“Against such a white man as they know you to be, I think they would,” answered Mr. Lanfranc. “But let that pass. Just now, all of us have seen you commit a crime. Two minutes more and that stone would have been swallowed up in the bog. The removal of boundary marks is a serious crime and a state prison offense. You’re due for a good long time behind the bars, Jim Boolus. Come along now,” he commanded, cutting short abruptly the mumbling appeals for mercy that the detected wretch was beginning.
The whole party took up the march, and in a few hours reached the nearest town, where Jim Boolus was committed to the charge of the sheriff, who took him to the jail. There he stayed until, a few weeks later, he began his long prison term.
The boys hurried at once to the plantation, where Lee flew to his mother’s arms. She hugged and cried over him, as mothers do, and then Bobby and Fred came in for a welcome scarcely less warm. It was a glorious reunion and one of the happiest occasions that the boys had ever known.
“Do you remember what I said about a hunch this morning?” Bobby asked Fred, when, at the end of that jubilant day, they were getting ready for bed.
“Yes,” agreed Fred, “your hunch was right. It sure has been our lucky day!”
“And to think we found those boundary stones,” put in Lee. “That’s the best ever. My mother will want to thank you for that—when she gets over all this excitement over our return.”
“Gee, but we’ll have a story to tell, when we get back to Rockledge,” was Fred’s comment. “Lost in a swamp, and fighting a cougar, and a moccasin snake, and sinking in the mush—”
“They won’t believe the half of it,” added Bobby. “It sure was a lot of adventures!”
“Well, now you’ve got to settle down to good times on the plantation,” said Lee.
“I wonder if we’ll get back that motor boat,” cried Bobby, suddenly.