“Glad you didn’t then,” said Ruth, promptly.  “Poor little thing.”

“Ya-as,” drawled the boy. “‘Poor little thing.’  It was just aiming for somebody’s hencoop.  One of ’em ’ll eat chickens faster than Gran’s hens can hatch ’em out.”

Pushing on through the woods at this slow pace brought them to the ruined grist mill and the old dam not before ten o’clock.  There was a pale and watery moon, the shine of which glistened on the falling water over the old logs of the dam, but gave the searchers little light.  The moon’s rays merely aided in making the surroundings of the mill more ghostly.

Nobody lived within a mile of the mill site, Curly assured the girls, and if Amy had found this place it was not likely that she had likewise found the nearest human habitation, for that was beyond the mill and directly opposite to Briarwood and the town of Lumberton.

They shouted for Amy, and then searched the ghostly premises of the ruined mill.  Years before the roof had been burned away and some of the walls fallen in.  Owls made their nests in the upper part of the building, as the party found, much to the girls’ excitement when a huge, spread-winged creature dived out of a window and went “whish! whish! whish!” off through the long grass, to hunt for mice or other small, night-prowling creatures.

“Goodness! that owl is as big as a turkey!” gasped Ruth, clinging to Ann in her fright.

“Bigger,” announced Curly.  “Old Scratch!  I’d like to shoot him and have him stuffed.”

“I’d rather have some of the turkey stuffing,” chuckled Ann Hicks.  “Owl would be rather tough, I reckon.”

“Oh, not to eat!” scoffed Curly.  “I’d put him in Gran’s parlor.  And that reminds me of an owl story——­”

“Don’t tell us any old stories; tell us new ones, if you must tell any,” Ann interrupted.

“How do you know whether this is old or young till I’ve told it?” demanded Curly, as they all three sat on the ruined doorstep of the mill to rest.

“Quite right, Curly,” sighed Ruth.  “Go ahead.  Make us laugh.  I feel like crying.”

“Then you can cry over it,” retorted the boy.  “There was a butcher who had a stuffed owl in his shop and an old Irishman came in and asked him:  ’How mooch for the broad-faced bur-r-rd?’

“‘It’s an owl,’ said the butcher.

“The old man repeated his question—­’how mooch for the broad-faced bur-r-rd?’

“‘It’s an owl, I tell you!’ exclaimed the butcher.

“‘I know it’s ould,’ says the Irishman.  ’But what d’ye want for it?  It’ll make soup for me boar-r-rders!’”

“That’s a good story,” admitted Ruth, “but try to think up some way of finding poor little Amy, instead of telling funny tales.”

“Oh, how can I help——­”

Curly stopped.  Ann, who was sitting in the middle, grabbed both him and Ruth.  “Listen to that!” she whispered. “That isn’t another owl, is it?”