e Grider explanation, while Prime clung to
it simply because he could not invent any other. Yet it was borne in
upon him that the mystery was edging away from the Grider hypothesis in
spite of all he could do. There was nothing to connect the two canoemen,
fighting over the purse of gold, with Grider, or with the abduction of a
school-teacher and a writer of stories; yet there were pointings here,
too, if one might read them. Why were the five fires lighted in the
glade unless it were for a signal of some sort? Prime wished from the
bottom of his heart that he could set the keen mentality of his
companion at work on this latest phase of the mystery, but with the dead
men lying stiff and still at the bottom of their pool less than a
stone's throw away, his courage failed him and his lips were sealed.

VI

CANOEDLINGS

ON the fifth morning--their third at the peninsula camp--Prime
registered a solemn vow to make this the last day of the entirely
unnecessary delay. More and more he was tormented by the fear that the
dead men might escape from their weightings and rise to become a menace
to Lucetta's sanity or his own; and, though he had been given the best
possible proof that his companion was above reproach in the matter of
calm courage and freedom from hysteria, he meant to take no chances--for
her or for himself.

At his suggestion they began the day by making another essay at the
paddling, embarking in the emptied canoe shortly after breakfast.
Gaining a little facility after an hour or so, they headed the
birch-bark downstream past the point which they had reached the previous
afternoon, and soon found themselves in a quickening current. Prime,
kneeling in the bow, gave the word, and Lucetta obeyed it.

"We'll try the quick water," he flung back to her. "We'll have to have
the experience, and we had better get it with the empty canoe, rather
than with the load."

This seemed logical, but it led to results. In a short time the shores
grew rocky and there was no safe place to land. Moreover, the little
river was now running so swiftly that they were afraid to try to turn
around. Rapid after rapid was passed in vain struggles to stop the
triumphal progress, and if the canoe's lading had been aboard, Prime
would have been entirely happy, since every rapid they shot was taking
them farther away from the scene of the tragedy. But the lading was n