irst her circle was a wide one, Janus following her
example by beginning well out beyond the trees. Harriet's smoking
torch was held close to the ground, sweeping from side to side, the
torch bearer assuming a crouching position with head well lowered, body
bent almost double.

"Look out!" shouted Tommy, as Harriet came abreast of her party.

"Wha--at?" Harriet straightened up sharply. "What is it!"

"You will burn your nothe, if you don't look out."

"Oh, Tommy!" Harriet laughed merrily. "Is that all?"

"I was thinking the same thing," chuckled the guide. "Wish I could
bend over like that. But don't bother us, little one. This is our
busy night, and right serious business it is, too." The laughter
disappeared from his face and Janus bent low to his task.

The others of the party had either seated themselves on the ground or
leaned against trees. They chatted while the guide and Harriet Burrell
sought for the true trail, but it was not very encouraging work.

The two torches flickered and smoked weirdly, now and then becoming
mere glows like distant lamps in a fog, as the bearer slipped behind a
tree or was masked by an intervening growth of bushes whose foliage was
very thick and dense.

"Oh, Mr. Grubb, who of our party has brass-headed tacks in his boot
heels?" called Harriet.

"I have. Why?"

"I found a heel mark that gave me that impression," answered Harriet
laughingly.

"Well, I swum!"

"It was a guess about their being brass-headed, though," she admitted.

"You would have made a prize sheriff, Little Brownie," declared the
guide, gazing at her admiringly. "If I'd had you to nose the trail
when I was after Red Tacy and Charlie Valdes it wouldn't have taken me
a matter of two months to get them."

"Who are they?"

"A couple of outlaws who turned things upside down in these hills some
years ago. But I got them both. They are serving terms up at Concord
now. Find anything?"

"No, sir."

The circles were steadily narrowing, though the man and the girl were
working slowly and deliberately, really covering the ground by inches,
so thorough was their search for clues of the supposed night visitors.
No spot of the size of a hand escaped the keen scrutiny of one or the
other of them. They could not have answered had they been asked what
particular thing they had hoped to find, but in some vague way each
felt that a clue to the mystery would be turned up as a result of their
search. I