Part 7 (2/2)
”Correct for you, Lil Artha, for that's what happened,” Elmer acknowledged.
”Is it a knife, Elmer?” continued the tall scout.
”Once more you hit it,” said the other; ”and Landy, since you say you've been going more or less with Hen lately, perhaps you'd be apt to know his knife if you happened to set eyes on it?”
”To be sure I would, Elmer.”
”You've handled it then, have you?”
”Lots of times, because you see I lost my own frog-sticker some weeks back, and I ain't had a birthday since to get a new one,” Landy confessed.
”That sounds good to me,” Elmer told him; ”so now take a look at this, and tell us what you think.”
With that he brought his hand around, having been keeping it behind his back all this time. When he opened it there was disclosed a common, every-day jack-knife with a buckhorn handle, such as might be expected to be found in the pocket of almost any lad, and capable, when given a keen edge, of performing miracles in the way of shaving sticks and cutting up apples.
So Landy gravely, though eagerly, took up the knife. He opened the big blade and seemed interested in a certain nick he found there.
”Elmer, that settles it,” he said, finally; ”it's Hen's knife, I'm positive; and it must have been him that was hanging from this tree a bit ago!”
CHAPTER VI
BOUND FOR Sa.s.sAFRAS SWAMP
When Landy Smith settled the matter in this convincing fas.h.i.+on, the rest of the scouts showed more or less interest in the outcome.
”That proves one thing,” a.s.serted Toby; ”Hen Condit is up here, all right.”
”It proves a whole lot of things, according to my opinion,” added Lil Artha as he nodded his head in a way he had of emphasizing his remarks; ”it tells us Hen is in bad company, for the second fellow must be the man he was seen with the other day in Hickory Ridge town.”
”According to my notion, fellows,” said Mark, seriously, ”the hand of that same unknown man stands back of all poor Hen's troubles. Until that party was seen in this part of the country, Hen didn't seem to have a single worry. He was always as light-hearted a chap as you could find in a week of Sundays.”
”What under the sun can it mean?” queried Landy, looking distressed; because, truth to tell, he and the missing scout had been getting quite fond of one another lately, and the shock had told upon Landy much more than any other boy belonging to the Wolf Patrol.
”I tell you what I think,” ventured Ted Burgoyne just then; ”that man mutht have hypnotized Hen. I don't thee how elth he could make him do whatever he wants. Yeth, I even believe he forced Hen to wite that letter. Needn't laugh, Lil Artha, I've been reading it all up lately, and there are thome queer happeningth along the line of hypnothism.”
”Elmer, how about that; do you believe in it?” asked Lil Artha, who was known to be pretty much of a scoffer in his way.
”I decline to commit myself--just yet at any rate,” laughed the patrol leader. ”I confess that queer things do happen, and a fellow who always refuses to believe because he doesn't understand is silly. But we do know this unknown man has some kind of influence over our chum; what it is we're going to find out before we're many days older.”
”I like to hear you say that, Elmer,” cried Landy, ”because I just seem to believe the thing's more'n half done when you put _your_ hand to the plough. I can't help but think how poor Hen must be feeling right now, after getting himself in such a fix.”
”How about those tracks we started out to find?” asked Toby just then.
”We'll give another look before closing shop,” replied the patrol leader. ”Just fetch the lantern over, Johnny; they'd be apt to head away from the barn.”
It was really in the direction of the near-by swamp that they now commenced to look. The wisdom of Elmer's figuring was soon made manifest, for they quickly ran across what they were looking for.
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