The household, save for the younger children, was early astir--before sunrise. Mrs. Blossom had prepared a hearty breakfast, and Rose was rolling up a few pairs of her father's stockings to put in the netted saddle-bag which Chi was wont to use in hunting.
"Tell March to call Chi, Rose," said her mother. "His breakfast is ready, I hear him in the barn."
Rose ran out in the dawning light to find her father and March just coming towards the house.
"Why, where 's Chi?" she cried.
For answer, her father pointed to the woodlands. She looked just in time to see in the soft gray of the early morn the horse and rider rise to the three-railed fence that separated the pasture from the woodlands. He was following the trail he had indicated to Jack--"through the woods 'n' acre or two of brush, 'n' then some pretty steep sliding down the other side, 'n' a dozen rods or so of swimmin', 'n' a tough old clamber up the bank--"
Some ten days afterward, late on a warm afternoon in May, there rode into New York City by the way of the Bronx and Harlem, a middle-aged man on a bright bay horse. The animal's gait was a noticeable one, a long, loping gallop, that covered the ground in a manner that roused the admiration of the drivers on the speedway. The tall, loose-jointed body of the rider apparently loped along with the horse--their movements were identical. The saddle was an old-fashioned cavalry one of the early sixties. A netted saddle-bag and a rolled rubber coat were fastened to the crupper. A light-weight hunting rifle was slung on a strap over the man's shoulder. At the northern entrance to the Park he drew rein beside a mounted policeman.
"Can you tell me if I 'm on the right track to this house?"
He took a card from the pocket of his dusty blue flannel shirt and handed it to the policeman.
The city guardian nodded assent. "But you can't take that gun along with you; you 're inside city limits and liable to arrest."
"'Gainst the law, hey? Well, I 've come from a pretty law-abiding state, 'n' ain't goin' to get into rows with you fellers--" He laid a brown, knotty, work-roughened finger on the policeman's immaculate blue coat--"I 'd trust that color as far as I could see. Where shall I leave the rifle?"