"I only wondered," Dave answered. "Seems as if the woods were full of mysterious people–one lone man hiding in an old clubhouse, another–" The lad checked himself. A sudden thought came to him that perhaps he better not speak too freely without knowing with whom he was talking.
"What's he doin' there? A man all alone, and in an old clubhouse? What might be his name thin?"
"How should I know?" Dave answered to this question. He was becoming the least bit suspicious and again he checked himself when it was just at his tongue's tip to add, "We think the name may be Grandall." There would be no harm in awaiting developments before he told a stranger quite all he knew, he grimly reflected–a wise thought, it should be needless to say.
"No harm,–no harm intinded," spoke the Irishman good-naturedly. He had come close to the water's edge now and Dave's eyes being fairly accustomed to the darkness, made him out to be a little, elderly man with a short beard, but very little hair on his head. The old fellow's baldness was, indeed, the most noticeable thing about him as, with hat in hand, lest it fall off into the lake, perhaps, he stooped down the more closely to inspect MacLester and the boat.
"Why," said the boy, fearing his short "How should I know?" might have been unpleasantly curt, "You see there are four of us fellows in camp on t'other side and we've happened to see a man at the old house on the Point below us. We've wondered who he might be, staying alone as he does, and keeping so out of sight of everybody. It's miles to the nearest house and nobody but our crowd of four fellows and our one visitor is anywhere near. But climb down into the scow and I'll take you over. Steady now, while I hold the old shell up to the bank."
For a few seconds the stranger made no reply. Then–"It must be a lake here thin. Has it a name, at all, d'ye know?"
"Why, sure it's a lake!" replied Dave a little tartly, wondering if the old fellow supposed the sheet of water lying so quiet in the darkness there might be a river or an ocean. "Its name is Opal Lake. This old boat is good and strong though. It'll carry us across all right."
Once again there was a long pause before the stranger spoke. "Oh yis!" he suddenly exclaimed, "There's me baggage, and me almost forgettin' of it! Will ye help me a wee bit with it? Sure 'tis not far!"
The kindly and somewhat coaxing voice of the old fellow, whose brogue was just enough to give a pleasant quaintness to his speech, amused MacLester and he assented readily enough to the request made of him. He threw a loop of the scow's anchor rope over a stub projecting from the water and sprang ashore. He did not notice in the darkness that his leap broke the fragile branch securing the boat, allowing her to drift, but at once said:
"We'll have to wiggle some, for they'll be looking for me in camp pretty shortly."