ng been here, or at least of having passed through
the glade on his way to the deeper woods."

"And what, if you had succeeded in this, sir? What, if some token of his
presence had rewarded your search?"

"I should have completed a chain of proof of which only this one link is
lacking. I could have shown how Craik Mansell fled from this place on
last Tuesday afternoon, making his way through the woods to the highway,
and thence to the Quarry Station at Monteith, where he took the train
which carried him back to Buffalo."

"You could!--show me how?"

Mr. Byrd explained himself more definitely.

Hickory at once rose.

"I guess we can give you the link," he dryly remarked. "At all events,
suppose you just step here and tell me what conclusion you draw from the
appearance of this pile of brush."

Mr. Byrd advanced and looked at a small heap of hemlock that lay in a
compact mass in one corner.

"I have not disturbed it," pursued the other. "It is just as it was when
I found it."

"Looks like a pillow," declared Mr. Byrd. "Has been used for such, I am
sure; for see, the dust in this portion of the floor lies lighter than
elsewhere. You can almost detect the outline of a man's recumbent form,"
he went on, slowly, leaning down to examine the floor more closely. "As
for the boughs, they have been cut from the tree with a knife, and----"
Lifting up a sprig, he looked at it, then passed it over to Hickory,
with a meaning glance that directed attention to one or two short hairs
of a dark brown color, that were caught in the rough bark. "He did not
even throw his pocket-handkerchief over the heap before lying down," he
observed.

Mr. Hickory smiled. "You're up in your business, I see." And drawing his
new colleague to the table, he asked him what he saw there.

At first sight Mr. Byrd exclaimed: "Nothing," but in another moment he
picked up an infinitesimal chip from between the rough logs that formed
the top of this somewhat rustic piece of furniture, and turning it over
in his hand, pronounced it to be a piece of wood from a lead-pencil.

"Here are several of them," remarked Mr. Hickory, "and what is more, it
is easy to tell just the color of the pencil from which they were cut.
It was blue."

"That is so," assented Mr. Byrd.

"Quarrymen, charcoal-burners, and the like are not much in the habit of
sharpening pencils," suggested Hickory.

"Is the pencil now to be found in the pocket of Mr. Mansell a blue one?"