Page:Cornelia Meigs-The Pirate of Jasper Peak.djvu/105

 was driving up his cow from the luxuriant pasture land, to be stabled for the night.

“It is a nice place,” thought Hugh. “I do not wonder Oscar likes to live here, but—well, winters must be pretty long and lonely.”

Oscar came in presently and they had supper before the blazing fire, a meal as odd and delicious as breakfast had been. After supper there was much work to be done in which Hugh lent a  hand, wood to be cut and carried in, water to be  fetched from the spring half way down the hill,  the cow, Hulda, to be fed and milked. The long twilight was nearly at an end and Hugh already  feeling sleepy again before they finished at last. Oscar, it seemed, had spent most of the day in searching the nearest hillsides for traces of John  Edmonds and his brother, but had to report blank  failure so far.

“But if they are alive they are in this region,” he said. “They would not have gone far north, for the woods and swamps in that direction are  almost impassable. Nor, if Edmonds wanted to hide for any reason, would he go toward the east