"Brushes and paints and pencils and all his outfit," said Blake.
"Oh, oh, yes," replied the lady. "You know in the West a squatter claims complete rights to the land he has settled on. I hope Mr. Gayne hasn't established an ownership up there that will make us seem like intruders. We thought we would like to see this exciting place."
"'Tain't exciting," said Matt Blake with another shake of the head. "It's asleep and snoring, the Dexter farm is."
"Who does own the place?" asked Diana with interest.
"It would take a pretty smart lawyer to find that out," was the reply. "It's been in litigation longer than it's been haunted. There's three women, I believe, pullin' and haulin' on it."
"I think I might pull and haul, too, if I find I like it," said Diana with her most dreamy serenity, and Matt Blake laughed.
"Well, you won't," he returned. "'Twould give a body the Injun blues to live there. How Mr. Gayne can stand it even in the daytime is a mystery to me; and there don't either o' the claimants really want it. They live around the State somewheres. I s'pose it would be hard to buy 'em out at that, because landowners here seem to think the island's goin' to turn into a regular Newport and that they'll make a fortune if they only hang on."
"Do not speak such desecrating words!" begged Diana. "Do not hint at waking the island from its alluring, scented dream."
Matt Blake gave her a patient stare. "Just as you say," he returned. He had already, as a fruit of many interviews with Diana, given her up as a conundrum. He tipped his hat and continued on his way.