"If you can explain what it was that happened in that cave that upset him so mightily, I'd come a little nearer to believing you."
Terry laughed and fell back beside him.
"It's a thing which I imagine may have happened to one or two other young men of this neighborhood—not inconceivably yourself included."
Mattison, seeing no meaning in this sally, preserved a sulky silence and Terry added:
"The thing for us to do now is to bend all our energies toward finding Cat-Eye Mose. I doubt if we can completely explain the mystery until he is discovered."
"And that," said the sheriff, "will be never! You may mark my words; whoever killed the Colonel, killed Mose, too."
"It's possible," said Terry with an air of sadness, "but I hope not. I came all the way down from New York on purpose to see Mose, and I should hate to miss him."