There were the tracks in the mud of a big man.  He had sprawled, falling on his hands and knees.  Here was the print of his hands several times, and in the mud, half hidden, something shining—­Guy saw it first and picked it up.  It was a white-handled Colt’s revolver.

“Let’s see that,” said Caleb.  He wiped off the mud.  His eye kindled.  “That’s my revolver that was stole from me ’way back, time I lost my clothes and money.”  He looked it over and, glancing about, seemed lost in thought.  “This beats me!” He shook his head and muttered from time to time, “This beats me!” There seemed nothing more of interest to see, so the boys turned homeward.

On the way back Caleb was evidently thinking hard.  He walked in silence till they got opposite Granny de Neuville’s shanty, which was the nearest one to the grave.  At the gate he turned and said:  “Guess I’m going in here.  Say, Yan, you didn’t do any of that hollering last night, did you?”

“No, sir; not a word.  The only sound I made was dragging the ring-stone over the boulder.”

“Well, I’ll see you at camp,” he said, and turned in to Granny’s.

“The tap o’ the marnin’ to ye, an’ may yer sowl rest in pace,” was the cheery old woman’s greeting.  “Come in—­come in, Caleb, an’ set down.  An’ how is Saryann an’ Dick?”

“They seem happy an’ prosperin’,” said the old man with bitterness.  “Say, Granny, did you ever hear the story about Garney’s grave out there on the road?”

“For the love av goodness, an’ how is it yer after askin’ me that now?  Sure an’ I heard the story many a time, an’ I’m after hearin’ the ghost last night, an’ it’s a-shiverin’ yit Oi am.”

“What did you hear, Granny?”

“Och, an’ it was the most divilish yells iver let out av a soul in hell.  Shure the Dog and the Cat both av thim was scairt, and the owld white-faced cow come a-runnin’ an’ jumped the bars to get aff av the road.”

Here was what Caleb wanted, and he kept her going by his evident interest.  After she tired of providing more realistic details of the night’s uproar, Caleb deliberately tapped another vintage of tittle-tattle in hope of further information leaking out.

“Granny, did you hear of a robbery last week down this side of Downey’s Dump?”

“Shure an’ I did not,” she exclaimed, her eyes ablaze with interest—­neither had Caleb, for that matter; but he wanted to start the subject—­“An” who was it was robbed?”

“Don’t know, unless it was John Evans’s place.”

“Shure an’ I don’t know him, but I warrant he could sthand to lose.  Shure an’ it’s when the raskils come after me an’ Cal Conner the moment it was talked around that we had sold our Cow; then sez I, it’s gittin’ onraisonable, an’ them divils shorely seems to know whin a wad o’ money passes.”

“That’s the gospel truth.  But when wuz you robbed, Granny?”