Don rode down to the landing and back alone, reaching the barn about half an hour after dark. Finding that the hostler was not there to take care of his pony, he attended to the animal himself, working in the dark, as there was no lantern nearer than the house, and he did not want to take time to go after it. He hung up his saddle and bridle, and was about to close the barn-doors, when he happened to look toward the house and saw a figure darting along the carriage-way, making use of every tree and clump of bushes to conceal his movements, and stopping now and then to look about, as if he were afraid of being seen by somebody. Don took just one glance at him, and then drawing back behind the door, laid hold of a pitchfork that was always kept standing in the corner. Thieves visited the plantation now and then after dark, and Don thought he had discovered one of them. “That fellow is up to something,” said he, as he tightened his grasp on the pitchfork, “and if I keep an eye on him, perhaps I shall find out where our chickens and hams go so mysteriously. It must be some one who is acquainted with the dogs, or they would have raised a fuss before this time. Let him pick up something, if he dares, and we’ll see how quickly he will drop it, when he finds the tines of this pitchfork within an inch of his nose.” Fairly trembling with excitement Don took off his hat, peeped cautiously around the edge of the door, and watched the motions of the supposed thief. The latter did not pick up anything, however, as Don hoped he would, but took his stand at the corner of the barn, almost within reach of the boy’s hand, and leaning against the building, looked down the road as if he were waiting for somebody. Then Don saw, to his great surprise, that it was his cousin Clarence. He was about to step out and speak to him, when he noticed that Clarence held a lighted cigar in his hand. “Perhaps I had better stay where I am,” thought Don. “If I go out there, he’ll think I have been watching him and playing the part of a spy; and then if father or mother should happen to say anything to him about his smoking, he would accuse me of telling it. I wish he would go somewhere else and enjoy his cigar, and let me go into the house!”