“Hello yourself, Josh,” replied Jack, looking up with a smile, as though pleased because he was to have some one to talk to, and possibly confer with. “Well, no, I can’t just say that either of your guesses comes anywhere near the truth. I’m only examining a trail.”
“What’s that? Then this old island hasn’t always been as deserted as it looks right now, if people sometimes drop ashore here?” remarked Josh, his interest at once aroused.
“Look here and tell me what you see,” the other lad continued, as he pointed to the ground near his feet.
“Say, as sure as you live, it is, for a fact,” exclaimed Josh. “Looks like they’d done a heap of passing up and down this way, too. D’ye know, Jack, I wondered what those marks on the little beach meant, and now I understand. Boats, that’s what; boats that have been drawn up there when the water was higher than it is now.”
“Yes, I saw them,” said Jack, quietly. “In fact, I looked to find such marks on the sand. And this broad trail began there, too.”
“Oh! I’m beginning to tumble to a few things. I guess that in the season, this same tight little island may be a place for duck shooters to hold out. Perhaps we might even find an old deserted shanty somewhere back yonder in which they camp out during the blustery fall months.”
“Hold on, Josh,” remarked Jack. “Is that all you know about signs?”
“Why, whatever do you mean?” asked the other, puzzled.
“Take another squint at these marks, and then tell me what you think, Josh.”
“Say, I tumble to what you mean!” exclaimed Josh, after he had bent down once more. “You expect me to say that if these marks had been made months ago, with a winter’s ice and snow, and a summer’s heavy rains, they’d have been washed out long ago. And so they would, Jack, so they would. You’re right about it. They’ve been made lately! They look fresh, for a fact!”