Mr. Cumshaw made no immediate reply. He was peering very intently through the boles of the trees as if he was not quite sure that what he saw was really there.
"What are you looking at?" Bradby demanded irritably.
"If that's not a bit of a clearing and a hut on the edge of it, I'm a lunatic," Abel Cumshaw said.
"Hell!" ejaculated Bradby, and he in his turn peered through the trees.
"There's no smoke coming from it," Cumshaw said comfortingly. "It looks deserted. I daresay it's been like that for years."
"I don't like this place," Bradby remarked with naive irrelevance. "It fair gives me the creeps. There's spooks about here."
"If you talk that way," said Cumshaw fiercely, "I'll put a bullet through you. That sort of talk's only fit for children. You're not a child. You ought to have more sense. There's things here doubtless that you and I don't understand, but they're quite capable of a rational explanation, so don't go digging up any stuff about ghosts until you find you can't explain them any other way. There's the hut in front of us, and either there's someone in it or there isn't. If there is, we've got to use our wits; if there isn't, the game's ours."
"Have it your own way," said Bradby. "I'm game enough when I know what I'm tackling. I only mentioned I didn't like the feel of the place, and I don't see that that gives you any call to say what you have."
"We'll call it off until we've investigated," Cumshaw replied. "You stay here with the horses, and I'll creep forward a bit and see if anyone's home. All the same, I'm willing to bet that the place's deserted."
"Maybe it is and maybe it isn't," suggested Bradby. "However, you go off as you say and I'll wait here for you."