“So he thinks; but he’s used to call this his own, because it’s the one first left to him; the one that was his legacy when it was all he took under the will.”

“When he shows his light,” said Venus, keeping watch upon his dusky figure all the time, “drop lower and keep closer.”

He went on again, and they followed again. Gaining the top of the Mound, he turned on his light⁠—but only partially⁠—and stood it on the ground. A bare lopsided weatherbeaten pole was planted in the ashes there, and had been there many a year. Hard by this pole, his lantern stood: lighting a few feet of the lower part of it and a little of the ashy surface around, and then casting off a purposeless little clear trail of light into the air.

“He can never be going to dig up the pole!” whispered Venus as they dropped low and kept close.

“Perhaps it’s holler and full of something,” whispered Wegg.