always he resolved to go around the next corner and the next, and finally his perseverance was rewarded.
For there, almost hidden behind a screen of trees, with hills protecting it on either side, stood an old stone house.