“I was going on to other houses in search of provisions,” Clay went on, “but your mother advised me that it wouldn’t be safe.”
“She told me,” Clay resumed, “that it was never safe in this section when three blue lights burned on the river.”
“Did she, now?” asked the boy. “And did you-all see the three blue lights?”
“Twice,” answered Clay. “Last night and the night before—once opposite Wolf Creek and once in the lagoon at that odd-shaped island just up the stream.”
Clay thought that the boy shivered a little in his ragged clothes.
“What is all this about the three blue lights?” he asked in a moment.
“We-uns ain’t allowed to talk about the three blue lights,” he answered.
“You think they are ghost lights, eh?” asked Clay.
“We-uns ain’t allowed to talk about the three blue lights,” repeated the boy. “We never mention them.”
Seeing that further conversation with the boy was likely to prove without result, Clay again turned to face in the direction of the river.
“I wish I knew,” he mused, as he pushed his way through tangled thickets and descended and ascended rocky slopes, “I wish I knew exactly why that woman came near fainting when I mentioned the three blue lights.
“I have an impression,” he went on, “that there’s some feud coming to life. In the first place, I don’t believe the story told at the stranded coal barges last night.
“Those men never sought the river with the intentions of destroying that steamer. They wouldn’t have brought their horses along if that had been their object.
“The horses, of course, might have been used in the way of transportation to the river, but, at the same time, men out on such a mission would not care to be seen riding so openly through the country.”
It is needless to say that the boy did not believe one word of the story told him by the woman who had given him his breakfast. He was too hard-headed to believe in ghosts or supernatural demonstrations of any sort.
He knew however, that there must be some reason for the display of the lights, and knew that no little ingenuity had been shown in the placing and extinguishing of them. So studying over the problem, the boy finally came to the little cove where he had left Case and Jule.
Captain Joe fawned about him as he advanced, but when he approached the thicket where the boys had been preparing their rough beds, he saw that they were not there. He lost no time in making a close examination of the ground, both at the landing and at the entrance to the thicket.