They had occupied an hour and had gained nothing, and so the launch was unmoored and they went on again. Pud scowled at the sound of the exhaust and he and Tim discussed the possibility of damage from running on one cylinder. But there appeared nothing else to do but keep on, and so they kept on. The sun threatened once or twice to break through, but each time it changed its mind. However, the rain had practically stopped, and they discarded rubber coats. So far they had passed no one on their way, nor had they so much as glimpsed a house, but now, out of the pearly distance, appeared ahead what was without doubt a human habitation. ‘We’ll stop and ask them where we are,’ said Pud. The habitation, seen closer, was only a shanty, rickety and unpainted. A path led to a log which doubtless answered as a landing, although no boat was in sight. Pud steered the launch to the log and Tim, who had volunteered for the duty, stepped suspiciously onto it and leaped to shore. The cabin looked deserted, but a few tattered garments hung on a line at one side and an axe was buried in a chopping-block close to the door. So Tim raised his voice and said ‘Hello!’ As there was no answer, he said it a second time, pausing, undecided whether to knock on the tightly closed door in front or make his way around to the back. This time there came an answer, but not of the sort he had expected. Something that sounded like a hornet sped past him and went whining off across the stream, and a sharp report came from the bushes behind the house. Tim, amazed, stood stock-still and stared until Pud’s voice reached him and galvanized him into action. ‘_Run, you chump!_’ shouted Pud. ‘_They’re shooting at you!_’ Then Tim ran. He spurned the log altogether and landed half in and half out of the launch, his feet dangling in the water. Pud jerked at the clutch and the boat limped on its way. Harmon, reaching up from a place of safety, pulled the rest of Tim over the gunwale. Pud, at the bow, making himself as small as possible, peered ahead at intervals and then back toward the cabin, all the time wondering how it would feel to have a bullet land between his shoulders. But the next shot went far overhead, singing past before the short _crack_ of the rifle reached them. Looking back, Pud saw a lean form in a calico dress and a faded blue cotton sunbonnet emerge from the bushes at the left of the cabin and stand for a moment peering after them. She held a long-barreled gun in one hand while to the other clung a child of three of four years. ‘Gee,’ muttered Pud, ‘a woman!’ There was a throaty chuckle from Harmon. ‘My golly, Mister Tim, I reckon it was plum’ lucky for you the ol’ man ain’ to home!’ he said. ‘I guess,’ observed Pud, resuming the seat, ‘she didn’t try to hit us. All she was doing was frightening us off. Maybe she thought we were revenue officers or sheriffs or something.’ ‘Plaguy old frump!’ sputtered Tim, his nerves still unsteady. ‘She ought to be arrested!’