"Guess you're right," said Tom. "S'pose we spread out in a long line an' go huntin' through the thickets, follerin' the general direction that his little piece of trail showed."
The suggestion was approved, and in ten minutes a whistle from Tom Ross drew them to a central point.
"Paul killed a wild turkey here," said Tom. "These woods seem to be full uv 'em, an' he lighted a fire with his flint and steel. Had a hard time doin' it, too. Knelt down here so long tryin' to knock out a blaze that the prints uv his knees haven't gone away yet."
"But he did get it to goin' at last," said Shif'less Sol, "an' he cooked his turkey an' et it, too. Here's the wishbone, all white an' shinin', jest ez he throwed it down."
"And down here is the spring where he picked the turkey after he heated it on the fire, and where he washed it," said Henry. "Paul was so hungry he never thought about hiding the feathers, and a lot of 'em are left, caught in the grass and bushes."
"I don't blame Paul," said Long Jim, his gastronomic soul afire. "Ef I wuz hungry ez he must have been, I'd hev et it ef all the warriors uv all the tribes on this continent wuz standin' lookin' on."
"Paul felt a pow'ful sight better after eatin'," said Shif'less Sol, "an' he took the rest uv the turkey with him. Seems likely to me that Paul would follow the brook, thinkin' it would flow into the Ohio."
"That's almost a certainty," said Henry.
They went with the stream, but it was one of those brooks common throughout the West—it came out of the ground, and into the ground it went again, not more than half a mile from the point at which they took up its course. The stream disappeared under a natural stone arch in the side of the hill.
"Paul was greatly disappointed," said Henry, "and of course he went to the top of the hill to see if he could get a reckoning."