spot.
She went fearfully, with uneasy laughter, where Hank led. They stopped
beside the tree where she and Jack had talked the other day. Hank
pointed down at the telltale snow.

"It's dead easy to read tracks," he drawled, "when they's fresh and
plain as what these are. They's four cigarette butts, even, to show
how long the feller stood here talkin' to the girl. And behind the
tree it's all tromped up, where he waited fer her to come, most
likely. You kin see where his tracks comes right out from behind the
tree to the place where they stood talkin'. An' behind the tree there
ain't no cigarette butts a-tall--an' that's when a feller most
generally smokes--when he's passin' the time waitin' fer somebody. An'
here's a string--like as if it had been pulled offn a package an'
throwed away. An' over there on that bush is the paper the string was
tied aroun'--wind blowed it over there, I guess." He waded through the
snow to where the paper had lodged, and picked it up. "It's even got a
pos'mark onto it," he announced, "and part of the address. It must
a'been quite a sizable package, 'cause it took foteen cents to send it
from Los Angeles to Miss Marion--"

"Why, what do you know about that!" cried Marion abruptly, bringing
her hands together animatedly. "All that's left of my opera fudge that
one of the girls sent me!" She took the paper and glanced at it
ruefully. "I remember now--that was the time Fred was sure he'd get
a--" she stopped herself and looked at him archly--"a jack-rabbit. And
I said I'd come out and help him carry it home. But he didn't have
any luck at all--why, of course, I remember! Meeting the professor
with the mail, and bringing the candy along to eat if we got
hungry--and we did too. And Fred hid behind the tree and scared
me--why, Mr. Brown, I think you're perfectly wonderful, to figure that
all out just from the tracks! I should think you'd be a detective. I'm
sure there isn't a detective in the country that could beat
you--really, they are stupid alongside of such work as this. But I
hope the tracks won't tell you what Fred said about not getting
the--er--the rabbit he shot at!" She laughed up into his face. "You
might tell," she accused him playfully, "and get us all into trouble.
I'm awfully afraid of you, Mr. Brown. I am really."

Hank Brown could read tracks fairly well, but he could not read women
at all. His puzzled gaze went from Marion's laughing face to the
tracks in the snow; from th