“Yes, they were New York plates,” Judy replied. “John Beer was trying to sell Sammis some furniture. I thought at first it might be display cases or something he’d made, because it said on the truck that he was a carpenter. But now I remember hearing him say, ‘This is good furniture. I’ve sanded and refinished everything—’”
“And the truck came from New York State?”
“It must have.” Judy began to see the importance of what she had just told Peter. If stolen goods had been transported across state lines it would be his duty, not only to report it, but to act upon his report.
“I’ll drive to the nearest telephone and be right back,” he promised. “You wait for me at the beaver dam. If you see Danny maybe you can get him to talk. Keep this picture and show it to him.”
“The ‘ghost picture’!” Judy exclaimed as Peter handed it to her. “What do you want me to do, scare him to death?”
Peter laughed. “It may give him a jolt. But you can explain the lady’s face—”
“A lot easier than I can explain some other things,” Judy finished.
She didn’t think of the woods as being lonely until Peter was gone. The beaver dam, robbed of its lady, was nothing but a mass of mud and sticks. Ripples on the surface of the pond told her the beavers were there. They hadn’t dragged out any more furniture to repair their dam. They had moved a stone. Or had someone moved it for them?
Suddenly Judy became uneasy. She had been keeping perfectly still with her camera focused on the pond. Now she whirled around with it as something moved in the bushes behind her.
“It’s only a beaver,” she said to herself, relief flooding over her. She had imagined the man in the “ghost picture” stealing stealthily through the woods. But that was silly. Peter wouldn’t have left her if there had been any danger. Without moving from where she stood, she began to take pictures.