An hour passed by in this manner.  When Max saw their visitor showing signs as if he meant to leave them, he took a hand in the conversation, which up to then had been almost wholly monopolized by Bandy-legs, Steve and the woods boy.

“It’s very kind of you to invite us over to inspect this wonderful little fur farm of yours, Obed,” he went on to say; “but you’ll have to give us directions how we can get there, unless you mean to accept our offer of a blanket by the fire here tonight, when we could go along with you in the morning.”

Obed looked sober.

“I’d like to stay longer with you, boys,” he hastened to say, as though he really meant it, “but I ought tuh be gettin’ back home.  Thar’s some duties waitin’ for me to look after.  And then I ain’t quite easy in my mind ’bout them two fellers that’s up here in the woods.  They ain’t meanin’ to do any shootin’, even if they have got Lem Scott along as a guide, and he the meanest skunk in the hull county, lots o’ folks do say, and a poacher in the bargain that the wardens are layin’ to grab one o’ these fine days.  Now I’ll jest up and tell yuh how to get to my place.  It’s as easy as water runnin’ down-hill.”

He entered into explicit directions, and Max pinned them in his memory.  In fact, Obed simply told them to follow the stream up three miles until they came to a bunch of seven birch trees on the right-hand bank.  There they were to pick up a trail they would find, follow it half a mile, and at that they would see a cabin under the hemlocks and pines, which would be his humble home woods.

“We’ve got it all down pat, Obed,” said Steve, “and like as not you’ll see the bunch of us trailing along there some time tomorrow morning.  I’ve always been crazy to see a fur farm, after reading so much about them, and you bet I don’t mean to let this chance slip by me.”

Max now thought it time to make a few inquiries himself.  He wanted to ask Obed whether he had ever run across a boy by the name of Roland Chase, a sickly looking chap in the bargain.  It might possible to pick up a clue in this way; and they had reached a point where they could not afford to let any opportunity for acquiring information get past them.

In order to pursue this course, however, Max realized that it would be necessary to enter into some sort of explanation concerning the nature of the peculiar errand that had tempted them to come to the Adirondacks.

“I want to ask you a question or two, Obed,” he began, “but first of all I ought to tell you what brings us here.”

Accordingly, Max proceeded to explain how the school had be closed for two or more weeks in early October, and what a singular thing came about to tempt them into taking an outing.  He was watching the woods boy at the time he first mentioned Mrs. Hopewell, and spoke the name of Roland Chase; but if the other gave any unusual signs of interest, Max failed to catch the same.  Still, Obed was listening with all his might, and it seemed as though the unusual story of the inheritance that was to be given to the said Roland in case he made good, interested him.