"I meant to remain awake to tell you of it last night," Silas replied hurriedly; "but I was so tired, from rowing all day, that I dropped off to sleep soon after I came in. I have seen the shadow!"
Tug sprang up from the low chair in which he had been sitting, and began to nervously fumble through his pockets, as if looking for ammunition.
"I was out in the bottoms with Armsby, yesterday," Davy continued, "and twice we passed a man rowing about alone. We were not very close to him, but I am sure it was the shadow, and that he meant mischief. Each time when we encountered him he rowed away rapidly, and when Armsby hailed him he paid no attention."
Tug was much concerned over this news, for, after finding his ammunition, he went to loading his gun with great vigor.
"Could you see his short ear?" he stopped to inquire, after ramming down a great quantity of powder.
"No, his left side was from me, but I am sure it was the same man. And I am sure that the boat in which he rowed was the same one you took the little woman out of. I hurried here as fast as I could to tell you, but when I lay down on the bed to wait for you, I fell asleep. Armsby made me row all day while he kept a look-out for ducks. I am sorry I fell asleep."
Silas rubbed his sore arms, and looked very meek, but Tug was too busy making arrangements to go out to notice him.
"The impudence of the scoundrel," he said, as he poured in the shot. "I never thought to look for him in daylight. Which way did he go?"
Tug peered into the tube of the gun with his big eye, before capping it, as if expecting to find his enemy crouching down in the powder, but finding that the powder primed, he put on a cap, and stood ready to go out.
"Into the woods," Silas answered. "When we first met him, he was rowing toward town, but on seeing us he turned the other way. That was about noon, and just before night we saw him again, coming toward town as before, but he pulled off to the right when he met us, and disappeared under the trees. I expected you in every moment when I fell asleep, or I would have gone up to The Locks, and told Allan Dorris. We ought to tell him about this man, Tug. His appearance here so regularly means trouble. Within a year we have seen him a dozen times, and each time he has been lurking around Allan Dorris. We really ought to do something."