“Oh, Bruce recovered, of course, and married her, and they moved up into Canada. There’s the landing at the lumber trail.”
A few minutes later they drew the canoe out on the shore. A lumberman’s batteau was drawn up at one side, and they could hear voices ahead of them on the trail.
“A party going up to the Brown camp, I guess. I understand they’ve begun cutting about three miles back,” said Walter.
The boys set out at a brisk pace along the trail. “Avery says that the trail to the cabin is so overgrown that it’s hard to find, but that there is a Scout sign where it turns off of this trail, and then a line of old blazes,” said Hal. “It’s on the right a short half mile from the lake.”
The boys slackened their pace, scanning the right hand side of the trail as they advanced. Presently Walter stopped and pointed to a little group of stones half hidden in the brush to the right. It consisted of a stone of fair size with a smaller one resting on top of it and a third on the ground to the right of the others. Both boys recognized it as the old Indian sign which means “Trail to the right.”
Turning in they soon found a tree with a blaze so old that it was nearly covered with bark. Getting the direction from this they were able to sight the next blaze and so pick out the trail.
“Doesn’t look as if any one had been over this for an age,” said Hal as they carefully picked their way along.
In about fifteen minutes they saw an opening in the tree tops ahead and soon stepped out into what had once been a small clearing, but which was now overgrown with brush and berry thickets, and in places good stands of second growth birch and maple. In the midst of this dreary waste stood the “haunted cabin.”
The boys stood at a little distance and looked at it in silence for a few minutes, thinking of the tragedy which was said to have been enacted there. It was the usual type of log cabin, a one room affair with the remnants of a shed or small addition of some kind clinging to the rear. The cabin had been well built, for it was in a good state of preservation save that in places the roof had fallen, leaving black, yawning holes. It had been turfed at some time in its existence, and such parts as were intact were covered with a tangle of grass and weeds. Altogether it was a desolate and dreary looking object.
“Gee, I don’t wonder they think it’s haunted! Well, let’s see what it looks like inside,” said Walter.