“Dat may be, suh. Day may be. I ain’t sayin’ dey isn’t, Marse Joyce.” He wagged his head solemnly. “I wuz out myse’f e’rlier in de evenin’.”
“Huh! You wouldn’t leave two sets of tracks!”
“Yaas, suh, Marse Joyce—goin’ an’ comin’.”
Dorothy, from her perch above, smiled at the old darky’s astuteness. Their tracks were on the trail, of course, for those who followed to read; but the rain had long ago blurred the outlines. Their pursuers could not know in which direction the footprints led.
“So you think it was your tracks we followed?”
John J. Joyce continued to speak in the harsh, bullying tone that made Dorothy want to kick him. She realized, nevertheless, that the old darky’s last statement was proving a serious facer to his inquisitor.
“I ain’t a-gwine ter say jes’ dat,” returned Uncle Abe. “All I knows is dat I made tracks on de trail. If dey’s more’n two pair, dey ain’t mine.”
“What trails were you on?” came the sudden question, and Dorothy tingled with excitement as Uncle Abe hesitated.
“Lemme see, suh—why, I wuz down de Spy Rock Trail, an’ de Cross Trail. And den I wuz ’long de Overlook and de Raven Rock Trails—”
“A nice long walk you had on a wet night,” sneered the white man.