“Thank you,” said Harry. “Come on, Kid, we’ll go up there. We don’t need to get up Bulwagga Mountain before night.”
The distance to Buck Mansion was somewhere between one mile and ten, and the way led them through a fragrant country with houses at intervals along the road. To-day the distance was rather shorter than usual, or else the “scout pace” helped to make it seem so, for within an hour the boys reached a spacious white house, standing well back from the road. The lawn in front was covered with trees, where a number of hammocks hung. The fence skirting the road was broken in one place by a little summer-house containing a pump, and the half of a cocoanut shell hung near by way of a cup.
The position of this little well-house on the very edge of the public road afforded a tempting resting-place for tired wayfarers. Through the trees the boys could see that a deer’s head with spreading antlers hung over the doorway of the house. On the deep porch easy-chairs stood about, and in a frame swing to one side of the lawn a solitary figure sat writing. With this exception, not a soul was to be seen, which seemed odd in a spot that afforded such tempting facilities for idleness and repose.
“The deserted village,” said Harry, “but I guess this is the place, all right.”
Just then voices reached the boys through the trees:
“Shall I come to you?”
“No, try to go out.”
“She’s for that wicket.”
“She can’t get through.”
“I could send her down to you.”