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That young gentleman had been sending imploring looks in Betty's direction over Alice Jallow's head, which the former had chosen absolutely to ignore. Now, being thus appealed to, he smiled down at Alice. "It certainly was a grave oversight on our part," he said.
The boys started at the sight of the girls, and looked wonderingly at the man who was so evidently threatening them. "What's up, Sis?" demanded Will, striding forward. "Has this fellow been annoying you?" asked Allen. "I warned 'em away they are trespassing on Mr. Jallow's land," said the man, but his manner was much softened. Evidently the sight of the three young huntsmen had had a good effect.
"Now everybody keep quiet and listen," said Grace, when she had related how she and her chums had come to the winter camp, and how Mr. Jallow and his company had encroached on land that Mr. Ford believed was his own. "And it is his!" exclaimed Paddy. "The boundary lines have been changed. I can see that myself. It's that Jallow's work. Listen and I'll tell you how it happened.
Are you camping too?" "We are," said Mrs. Jallow, taking up the conversation. Evidently she did not propose to do as her daughter did, and not speak, for Alice, with a supercilious air, had not so much as addressed a word to the outdoor girls and their boy friends. "We are in one of Mr. Jallow's cabins. We like it very much." "Yes, it is nice," agreed Grace.
"But before that I had seen all I wanted to that was the changed boundary lines. Then I knew Jallow's game. He wanted to throw that valuable timber strip into his own land. I made some inquiries, and found that Mr. Ford still owned the lumber camp, and hadn't sold out, as Jallow told me.
"I'm from the court, and I have authority in this matter that goes above even Jallow's." "All I know is that my orders is not to let any one on here exceptin' Mr. Jallow's men," growled Hank. "Where is Mr. Jallow?" asked Mr. Ford. "Over there," and Hank pointed. "Then we'll settle with him. Drive on, Ted." "I don't see how I kin let ye!" whined Hank. He had lost much of his bluster now.
"Oh, we'll go," said Betty quickly, "but I don't see what harm we were doing. The woods seem all alike to me." "Well, mebbe ye wasn't doin' no particular harm," admitted the man in surly tones, "but my orders is to keep trespassers off, an' I'm goin' t' do it!" "It's hard to tell where Mr. Ford's land ends and Mr. Jallow's begins," said Mollie, looking for some sign of a boundary mark.
"Well, be you goin' t' git?" he finally asked. "I tell you this is private land, and Mr. Jallow don't allow nobody on it 'ceptin' them he hires." This gave Mollie an opening. "Oh, is this Mr. Jallow's land?" she asked, and her chums wondered at the sweetness of her tones. "It be," the burly guard replied, "an' you'd better git off."
"Oh, so this is Mr. Jallow's land?" inquired Allen quickly. "Is this the part that is in dispute?" "I don't know nothin' about no dispute," was the sullen response, "but I know what my orders are, and I'm going t' carry 'em out." "Far be it from us to stand in the way of you doing your duty," remarked Will pleasantly.
Those by which I went, when I had my survey made, had disappeared, and others which were accepted by the court seemed to indicate that the land was Jallow's. But I know better. I was there at the survey, and saw the marks. The trouble is that I couldn't prove it. My word alone was not enough, and the surveyor, I am sorry to say, is dead." "Then you can never prove it is your land, Daddy?"
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