“Why do ye think that, docther?”
“Heretofore we had nothing positive to bring against them. Now I can bear witness that they tried to rob you. They know it and have no wish to go to jail while the weather is so pleasant outside. Let’s sit down on this log for a wee bit, before going to my house. Tell me how you came to be in this place.”
“I was on me way from Uncle Elk’s cabin whin the smoke of this camp caused me to turn aside, wid the result that I’d been mixed up in the biggest shindy of me life if ye hadn’t took it in yer head to spoil the picnic.”
“It was mighty lucky for you that I did so, Mike. Did Uncle Elk send any message to me?”
“He did that,” gravely replied Mike, who thereupon told his friend of the assertion of the hermit that he and the physician must not meet.
“I had begun to suspect some such feeling on his part, though not to the degree he shows. I have called there twice, the last time with my wife, who insists that the old man was in his cabin at the time and purposely kept out of our sight. He can depend upon it that I shall not put myself in his way, though I am wholly at a loss to understand his enmity. But we may as well go to the house, Mike.”
As he spoke, the doctor rose to his feet, and the two began threading their way through the wood to the point where Mike had left his canoe.
CHAPTER III — A Strange Occurrence
It was not far to the edge of the lake, and, as you will remember, there was abundant undergrowth, but the fleeing tramps had left a trail of broken and twisted branches which it would have been easy to follow, even with greater distance and more uncertainty of direction. Mike kept a few paces in the lead, and soon caught the shimmer of water, but when he glanced around saw nothing of his craft. He stood perplexed when Dr. Spellman stepped beside him.
“Where’s the canoe?” asked the man.