[CHAPTER XII]
ELDREDGE REJECTS A SUBSTITUTE
Joe made his leisurely way along the lane, his feet rustling the leaves that littered the grassy path. There had been a frost during the night and in shaded places it still glistened. When he had left the lane and was making his way between the old tumbledown shed with its piles of crumbling bricks and one of the clay pits he saw that there was a skim of ice on the water below him. It was a morning that induced a fine feeling of well-being, that made the blood course quickly and would have put a song on Joe’s lips had he been able to sing a note. As it was, he whistled instead.
Ahead of him was a smallish shed, perhaps at one time the office. Some rusted barrows and pieces of machinery lay about it. As it presented the only place of concealment in sight, Joe concluded that it was the place of appointment. Eldredge, however, had not arrived. Joe made sure of that by looking on all sides of the building and peering into the interior through a paneless window. So he seated himself in the sunlight and philosophically waited.
Some ten minutes passed and then he heard footsteps and presently around the corner appeared Paul Eldredge and Sam Rogers. Joe frowned. Eldredge shouldn’t have brought a second fellow without telling Myron of his intention. The newcomers stopped in surprise when they saw Joe, and after an instant Eldredge said: “Hello! Have you seen—Is Foster here?”
“Hello,” replied Joe. “Foster? No, he isn’t coming.”
“Isn’t coming!” exclaimed Eldredge. Then he laughed. “What do you know about that? What did I tell you, Sam?”
Rogers nodded. “I know. You said he wouldn’t.”
“Fact is,” said Joe, “he can’t.”
“Can’t, eh? I suppose he’s sick,” sneered Eldredge.