"Why, that was easy enough—I just put my boot on his snakeship's tail, then taking hold of the rattles with a handful of leaves—and—here they are. But—oh fury!—how it did smell, though!" he added in disgust. "Fourteen rattles and a button! Don't that beat the snake-tale of the oldest inhabitant, Maud?"
Then, without awaiting a reply, he added, out of breath with excitement:—
"Cliff had a shocking time of it up there last Friday night, for this is only a small part of his experience."
"Rob—what—oh, what can you mean?" cried Maud, in wildest excitement.
"Well, I don't know much; but this much I did learn by guessing at it first, then making him own up; for Cliff is as close-mouthed as an oyster. From what I could learn, it appears that, while prowling about that night like a vagrant tom-cat, our good-looking brother ran into that old spectre which shrieked so like a demon that night by the camp-fire. This time, of course, it gave him the slip, as it always does," he answered.
"You do not mean to say that horrible sight has been seen again, Rob?"
After cautioning her not to raise such a racket, Rob proceeded to tell of his encounter, and also what he had learned of Clifford's experience likewise.
"Oh, Rob—what a horribly unreal thing it all seems! But everywhere there is so much of mystery that I am almost wild," she cried, with a good deal of incoherence.
"Why was Clifford digging about the old cottonwood that night, Rob?" she added, after a moment's pause; but, as her brother only expressed both surprise and ignorance, she continued: "But this is not all, Robbie; for I made a most startling discovery to-day—one which throws a gloomy light on the old tragedy of Bruce and his wife."
"Why, thicker and thicker!" cried Rob. "But what kind of a mare's-nest did you run into this time, Maud?" he added.