elieving that, if
Peveril had really got himself into trouble, it would be in connection
with some of those people, he felt that it was a likely locality in
which to search for information. Accordingly he headed directly for
it, only going a short distance out of his way to visit Laughing Fish
Cove. Having heard that the fisher-folk were in league with the
smugglers, he did not care to betray his presence to them, and so did
not show himself in the little settlement, but only skirted it, until
certain that his friends were not there. Then he proceeded towards his
destination by the same trail that Peveril had followed only two
nights before.

As he walked slowly along the narrow pathway, trying to invent some
plausible excuse for presenting himself before the irascible old man
who, he had heard, excluded all strangers from "Darrell's Folly," his
steps were arrested by the sound of voices approaching from the
opposite direction. In another moment he saw three men hurrying
towards him, gesticulating wildly and talking loudly in an unknown
tongue.

As they drew near he recognized in them the three car-pushers recently
driven from the White Pine Mine. It also flashed into his mind that
these were the men whom he had urged to make a cowardly attack on the
young fellow he had then considered an enemy, but for whom he was now
searching as for a dear friend.

The new-comers also recognized him, and, regarding him as of one
purpose with themselves in all that concerned Peveril, did not
hesitate to advance and speak to him. After an exchange of greetings,
Connell broached the business in hand by asking if they had seen
anything in those parts of the chap who had driven them from White
Pine.

The men glanced at each other hesitatingly for a moment, and then
Rothsky answered:

"Yes, my friend, indeed we have seen him, and to our sorrow, since it
is but now that he has driven us from another job, better even than
that."

"How so?" inquired Connell, pricking up his ears.

"It is this way: We are working, at good wages, for the old fool over
yonder, when that devil of a Per'l comes and tries to steal our
timbers. Then the boss compels us to seize him and put him in his
boat, which we tow far out in the lake. Then, as he makes a try to
escape, the boss, who is like a man crazy, shoots him with a pistol
through the head, and we all see him fall without life in the bottom
of his boat. He is so very dead that he does not even m