“What do you think we came in for?” asked Ned.
“Young man,” Toombs answered, “a good many million dollars depend upon the finding of certain records. I, representing various claimants, am informed that Jack Bosworth, Senior, the scheming corporation lawyer, has definite information concerning the whereabouts of those papers. It is my belief that you came here to seize and destroy them.”
“Well,” Ned said with a smile, “if you believe that, you certainly have acted unwisely. It strikes me that the correct thing for you to have done was to have waited until I secured the papers before you declared yourself my enemy. Can’t you see that?”
“No, I can’t!” was the reply. “The papers would not last five minutes after coming into your hands.”
“I tell you,” Ned replied lightly, “I don’t know anything about the papers of which you speak. We came here on a vacation, and that is all there is to it. You have made a mistake, and my advice to you is to rectify it at the earliest possible moment.”
“Well,” Toombs said, “if you insist on sticking to a lie like that, I can’t help it. I’ll give you fair warning, however, that you must consider yourself my guest until I get an entirely different answer from you. I hope we’ll get along well together. You’ll be well treated.”
Ned turned his eyes away from the broad, fat, smooth face of Toombs to catch a glimpse of the boy messenger standing at a corner of the tent. It seemed to Ned for an instant that the boy was about to communicate with him by sign or word. Then his face changed into one of sullen defiance and he passed from view.
“Who is that boy?” asked Ned. “The messenger who brought the note, I mean? Did he write the note himself?”
“No,” answered Toombs, “I wrote the note. We were together—the boy and I—on the slope below your camp, and he caught sight of two of your chums. Then it occurred to me to send for you in the name of the boys. He only delivered the note—I wrote it.”
“It’s a wonder you didn’t send your half-breeds out after the boys, too,” Ned said. “You might have lugged them away easily enough, I presume.”
“Now, see here,” Toombs went on, “I don’t want any trouble with your friends or with you. I’ll make you a fair business proposition. Tell me the plans of this tricky corporation lawyer you are serving; tell me where to find the papers you came here in trace of, and I’ll give you half a million dollars. Now,” the fat man went on, “perhaps you will understand why I did not molest any of your chums and why no harm came to any of you when my men were at your camp at midnight.”
“And if I refuse to accept this monstrous bribe?” Ned asked.
“Then no one will ever know that the offer was made or refused,” declared Toombs with an evil gleam in his eyes.
CHAPTER VII
THE FRANCISCAN MISSION
“Now, I wonder,” Jimmie mused as he was forced along by the two half-breeds, “whether I won’t get a chance before long to show these ginks how fast I can run. I sure could do something of a stunt on my feet if I had an opportunity right now.”
During one of the brief breathing spells, when the half-breeds paused for an instant on a level ledge of rock, the boy turned to the east and faced the pines in the vicinity of which he had been captured. In the distance he could see the granite finger sticking up like a mile-post in the green of the trees.
“Judging from the course we have taken, and the distance we have traveled,” the boy mused, “we ought to be somewhere in the vicinity of the parallelogram I saw in the snow. Only,” he added ruefully, “it’s quite a climb up to that point yet.”
He was thinking of the story Gilroy had told of the ruined mission; of the walls in ruins, and the subterranean rooms and passages farther back in the heart of the hill.
“It would just be my luck,” he mused grimly, “to discover that ruined mission, and lead the way into the basement of that old peak. If I get a chance to break away from these half-breeds, I’ll make a run in that direction anyway.”
From that time on the boy pretended great fatigue. He insisted on frequent rests, and always lay down panting whenever his captors halted in their clumsy ascent of the slope. The half-breeds regarded the boy with scornful glances at such times, as if expressing contempt for one unable to endure an ordinary journey up a mountainside.
The boy was perfectly willing that they should believe him to be exhausted by his efforts. When, after a few short rests, they dropped their hands away from his arms, he experienced a thrill of hope.
At last his opportunity came. The half-breeds became less watchful as time passed on. They even turned their snaky eyes away from him at times, looking over the valley below and conversing together in a language he could not understand.
Watching his opportunity, when their eyes were directed in another direction, the boy sprang away and ran as nimbly as a mountain goat up the acclivity. The half-breeds were so astonished at the sudden action of the boy; so utterly bewildered by the speed he made, that for a moment they made no effort to stop him.
When at last they sprang after him, threatening to shoot if he did not halt instantly, it was too late. Jimmie passed around a ledge of rock and was soon out of their sight.
The remainder of that race for freedom always came back to the boy’s mind as a bit of nightmare. He ran swiftly along ledges, bounded over boulders, dipped breathlessly into gulches, and clung to precipitous sides with his bare fingers until it seemed that he must drop from sheer exhaustion. At last he came to a canyon wider and deeper than any which he had yet encountered.
He scrambled down the slope, always pursued by fragments of rocks from above, and presently landed a hundred feet below on a shelf which seemed to promise temporary safety. Panting and trembling from the exertion, came in every limb, he listened for sounds of pursuit but none came to his ears.
Sitting on the narrow ledge, his back against an almost vertical wall, he realized that he had climbed to a great distance, for he shivered in his warm clothing and the sharp sting of frosty air was in his nostrils. Without knowing it, he had actually entered the region of snow.
After a time composure came back with his breath, and he began looking around in the hope of finding some way out which did not lead in the direction his pursuers were probably taking. Then his attention was attracted to the shelf upon which he sat.
It seemed to him that at some time in the distant past crude steps had been cut in the ledge and along the wall leading into the gorge below. Melting snows and the storms of many winters had, in a measure, obliterated the sharp outlines of the treads, but still the boy saw the work of man in the arrangement.
After a time he arose lamely to his feet and walked along in the direction pointed out by the crude stairway. Directly he came to an opening in the wall of the precipice.
Realizing that the cave would at least serve as a hiding place, the boy entered and looked about. The place was dark and damp. A flock of bats, stirred into activity by his approach, flew in his face and winged their way toward the brilliant sunshine beyond.
Jimmie would have given a good deal just at that time for one of the dozen or more searchlights which lay at the camp. There was no knowing how far the passage extended into the mountain, and it was very dark.
For all he knew it might be intersected by passages worn away by subterranean streams. Presently he remembered that a good supply of matches which he had acquired that morning had not been taken away from him. Lighting one, he saw that the floor of the passage was remarkably smooth and free from obstructions. The walls were also smooth, and held, here and there, shallow openings which seemed to have been artificially produced. As he proceeded through the tunnel-like place he became aware of a damp chill wind blowing directly upon him.
As the passage narrowed, the current of air became stronger, and before long the boy found it impossible to use matches without wasting them. Presently he found that by extending his arms he could touch the walls on either side. The stones were, of course, damp and loathsome to the touch.
Only for a remarkable discovery made through the medium of his fingers, he might then have abandoned further investigation of the grewsome place. His discovery was this:
The passage through which he was moving was of artificial construction!
The walls showed traces of rude chisel work!
After a time the walls drew back so that he was unable to reach them even by taking a few steps to right and left. It seemed, too, that he had passed out of the current of air.
“It’s dollars to rotten apples,” mused the boy, exultant though anxious, “that I have blundered into some old-time robber den, or into the subterranean rooms of the old Franciscan mission.”
The thought was exhilarating, and the boy notwithstanding the peril in which he believed himself to be, danced gaily about for a moment. As he did so, one foot slipped over the edge of a declivity and he went rolling down, down, in the darkness to a lower level.
“Whoever built this idiotic contraption,” the boy declared, feeling of his arms and legs to see if they were still whole, “neglected to put in elevators, but I found a way to get down stairs, all the same!”
While the boy sat on the rocky floor rubbing the bruised knee upon which he had fallen, a ray of light shone upon a wall directly in front of him. He turned quickly about and saw the round eye of a searchlight fixed upon the ceiling.
He crouched closer to the floor and waited. It seemed to him that the person in charge of the light must have seen him. Still he hoped that such was not the case. The light advanced nearer to where he sat and so he crawled stealthily away.
“I am a child of fortune, sure enough!” chuckled the boy after the immediate danger of discovery had passed. “First thing I know, I’ll find a banquet room in here with a table loaded down with haunches of venison and great tankards of nut-brown ale.”
While the boy crouched in the corner the light passed him and turned into a passage leading to the east. Then he heard the sound of voices—low, fierce voices, speaking in English.
“And you let him escape!” one said.
“I tell you he rose up in the air and flew like a bird!” another voice exclaimed. “No living person ever saw such an exhibition before!”
“But still, you let him escape!” the first speaker repeated.
“He only got away!” was the answer. “He is somewhere in this vicinity and we’ll get him before nightfall.”
“As well look for a diamond in the bottom of the Atlantic!” snarled the other. “I have sent the men out in the search, but have no hope of their getting hold of him.”
“That’s me!” mused Jimmie. “That’s me they’re talking about trying to get hold of.”
“Well, we may as well go back to camp,” said the first speaker. “There is no profit in arguing here.”
Jimmie crept forward toward the light and saw a large, fat, smooth-faced man and a tall man with a thin face standing in a narrow chamber which seemed to have been fairly well furnished once, but which now held only decaying tables, chairs and couches. It was the tall, dark man who held the light. As Jimmie looked, he laid it down on a tottering table to make and light a cigarette.
His mind busy with a daring thought, Jimmie crept into the chamber and watched for the opportunity he sought. The men were talking together in lower tones now, and seemed to be very much interested in the subject under discussion. As they spoke, they both walked excitedly up and down the little chamber, brushing against the decaying articles of furniture whenever they by chance left the pathway shown by the light.
Jimmie advanced toward the table and finally succeeded in crawling under it. Then, waiting until they were at the farther end of their promenade, at the extreme distance from the lamp, he reached cautiously out and switched off the light.
In the darkness which followed he gave the table a slight push and sent it clattering to the floor and, with the light in his possession, darted out in the direction of the passage by which he had entered.
“Now, we’ll have a job finding that electric!” one of the men said angrily. “Light a match, will you?”
“I have just used my last match,” was the discouraging reply.
“Well, I never carry matches,” the first speaker said, “but we ought to be able to find the electric easily enough in the darkness.”
“Strange what made it go out,” one said.
“Didn’t you hear the table fall?” demanded the other.
“I remember now,” was the answer. “The lamp is probably broken, so we may as well find our way out without looking for it.”
“You have my permission to do that,” chuckled Jimmie from his now secure hiding place.
The two men stumbled about in the darkness for a minute, and the boy knew that they were feeling their way to some entrance other than the one by which he had found his way into the cave. Before long their footsteps and their voices died away, and then he advanced into the little chamber where they had stood.
“The old mission, all right!” he thought.
While he looked around other footsteps were heard, followed by the sound of a struggle.
“Hold fast!” some one shouted.
“Hold fast yourself!” was the smothered reply. “What do you mean by letting go of the fellow in that way?”
“I didn’t let go. I’ve got hold of him yet!”
“Oh, you fool!” shouted the other. “That’s my arm you’ve got hold of! Where’s your light?”
“I dropped it in the fight,” was the answer. “Go on away and get one. He’s somewhere in the cave, and it’s a sure thing he can’t get out. Tell the boys to guard all the entrances. That fool of a Toombs did a smart thing when he told us we needn’t keep him tied!”
Jimmie heard running footsteps for an instant and then came silence.
“Now I wonder,” he thought, “if they’ve gone and captured some of the boys and brought them here. They may have the whole bunch by this time for all I know. I wonder if I dare turn on this light.”
Instead of doing so, however, he sat perfectly still and listened to a soft tread approaching the spot where he stood. Whoever the visitor was, he was short of breath for he came along panting as if winded by a long struggle.
“I’ll take a chance on the light,” he mused.
And the next instant the room was illuminated.
CHAPTER VIII
A QUEER HIDING PLACE
When Jimmie turned on the searchlight in the cavern, he half expected to see the hostile face of one of the half-breeds. Instead, the light revealed Ned, standing in an attitude of defense, a stone of good size balanced in each hand. The light went out instantly.
The situation was now doubly alarming, it being well-known to the outlaws that Ned was at liberty somewhere within the cavern. It was certain that they would soon enter the place in full force, with plenty of light, in which case it seemed that both boys would surely be discovered.
Still, so great was the joy of the boys at the unexpected meeting, that, in spite of the general peril of the situation, they seized each other like baby bears and danced madly about.
“Where did you come from, Jimmie?” demanded Ned, still breathless.
“Oh, I was invited to this part of the country,” the boy replied, “and came in here by accident. And so, then,” he continued, “that message was a fake one after all!”
“Yes, it was a fake message, of course, because you boys never sent it,” laughed Ned, “but we mustn’t stop here to explain matters,” he continued. “Those fellows will be in here thicker than bees around honey in a short time, and we must find some way of eluding them.”
“I know the way out!” Jimmie answered. “There’s a long passage leading to a gorge on the side of the mountain, and if we can get up to that, we can slip away without any one knowing anything about it.”
“I’m afraid the outlaws know and are guarding all the entrances,” Ned answered.
“Well, if they know this one, they don’t use it,” Jimmie insisted, “because the elevator isn’t working, and there isn’t any staircase, and I came near breaking my neck tumbling down a chute from the passage into the next room. I believe we can make a sneak that way!”
“We may as well try,” Ned agreed, “for we can gain nothing by remaining inactive. Turn on your light, and we’ll make a break for the place where you got your tumble.”
“Is it safe to turn on the light?” asked Jimmie.
“It is safer now than it will be in a few minutes,” Ned answered.
“What’s the answer to that?” demanded Jimmie.
“Why, the outlaws are doubtless collecting their forces now, and in a very short time they’ll be rummaging every nook and corner of this hole in the ground. We certainly can’t show a light after they get in here.”
“I should have known that!” Jimmie exclaimed. “I think I’m getting pretty dense, anyhow. Say, Ned,” the boy went on, “is it absolutely necessary for us to get captured, and tied up, and imprisoned, and shut up in some old hole, every time we go out on a vacation trip?”
“You can’t go out looking for adventures and have things come your way all the time,” suggested Ned. “Now, turn on your light,” he continued, “and we’ll make a quick break for the passage by which you entered. The minute you see the passage, turn out your light and we’ll find our way in the dark.”
“I’m afraid we’ll need wings to get up into the passage,” Jimmie suggested. “It seems to me that I fell far enough to hit the pavement from the top of Madison Square Garden.”
“Well, get to going!” urged Ned. “Get a move on! For all we know they may be lurking around here now.”
Jimmie switched on the light, whirled it over the dilapidated and rotting furniture for an instant, then shot into the next chamber, and from that into a by-passage by way of which he had entered. The floor of this by-passage stood at an angle of about fifty degrees, and the boys were preparing to undertake the climb when shouts came from the rear, and a great light filled the room they had just left.
“We can never get up there now!” Ned whispered. “We’ve got to take a run for it!”
“Huh!” returned Jimmie, “we can run only around in a circle, and there’s enough of them to wear us out in a few minutes. What we’ve got to do right now is to find a hiding place!”
At great risk of discovery, Ned seized the flashlight and pressed the spring. The illumination showed a moldy chamber with water dripping from the walls in places.
At some distant day the chamber had evidently been occupied by human beings, for a great fire-place was cut in the rock at one end, and there were niches in the wall which had doubtless been used for storage. The floor was smooth, showing the work of human hands.
“Get onto the fire-place!” whispered Jimmie. “Where do you suppose the smoke goes? There’s no chimney on the mountain.”
“Probably it escapes through some opening in the rock,” Ned answered.
“Do you suppose,” Jimmie asked, “that the smoke vent is large enough for us to hide in?”
Before the words were out of the boy’s mouth, Ned was making toward the fireplace. The light was out now, but Jimmie had no difficulty in following the boy in the darkness.
“Ned!” he called softly in a moment.
“Come on up!” whispered Ned.
“Turn on the light, then,” Jimmie advised.
Ned switched on the electric, but kept it inside the chimney into which he had climbed. Only a faint radiance reached the opening below.
“Give me your hand,” whispered Ned, “and I’ll give you a lift.”
The sound of voices and footsteps now echoed loudly through the cavern. Lights were flashing here and there, and when Jimmie at last found himself inside the chimney, he knew that the very room he had recently left was being occupied by the outlaws.
The electric light was out again, and the boy groped with his hands in the darkness. Much to his surprise they failed to locate his chum.
“Ned!” he called softly. “Where are you hiding?”
Jimmie heard a chuckle in the darkness and felt a hand on his shoulder. Then Ned whispered in his ear:
“I guess I’ve stumbled on one of the hidden cells of the mission!” he said. “Anyway there’s a hole leading out of this chimney that’s big enough to keep house in.”
“We’ll be finding a train of cars and an East river ferryboat next,” Jimmie chuckled. “We always do find something when we go away from camp. If we don’t find anything else, we find trouble.”
It was thought safe, now, to turn on the electric light. The rays showed a room perhaps twelve feet in size with furniture and furnishings of the description of those in the chamber below. Although the apartment seemed to be somewhere near the center of a lofty finger of rock which lifted from the eastern slope of the mountain, the air was remarkably fresh and pure.
“There’s an opening somewhere,” Ned suggested. “A shut-in room like this would asphyxiate one if there were no ventilation.”
“Then I think we’d better be finding it!” Jimmie advised. “Just listen to those fellows chewing the rag in the room we recently left!”
The boys remained perfectly silent, then, and listened. There seemed to be several men in the chamber below, and two were talking in angry tones. There were plenty of torches below, too, for the red flare and the stink of them came into the boys’ hiding place by way of the fire-niche below. This is what the boys heard:
“You can see for yourself, Huga,” a voice which Ned recognized as that of Toombs, was saying, “that the boy is not here.”
“But I am certain I heard footsteps running in this direction when I stood in the darkness before you men came in!” Huga answered. “He must be in this chamber somewhere.”
“Look for yourself!” Toombs advised crossly.
“Isn’t there some hiding place in the walls?” asked Huga.
Ned nudged Jimmie as they heard this, and both moved farther back in the hiding place. It will be understood how intently they listened for the next sentence.
“You ought to know that,” Toombs answered; “you are supposed to know all about this old mission, while I am fresh from Wall street.”
“I have never heard of any secret passage or room in this part of the excavation,” the half-breed replied.
“Then stop arguing that the boy is here!” roared Toombs.
Huga made no reply, but the boys heard him poking about in the fireplace. Presently a light flashed into the chimney.
“He’s after us now all right!” whispered Jimmie.
“Keep still, you little dunce!” Ned said.
“If he sticks his head up here, soak him!” advised Jimmie.
“Don’t you think I won’t,” Ned returned.
But Huga did not enter the huge old fireplace at all. When he flashed his light into the chimney he saw only straight up, and the vertical passage from the fire-flue was too small for even a small cat to negotiate.
The chamber into which the boys had found their way was directly at the back of the flue, and might have been seen by a more careful man. The boys chuckled as the half-breed turned away.
In a few minutes the sounds of pursuit ceased entirely. Lights no longer flashed about the room, creating a faint mist in the fireplace below. Still the boys were not certain that the outlaws had abandoned the hunt.
“Say, Ned,” Jimmie whispered, directly, poking Ned in the ribs, “you didn’t bring one of those bear steaks with you, did you?”
“Why, Jimmie,” Ned said in pretended amazement, “you’re not getting hungry, are you? I’m astonished at that!”
“Hungry!” repeated the boy. “I feel as if I could eat my way through this rock like a mouse eats through cheese! And I could drink a barrel of water. There never was such a thirst.”
“Well,” Ned suggested, “we’d better wait here a little while, until things get quieted down, and then make a break for the passage.”
“All right,” Jimmie said with an air of resignation, “I’ll crawl back here in the corner and try to imagine that I’m in charge of a pie wagon on Third avenue. Perhaps I can dream a pie or two!”
The boy leaned back in an angle of the chamber and prepared to continue the discussion regarding the different kinds of pies sold at the old Williams street corner. As he did so, the support of his back gave way, his heels flew up in the air, and he tumbled all of a heap into a passage which seemed to begin at that corner of the room.
Hearing the fall and the exclamation of impatience which came from the boy’s lips, Ned turned on the electric and saw Jimmie lying on his back in a tunnel probably a yard in size each way. There were plenty of indications that the tunnel had been cut through solid rock.
As far as Ned could see; that is, as far as the eye of the electric carried; there were no breaks in it. Directly a chill breeze blew in from the opening, and the boy knew that the passage touched the surface of the mountain not far away.
“Je-rusalem!” shouted Jimmie, “hold up the light and let me see if I’m all here. That’s the second tumble I’ve got in this consarned old hole today.”
“If every tumble you get in life brings such results as this,” Ned declared, “you ought to go around the world looking for tumbles!”
“They hurt, just the same!” Jimmie declared, rubbing the back of his head. “I got an awful bump on my coco!”
“Well, crowd along!” advised Ned.
“Crowd along?” repeated Jimmie. “What for?”
“Use your nose,” advised Ned.
Jimmie sniffed elaborately and hit Ned a resounding whack on the back. Then he sat down on the bottom of the passage.
“Say, Ned, look here!” he said. “When we got into this scrape, we didn’t look for any old Franciscan monks to help us out, did we? Two or three hundred years ago, when they dug this passage through the rock, they hadn’t any idea they were digging it for us, had they?”
“This is a mysterious world,” Ned answered. “It seems to be unnecessary for us to plan any mode of escape. The wise old chap who formed the Franciscan order in Europe, hundreds of years ago, prepared the way of escape for us!”
“That’s what he did!” answered Jimmie. “And I wish he had gone a little farther and prepared a good fat meat pie for us.”
“Jimmie,” Ned chuckled, “some day you’ll get into a corner where you won’t get anything to eat for a week. I never knew a boy who thought so much of his stomach as you do!”
“May the day be long delayed!” laughed Jimmie.
“Well, crawl along!” Ned advised, “and I’ll see if I can get this slab of stone you pushed out back in its place.”
It was by no means a difficult task to replace the stone, as it was thin and had been nicely fitted into the opening. In a short time the boys, proceeding mostly on their hands and knees, came to the end of the tunnel and looked out over a valley tucked in between two great summits.
The snow-line was not far away and the air was cold, notwithstanding the direct rays of the sun.
There was no one in sight, no moving object anywhere, as the boys paused at the mouth of the passage and gazed about. Judging from the location of the sun, they were looking straight west.
“Now,” Ned said after a pause, “if we follow this little valley straight to the south, we’ll come out somewhere near our camp.”
“Yes,” Jimmie answered, “I have a pious notion that our brownstone front is carved into the face of a continuation of that ridge on the other side of the little valley.”
“Perhaps we’ll find the Boy Scout messenger at the camp,” Ned suggested.
“If we do,” Jimmie declared, “I’ll change his face for him!”
“I can’t understand the fellow,” Ned admitted.
“Gee!” cried Jimmie, “He came out into the woods and told Frank and I to beat it, then went up into the camp and led you into the clutches of these outlaws. If I had his head in chancery right now, I’d ‘beat it’, all right! He ought to get a thousand years!”
“I hope the boys are all safe,” said Ned.
Jimmie told his chum of the arrival of Gilroy, and then the two boys hastened toward the camp.
“The outlaws were discussing the advisability of taking all the boys into their care,” Ned said, as they hustled along, “so I’m afraid they’ve been there and taken the lads by surprise.”
CHAPTER IX
IN QUEST OF INFORMATION
Left at the camp by the departure of Ned and Jimmie, Jack, Frank and Harry sat for a long time in the warm sunshine in front of the barrier and discussed the situation. Gilroy had tucked himself into a collection of blankets at the rear of the cave and was sound asleep.
“What do you think Jimmie had in his mind when he went away alone?” asked Harry. “He merely had some plan to carry out.”
“Oh, he’s always going off alone,” Jack answered.
“Some day he’ll go away alone and won’t be able to get back!” Frank put in. “He won’t always be able to get out of his scrapes.”
“Pretty foxy boy, that!” Jack declared.
“What strikes me as being singular,” Frank suggested, “is that Jack’s father never said a word to him about this land business.”
“Father never talks his business over with any one,” Jack broke in.
“If we had only known about the outlaws being here in the hills,” Harry suggested, “we might have kept out of sight of them for a long time. But, you see, they found us first.”
“And they used a nice, crooked little spy to do it with!” Frank exclaimed. “This little alleged Boy Scout who stole our provisions last night, and crept into the woods to tell Jimmie and I to beat it, and then brought a note to Ned to get him away from the camp, must be playing a leading part for the sneaks.”
“He’s doing all of that!” Jack agreed. “I don’t believe he’s a Boy Scout at all. He’s just picked up a word or two and a sign.”
“Perhaps we’ll run across him again,” Frank said. “If we do, I’ll find out whether he’s a Boy Scout or not!”
“Well,” Jack exclaimed, springing to his feet, “are we going to sit here all day and let Jimmie do all the hunting? We ought to get out in the mountains and help find Ned.”
“Look here, boys!” Harry cried, “do you see anything to the east there that looks at all familiar?”
“Do you mean the smoke coming up over the tops of the trees?” asked Frank. “I noticed that several minutes ago.”
“Well, just keep your eye on it,” Harry advised, “and see if it brings anything to your mind.”
“Sure it does!” shouted Frank, all excitement now. “There are two columns of smoke close together, and you ought to know what that means.”
“Indian sign! Boy Scout sign! Means ‘Help is wanted’!” exclaimed Harry. “We’ve got to go and see what it is.”
“It may be Jimmie,” Jack suggested.
“It’s either Jimmie or that messenger boy,” Frank said. “If it’s Jimmie, he’s really in trouble, and if it’s the messenger boy, he’s doing it to get more of us into his clutches.”
“Then we’d better go well armed and ready for any kind of a reception,” Jack advised. “No knowing what we’ll find.”
“What’ll we do with Gilroy?” asked Frank.
“Aw, let him sleep,” advised Harry.
“Sure, let him sleep,” Jack put in. “He’ll be all right ’till we get back. No one will molest the camp in daytime.”
“Seems to me that we ought to leave someone here,” Frank said.
“All right, you can stay if you want to!” Jack declared. “Harry and I are going down there to see what the trouble is about.”
“Aw, come on, Frank!” Harry urged. “There won’t anything happen to Gilroy! He may have a bad dream, but that’s about all.”
“How far do you suppose that signal is from here?” asked Frank.
“Not more than half a mile,” Harry explained.
“Then I’ll go,” Frank decided. “I don’t like the idea of sitting around the camp and letting you boys have all the fun. Besides,” he continued, “if it is the messenger who is making the signals, you’ll need all the help you can get.”
“Come running, then!” advised Jack, starting down the slope.
As the reader will remember, the signal observed by the boys had been built by Jimmie in the hope of attracting the attention of Ned, or of Norman, the boy who had made himself so conspicuous that morning. In building the fires and creating the columns of dense white smoke by heaping on green boughs, the boy had not given serious thought to the effect his action might have on his chums.
In fact, at the time of his leaving camp, he had not fully decided what course to pursue, and for this reason he had not informed the boys of his intention to set a signal for the benefit of the mysterious Boy Scout. Even at the time of making the signal, he had no idea that it would actually draw his three chums away from the camp.
He might have known what the effect would be, but, though he did stop to consider for a moment, he did not take in the whole situation. Jimmie usually acted on impulse, and so the signal lifted to the sky without any explanation having been made to the Boy Scouts who were certain to see it.
It will be remembered that when Jimmie descended from the elevation where the fires had been built he did so in order to hasten in the direction of a smoke signal which he saw to the north. The result of this was that he was out of the vicinity of the fires long before the boys reached that point.
When the three lads came to the finger of granite upon the top of which the two fires showed, they first made a careful examination of the thickets close by and then ascended to the top.
“These fires were made to constitute a signal, all right!” Jack declared, poking at the now dying embers.
“Sure!” answered Frank. “You see, no cooking was done here, and there is no camp in sight.”
“Besides, the position of the blazes on this high rock shows that the fires were built so that the columns of smoke might be seen,” suggested Harry. “It was Indian talk, all right!”
“Well, there’s no one here in need of help so far as I can see!” laughed Jack, “and so we may as well go back to the camp.”
“That’s the thing to do,” Frank urged. “To tell the truth, I don’t feel exactly right about leaving Gilroy there alone.”
“Aw, we’ll hear him sleeping before we get within a rod of the cave,” laughed Jack. “Gilroy is a good old chap, and father thinks a lot of him, but he doesn’t know much about this kind of a life. I’ll bet that right now he’s dreaming about grizzly bears, and lions, and crocodiles, and panthers.”
From their position in the forest, after their departure from the rock, they could see nothing of the signal from the north which had attracted Jimmie’s attention, so there seemed nothing for them to do but to return to camp. Therefore they set out at good speed.
After a short walk, Jack beckoned the boys to his side and suggested that they take a route to the camp different from that which they had followed on leaving it.
“You see, boys,” he explained, “that was a signal, all right, and we haven’t found out the cause of it. So far as we know, it was put up to get us away from the camp.”
“I’m beginning to think it was,” Frank announced. “Either to get us away from the camp for the purpose of capturing us, or for the purpose of raiding our provisions.”
“Well,” Jack went on, “if we duck away to the south and return to the camp by a new course, anyone watching for us might watch in vain.”
“That’s the idea!” Harry answered.
“Then here we go the south,” Frank suggested, starting away at as swift a gait as was possible in the thicket.
They had proceeded but a short distance when every tree bole of good size immediately in front of them seemed to their astonished eyes to yield a scowling, dirty half-breed. The boys drew their guns.
“No use, lads!” a voice said, speaking in good English. “The men in the bushes have you covered. Anyway, there’s no harm intended.”
“Why the holdup?” demanded Jack.
The man who had spoken now advanced to Jack and looked him keenly in the face. Although carrying the general appearance of the gang of half-breeds at his back, the boys could see by the fellow’s face and manner that he was different from the others.
“You are Jack Bosworth?” he asked.
“That’s my name,” replied the boy.
“You are here on a mission for your father?”
“I am here on a hunting trip.”
“With business on the side, eh?”
“No business at all,” replied Jack.
“We know better than that!” the stranger answered.
“What do you want of us?” asked Jack.
“We want information now in your possession,” answered the fellow, looking Jack sharply in the eyes.
“What kind of information?”
“We want to know where certain documents are.”
“You’ll have to ask some one else, then.”
“We are certain that you have the information we require.”
“If I had,” Jack answered, “you never would get it from me.”
“You will gain nothing by being obstinate,” the fellow said. “Remember that we have Ned Nestor, the alleged juvenile detective, at our camp. He seems inclined to keep what information he possesses to himself, and, before proceeding to extreme measures with him, we decided to lay the case before you. I am afraid Nestor will receive rough treatment at the hands of my allies unless the information they demand is given them.”
“So that was a lying message you sent Nestor, was it?”