“That’s what you think. Anyway, I’m not going to follow him. I’ll lead him. I’ll go out the first thing tomorrow morning and look for any traces they may have left. Then the next time they go, I’ll be waiting for them at the farthest trace I could find, and go on from there. That’ll work, for sure!”
“Who does the patrolling?”
“Oh, we both do, same as before. This won’t take long. Anyway, like I said, since I’ll be watching the trail they take, it’ll be even better than the regular patrol. Don’t you think?” Edie looked a little dubious as she latched the door of the feed bin.
“You’ll probably get away with it, but I bet you’ll have to talk fast,” was her verdict as they headed for the house.
Twenty-four hours later Roger was wondering whether any excuses would be needed at all. Things had not gone according to his sweepingly simple forecast.
In the first place, he had not had time to check any trail his father and Don might have left; for the two started out at daybreak the next morning. They did not follow the previous day’s route, but the one Mr. Wing had always taken in years past — the admittedly zigzag path specifically designed to permit his scouts to take short cuts to warn him, in the event that anyone followed. Roger and Edith were given stations which were to be watched for one hour after the two men had passed; each was then to intercept the trail and make a report, whether or not anyone had been seen. Roger looked suspiciously at his sister for an instant when those orders were received, but decided she would never have told his plans. His father was simply one jump ahead, as usual.
A good fraction of the morning had passed by the time he had made his report, and watched his father and brother disappear to the north. This was not the direction they had gone the day before, according to Edith; now the question was whether or not they had bothered to lay a false trail on that occasion, too. The only way to settle that appeared to be a straightforward search for traces. That was not too hopeless; as Roger had said while telling his father about the new patrol arrangements, there were places practically impossible to cross without leaving some sort of track, and the mere act of avoiding all those places would narrow down considerably the routes a person could take.
In spite of this, the boy had decided by dinner time that either he knew less about tracking than he had supposed or else the two he sought had spent the day in the attic. Certainly he had found nothing to which he could point with confidence as being evidence of their passage.
After the meal he had abandoned that line of research, and simply headed eastward. His sister had said they had taken this direction, and there was the remote chance that they might have abandoned precautions just that once. He travelled without pause for nearly half the afternoon, following what seemed to be natural trails, and finally stopped some eight miles from home.
He found himself in a valley, its center marked as usual by a noisy brook. The hills on either side were high, though by no means as high as some of their neighbors — six to seven thousand feet was a common height in this part of the range. He had not been here before, either alone or with his father, but still felt he had a good idea of his location. His principal worry was the fact that he had as yet seen no sign of his father or brother.