Jones gazed vacantly at his cowhide boots. Nick decided to try him on another tack. “Do you do much business here?” he asked agreeably. “Some,” said Jones. “Taken any strangers over lately?” “One.” “Man or woman?” “A she.” “When was that?” “Last Friday.” “Three days ago,” thought Nick, a bit amused. “He’s not getting rich at that canter with this old tub. It would take a corkscrew, moreover, to draw anything out of him. I’ll try once more.” “Who runs that place a quarter mile down the stream?” he inquired. “Sign’s on the building,” said Jones, rowing steadily and vigorously. “I cannot read it at this distance.” “Name’s Ardley.” “Do you know him.” “Yep.” “Anything about him?” “Nope.” “Does he employ any help?” “Wife. No one else. Lookin’ for a job?” “By Jove, he’s loosening up,” thought Nick, laughing inwardly. Further inquiries evoked nothing of any importance from the taciturn ferryman, however, who landed his passenger, accepted his fee with a grin, and immediately pushed off his rude craft and started to return. Nick found himself at the end of a narrow lane, about a stone’s throw from two small dwellings, and he rightly inferred that it led to a more pretentious road running through the woodland farther back from the river. He arrived at it a few minutes later, then turned his steps in the direction of the Ardley place. A walk of a quarter mile brought him to a narrow road leading down to it. Nick then paused and took from his pocket four pieces of the blue veil, which he had retained after picking them up on the opposite side of the river. “If Chick has found any since we parted, and if my suspicions are correct, he by this time has crossed the bridge mentioned by Dugan, and he must be coming in this direction. I’ll leave a trail for him that he can not mistake. If he finds four pieces of the veil here, instead of one, he will reason that I must have put them here, for the girl would not have dropped four in one spot. That will show him the way.” Nick dropped one blue fragment in the middle of the main road. He then placed the other three where they could not be overlooked, and in a line plainly denoting the direction he was about to take. He lingered only to carefully put on a disguise which he thought would serve his purpose. “Now, for Mr. Ardley,” he said to himself, striding rapidly down the diverging road. Something like three hundred yards through the woods brought him to a clearing back of the dwelling of the now suspected man. Off to the right was the faded old building used for his rubber business. One end of the clearing was covered with old boxes, barrels, and a huge pile of refuse. Beyond the building, which was close upon the bank of the river, could be seen one end of a deep wooden sluice, in which revolved the wheel from which Ardley evidently derived the power to operate machinery of some kind.