"I was walking with Margie on the Common in Boston. A big man came up to us. He sat down on a park bench and took me on his knee. He had toys in his pocket for me. Were you the man, sir?"
"I was," said Mr. Devering, "and that was only one of many visits, but come on, lad, we are losing time."
Dallas shook his young head with a puzzled air and followed him.
I trotted gaily after, my heart as gay as a lark's. After two long months with a horse dealer, I was once more in a family with boys and girls that I love so dearly. What fun I should have watching them and wondering why they do the queer things they do.
"Oh! you hurry-upper," my boy was saying now, "you beat this Sub."
He was addressing Mr. Devering, whose broad back was just visible in the dim green distance, and suddenly picking up his young heels he ran after him.
Of course I ran after the boy, and as I ran I looked about me.
This was a peculiar trail we were on. We had left the nice wide road and had branched off toward the western hills and the afternoon sun. At first there had been grand old maples and beeches standing in groups about pastures each side of us where the black and white Holstein cows were feeding. Now, however, the pastures had given place to dense evergreens which made my young master shudder. There were masses of them standing very close to each other and holding stiff arms across our trail. Precious little of the sun did we see, and it was necessary to keep one's eyes on the path which wound up and down into dark green hollows where beds of maidenhair fern flourished, or up to hilly spots where rock ferns grew in patches on enormous boulders.
Little brownish streamlets ran across our track, and the boy was always jumping over or going on stepping stones to keep his feet from getting wet.
Suddenly Mr. Devering paused. "Sub," he called back, "this used to be an old road leading up to a farm on Lonesome Hill. Mr. Talker, who brought you in, lived here. It was a mile from our main road and it was a great haul to get supplies in."