142 Dreaming Bob 



told me been enough to bring about such a 

 dream ? Even " Dreamin' Bob" was losing 

 faith in dreams after many years, and now I 

 took it up with his former enthusiasm. It 

 was absurd, and here I was, his guide, of 

 my own volition, and not knowing in what 

 direction to go. I hesitated, and he noticed 

 it. 



" What's the matter ?" he asked : " gettin' 

 out o' the notion a'ready, when you was so 

 full of it?" 



" Let's look over the ground you've been 

 examining," I suggested, not knowing what 

 to say. 



" It couldn't 'a* been far from the house, 

 and it stood close on the road, you know," 

 he replied, and this was a clue, if we 

 could only locate the house. No document 

 of mine helped me here ; I could only 

 guess ; and so we moved on, taking what I 

 thought was a probable course. We were 

 soon in a traft of sprout-land, and the 

 stumps of the original timber growth had 

 quite disappeared. Here and there, though, 

 was a variation in the level surface of the 

 ground, a slight elevation, and moss-cov- 

 ered or bright green with a mat of fine 



