“Right where, son?”

“Do you see that clump of bushes, the ones with the bully red leaves?  Well, it was close to them.  It moved just when I happened to look that way.  I give you my word, Maurice.”

“All right.  We’ll find out quick enough, I reckon,” remarked the other, with that decisive ring in his voice which Thad knew so well.

“Now what are you goin’ to do, pard?  Don’t be too rash.  Remember what Mr. Stallings, said,” and Thad laid a restraining hand on his chum’s arm.

But Maurice was not to be daunted.

“Fall in behind me, then.  I’m going up to the bushes and see for myself what it was.  Ten to one it must have been a muskrat out of the swamp; or perhaps a fox, prowling around for his grub.”

He cocked both barrels of the Marlin, and the act must have instilled new courage in the heart of Thad, for he immediately removed his detaining hand.

“All right, then; go ahead.  If he jumps for you, poke the old gun in his face.”

He stooped down and secured possession of a stout cudgel himself, as though he felt inclined to back up his comrade after a fashion.

In this manner they slowly approached the clump of bushes, where the frost had turned the leaves to rusty red color.

Maurice was on the alert for any sign of trouble.  He even passed partly around the clump, without discovering anything to indicate the presence of an enemy.

When he had made sure that the bushes did not conceal a lurking figure, he turned to Thad with a grin.

“Went off in smoke, I reckon.  A fellow who can see a hanging coon in a bundle of burlap strung up to a tree might imagine anything, it seems to me,” he said a little sarcastically.

Thad looked somewhat sheepish.

He allowed his head to droop, and shrugged his shoulders.

“I did see something move, I tell you.  It seemed to skip back out of sight, like it didn’t want me to get my peepers on it,” he said, with a conviction that would not be denied.

“All right.  I hear you; but please show me the animal or human being.  I’m willing to be convinced, Thad.”

The other started to smile.

“I reckon I can’t show you the thing that was here, Maurice, but I might do the next best thing,” he said, eagerly.

“What’s that—­point out it’s shadow?” jeered the other, still skeptical.

“A smoke ghost don’t leave any marks behind, does it?”

“Well, I don’t know.  I wouldn’t like to say, since I never ran up against one.  But why do you make that remark, brother?”

“Looky there!”

Thad dramatically pointed down at his feet as he spoke, and Maurice, turning his gaze in that quarter, instantly saw something that caused him to draw in a quick breath and involuntarily clutch the gun with a gesture of alarm.

There were plain marks on the ground, and even as inexperienced woodsmen as the two boys could easily see that these had undoubtedly been made by the big feet of a shuffling man!