Aunt Hannah had planned the trip with remarkable accuracy, for at about three o'clock the lumbering stage stopped at a pretty chalet half hidden among the tall pines and overlooking a steep bluff. Here the baggage and boxes were speedily unloaded.
"I gotta git back ter meet the aft'noon train," said Bill Coombs, their driver. "They won't be any more passingers in this direction, tain't likely, 'cause the houses 'roun' here is mighty scattered an' no one's expectin' nobody, as I know of. But in the other direction from Millbank—Sodd Corners way—I may catch a load, if I'm lucky."
So back he drove, leaving the Conants' traps by the roadside, and Peter began looking around for Morrison's man. The doors of the house were fast locked, front and rear. There was no one in the barn or the shed-like garage, where a rusty looking automobile stood. Peter looked around the grounds in vain. Then he whistled. Afterward he began bawling out "Hi, there!" in a voice that echoed lonesomely throughout the mountain side.
And, at last, when they were all beginning to despair, a boy came slouching around a corner of the house, from whence no one could guess. He was whittling a stick and he continued to whittle while he stared at the unexpected arrivals and slowly advanced. When about fifteen paces away he halted, with feet planted well apart, and bent his gaze sturdily on his stick and knife. He was barefooted, dressed in faded blue-jeans overalls and a rusty gingham shirt—the two united by a strap over one shoulder—and his head was covered by a broad Scotch golf cap much too big for him and considerably too warm for the season.
"Come here!" commanded Mr. Conant.
The boy did not move, therefore the lawyer advanced angrily toward him.
"Why didn't you obey me?" he asked.
"They's gals there. I hates gals," said the boy in a confidential tone.
"Any sort o' men critters I kin stand, but gals gits my goat."
"Who are you?" inquired Mr. Conant.
"Me? I'm jus' Bub."