I knew the track of the hoss I lent him by a loose shoe.

I examined; and found he had turned off the high road somewhere beyond the lagoon, jist as if he was makin' a bee line here." "Well," said Mrs.Tucker, breathlessly.
"Well," said Patterson, with the resigned tone of an accustomed martyr, "mebbe I'm a God-forsaken idiot, but I reckon he DID come yer.

And mebbe I'm that much of a habitooal lunatic, but thinking so, I calkilated you'ld know it without tellin'." With their eyes fixed upon her, Mrs.Tucker felt the quick blood rush to her cheeks, although she knew not why.

But they were apparently satisfied with her ignorance, for Patterson resumed, yet more gloomily:-- "Then if he wasn't hidin' here beknownst to you, he must have changed his mind agin and got away by the embarcadero.

The only thing wantin' to prove that idea is to know how he got a boat, and what he did with the hoss.