“It was early, and the day was misty, but we could see plain enough, and we saw all that stuff knocking about as plain as I see you now. There was a big timber in my way—a stick—well, thirty feet long and two feet or two and a half square, so that I had to raise my foot high to clear it; I stepped one leg over, and drew the other along to feel it, but it didn’t touch anything; then I stopped and looked down—there was no timber there; I looked back towards the sea—the drift had disappeared, the barrels and boxes and truck of one sort or another was gone. There was nothing on shore nor in the water. Now you may laugh, but ’Lige knows whether what I’ve told you is true.”
“Bill, that is a pretty good story, but it is not the one I meant,” persisted the individual who had commenced the attack.
“Well, another time, Zeph and I were at work getting the copper bolts out of an old wreck, when we happened to look up and saw two carriages coming along, up the beach. I spoke to Zeph about it, but as they came along slowly, we went on with our work, and when we looked up again there was only one. That came on closer and closer till I could tell the horses; they were two bays of squire Jones’ down at the inlet; they drove right on towards us till they were so near that I did not like to stare the people in the face, and looked down again to my work. There were two men, and I saw them so plain that I should know ’em anywhere. Well, I raised my head a second after, and they were gone; and there never had been any wagon, for Zeph and I hunted all over the beach to find the tracks in the sand.”
“I guess that was another misty day, and you hadn’t had your eye-opener,” was the appreciative response.
“No, it was three o’clock in the day, and bright sunshine; but at that time, as near as can be, Tommy Smith was drowned down at the inlet, and the very next day at the very same hour, the ’Squire’s wagon did come up the beach, with the same two men driving, and the body in a box in the back part.”
“Now, Bill,” continued the persistent individual, “this is all very well, but it is not the story. Come, out with it; you know what I mean.”
Bill fell silent, again looking off into the distance as though he saw something that others could not see; he pulled away nervously on his pipe, which had gone out, but answered not.
“Bill’s afraid;” was the tantalizing suggestion.
“There’s Sam,” said Bill suddenly; “he’s not afeard of man or devil; ask him what he saw.”
The person referred to was a large, broad-shouldered, pleasant-faced man, with a clear blue eye that looked as though it would not quail easily, and he responded at once: