The party turned about as if to their steps; but the moment they had the hill, so as to be out of sight of the Island, Inwood dismounted, and said to his friends:  
“Now, you walk the horses as slowly as you can, and when you get beyond that of trees, wait for me, but don’t halt until you are there.”
 
 
Jim and Edwin looked wonderingly at him, but he waved them impatiently away, and trailing his rifle, ran rapidly around the brow of the hill from which he had taken his view of the lake, and, gaining a position where he could still see it, he screened himself from observation, and carefully awaited the of his suspicions.
 
He had been here about twenty minutes, when he observed an in the bushes between the hill and the lake, and the next minute the head and shoulders of a man rose to view. One glance identified him as the individual whom he had surveyed through his telescope, and it is hardly necessary to say that our young friend watched his motions with intense interest.
 
Looking cautiously about him, as if to satisfy himself that he was unobserved, the stranger soon came to view, and commenced the hill with a silent, cautious step. Reaching a point almost to the summit, he sank down on his hands and knees, and looked over. Watching the horsemen, who, by this time, were a third of a mile distant, for a few moments, he laid his rifle across a of earth, and took a long, deliberate sight.
 
Inwood felt very uncomfortable as he watched this operation, and he was on the point of bringing his own gun to his shoulder to prevent this murder, when the piece was discharged, and, glancing at his friends, he saw that they were not disturbed enough to cause them to look around.
 
“Try it again!” muttered Inwood, “that is rather too long a range for a gun like yours.”
 
The man, after the failure of his piece, took an upright position, and watched the horsemen with an of gaze which showed that for some reason or other, he had a deep interest in their movements. Finally they rode behind the grove referred to, and the man, with a great sigh and some muttered words, turned on his heel and descended the hill.
 
“That man, for some reason or other, doesn’t wish any visitors in these parts,” was the reflection of Inwood, “and he has a special objection to white men. There is some connection between what I have seen and that island out in the lake.”
 
Having learned all that he deemed it safe to learn, he carefully made his way out of his hiding place, and soon after rejoined his friends behind the grove. Jim had had some difficulty in controlling the actions of the , but he had succeeded at last in bringing him to a stop by shying him against the trunk of a tree, as he swung round his circle.
 
“Dat’s de way to put de brakes on,” said Jim, “no danger ob de wheels slippin’—fotched him up chock!”
 
“I suppose you didn’t understand what I meant,” remarked George, as he resumed his horse, “but I discovered a man watching us, and I wanted to watch him a little.”
 
“Did you see him?”
 
“Yes; but I took good care that he didn’t see me. You heard a gun fired shortly after you left. That was done by him, and he took deliberate aim at you, but the distance proved too great.”
 
As might be expected, this announcement created quite a sensation.
 
“He is a white man,” added George, “although he is disguised as an Indian. Why he should do so, I cannot understand, but I suspect he does not want any one to know that there are white men in this vicinity. It might draw others here, to which he appears to have a strong objection.”
 
“It has sumfin’ to do wid dat ’ere island!” asserted Jim.
 
“I believe you are correct.”
 
“An’ dere is spooks about, so’ de best ting we can do is to trabble. I—I—I—don’t tink the air around here ’grees wid me.”
 
“We must find a suitable place and settle down here for a few months, or, at any rate, until I understand the mystery about this Enchanted Island.”
 
“Jus’ as you says; I don’t care about Ingins, for I can come de gold trick ober dem, but I don’t like spooks.”
 
“Can’t you serve them the same way?”
 
 
“No; dey won’t hold still; dey is always oneasy, an’ I’s afeered ob ’em.”
 
“They have never harmed any one as yet.”
 
“But dey will carry you off—dat’s what dey will do.”
 
“Do you think we are going to find any gold?” inquired Edwin.
 
“We may and we may not; the chances are equally good in almost any place in this section.”
 
“I suppose there is plenty of hunting?”
 
“Yes; and we will let you range the woods. Jim may look for gold, while I keep my eye on this island. I think we shall all find enough to interest us.”
 
“I’s no ’bjection, so long as I don’t have to hunt spooks,” replied the negro.
 
“It seems to me,” continued George, pointing to the south, “that off yonder must be ............