Painted white with green shutters, with a bright flower garden in front, it was a veritable picture of rural thrift.
The boy hesitated for an instant as they stood on the opposite edge of the cleared ground. There was no question but that they had reached the place whence the groans had proceeded. As they stood there the grim sounds began once more, after being hushed for an instant. Now, however, they took coherent form.
Roy was undetermined no longer. Directing Peggy to remain outside till he summoned her, he walked rapidly, and with a firm step, up the path leading to the hut, and entered. It was so dark inside that at first he could see nothing. But pretty soon he spied a huddled form in one corner.
"Oh, don't hurt me! I'm only a harmless old man! I have no money," cried the cringing figure, as Roy entered.
"I don't want to hurt you," said the boy kindly; "I want to help you."
He now saw that the form in the corner was that of an old man with a silvery beard and long white hair. From a gash on his forehead blood was flowing, and the wound seemed to have been recently inflicted.
"What is the matter? What has happened?" asked Roy, gently, as he raised the old man to a chair into which he fell limply.
Roy hastened outside saying to himself as he went:
Summoning her he hastily related what had occurred and the warm-hearted girl, with many exclamations of pity, hastened to the wounded man's side.
"Get me some water quick, Roy," she exclaimed, tearing a long strip from her linen petticoat to serve as a bandage. Outside the hut, Roy soon found a spring, back of a rickety stable in which the old man had a horse and a ramshackle buggy.
When he returned with the water the poor old fellow took a long draught from a cup Peggy held to his lips and the girl then deftly washed and bandaged his wound. This done the venerable old man seemed to rally, and sitting up in his chair thanked his young friends warmly. Roy, in the meantime, had been looking about the hut and saw that it was furnished in plain, but tidy style. Over the great open fireplace, at one end, hung a big picture. Evidently the canvas was many years old. It was the portrait of a fine, self-reliant looking young man in early manhood. His blue eyes gazed confidently out from the picture and a smile of seeming satisfaction quivered about his lips.