“Perhaps it is,” returned Sleuth; “as true as the illuminated fiction someone politely sneered at a short time ago. If I had read it in a book, I’d taken it for just what it doubtless is, pure romance. To romance I have no objection whatever, but I certainly hate for anyone to try to cram it down my throat as truth.”
“Evidently you’re a doubting Thomas,” said the narrator of the legend, who was greatly surprised that, of them all, Piper should be the one promptly to brand the tale as fiction.
“No,” said Sleuth, “I’m a doubting William; Billy is my first name. It’s scarcely necessary for me to bring my penetrating and deductive faculties to bear upon that yarn in order to point out the ragged holes with which it is riddled. Who recorded this wonderful legend? Who knew all about the very thoughts of the beautiful Indian princess as she lay a captive in the lodge of the great war chief, her father? I haven’t anywhere read that the North American Indians could record things by any other method than that of picture writing of the crudest sort. And the old guy of a brave who recorded thoughts in that manner would be obliged to hump himself some. I wonder who faked up that yarn?”
“You seem inclined to take everything too literally,” said Granger, seeking to repress his resentment over Sleuth’s attitude. “Perhaps it has been touched up a bit and filled out in complete narrative form, but doubtless, in the main, the story is true.”
But Billy shrugged his shoulders and elevated his eyebrows significantly.
“It makes little difference whether you believe the story or not,” said the annoyed visitor. “A great many people do believe it.”
“There are always suckers ready to swallow anything,” retorted Sleuth. “Why, I suppose there are some people who actually believe this lake, or that island out yonder, in particular, to be haunted.”
A queer look passed over Granger’s face, and for a few moments he scrutinized Piper in a perplexed manner. At first he had imagined that of the young campers this lad would be the most ready and eager to accept such fanciful tales as truthful, or as containing a certain amount of truth, at least. It now seemed that this sentimental, imaginative boy was the most skeptical fellow among them.
“You may believe as much as you like,” he finally said; “or as little; it makes no difference to me. The story of Lovers’ Leap, as a story, sounds very well.”
“And you tell it fluently,” murmured Piper.