"Can't we shout and make them hear us?" asked Hiram in an alarmed voice. He saw from the troubled faces of both the elder lads that something serious indeed was the matter.

"We might try it," responded Tubby, with a bitter shrug. "But it's about as much use as a mouth organ in a symphony orchestra would be. Better get on the life belts."

With hands that trembled with the sense of impending disaster, the three boys strapped on the cork jackets.

"Now all shout together," said Merritt, when this was done.

Standing erect, the three young castaways placed their hands funnel-wise to their mouths and roared out together:

"Ship ahoy! St-eam-er a-hoy!"

They were alarmed and not ashamed to admit it.

"No good," said Tubby, after they had roared themselves hoarse. "When she strikes us, jump over the starboard bow and dive as deep as you can. If you don't, the propellers are liable to catch us."

It was a grim prospect, and no wonder the boys grew white and their faces strained as the impending peril bore down on them.

They could now see that she was a large vessel—a liner, to judge from the rows of lighted portholes on her steep black sides. Her bow lights gleamed like the eye of some monster intent on devouring the Flying Fish and her occupants. On and on she came. The air trembled with the vibration of her mighty engines, and a great white "'bone" foamed up at her sharp prow.

Not one of the boys spoke as the vessel came nearer and nearer, although it speedily grew evident that unless a wind sprang up or the lookout saw them, it was inevitable that they would be cut in two amidships.

"Remember what I said," warned Tubby, in a strange, strained voice. "Dive deep and stay tinder as long as you can."

And now the great vessel seemed scarcely more than two or three boat lengths from the tiny cockleshell on which she was bearing down. As a matter of fact, though, her towering bulk made her appear much nearer than she actually was.

"Can't we do anything, Merritt?" gasped Hiram, with chattering teeth. "We might try shouting once more," suggested Tubby in a voice that quivered in spite of his efforts to keep it steady.

"All together now—come on!"

"Ship ahoy! You'll run us down! St-eam-er a-hoy!"

Suddenly there were signs of confusion on the bow of the big vessel. Men could be seen running about and waving their arms.

"By hookey, they've seen us!" breathed Merritt, hardly daring to believe it, however.

The others were speechless with suspense.

Suddenly from the bow of the oncoming steamer a great fan-shaped ray of dazzling light shot out and enveloped the boys and their boat in its bewildering radiance.

"Hard over, hard over!" the boys could hear the lookout roaring, and the command rang hoarsely back along the decks to the wheelhouse.

Slowly, very slowly, as if reluctant to give up her prey, the bow of the mighty liner swung off, and the boys were safe.

"Look out for the wash," warned Merritt, as the great black bulk, pierced with hundreds of glowing portholes, ploughed regally by them, her deck crowded with curious passengers. A voice shouted down from the bridge:

"What in blazing sea serpents are you doing out here in that marine oil stove?"

The boys made no attempt to reply. They had all they could do to hang on, as the Flying Fish danced about like a drifting cork in the wash of the great vessel. They could see, however, that several of her passengers were clustered at her stern rail, gazing wonderingly down at them in great perplexity, no doubt, as to what manner of craft it was that they had so narrowly escaped sending to the bottom. For had the vessel even grazed the Flying Fish, the small boat would have been annihilated without those on board the liner even feeling a tremor. It would have been just such a tragedy as happens frequently to the fishing dories on the foggy Newfoundland banks.

"Wh-ew!" gasped Merritt, sinking down on a locker. "That was a narrow escape if you like it!"

"I don't like it," remarked Tubby sententiously, mopping his forehead, on which beads of cold perspiration had stood out while their destruction had seemed inevitable. So thoroughly unnerved were the lads, in fact, by their experience that it was some time before they could do anything more than sit limply on the lockers while the Flying Fish rolled aimlessly with an uncontrolled helm.

"Come on," said Tubby at length; "we've got to rouse ourselves. In the first place, I've got an idea," he went on briskly. "I've been thinking over that gasoline stoppage, and the more I think of it the more I am inclined to believe that there's something queer about it. It's worth looking into, anyhow."

"You mean you think there may be some fuel in the tank, after all?" asked Merritt, looking up.

"It's possible. Have you tried the little valve forward of the carburetor?"

"Why, no," rejoined Merritt; "but I hardly think—"

"It wouldn't be the first time a carburetor had fouled, particularly after what we went through in that squall," remarked Tubby. "It's worth trying, anyhow."

He bent over the valve he had referred to, which was in the gasoline feed pipe, just forward of the carburetor, and placed there primarily for draining the tank when it was necessary.

"Look here!" he yelled, with a sudden shout of excitement. "No," he cried the next moment, "I don't want to waste it—but when I opened the valve a stream of gasoline came out. There's plenty of it. That stoppage is in the carburetor. Oh, what a bunch of idiots we've been!"

"Better sound the tank," suggested Merritt; "what came out of the valve might just be an accumulation in the pipe."

"Not much," rejoined the other, "it came out with too much force for that, I tell you. It was flowing from the tank, all right."

"We'll soon find out," proclaimed Merritt. "Give me the sounding stick out of that locker, Hiram."

Armed with the stick, Merritt rapidly unscrewed the cap of the fuel tank and plunged the sounder into it.

"There's quite a lot of gasoline in there yet," he exclaimed, with sparkling eyes, as he withdrew and felt the wet end of the instrument.

The carburetor was rapidly adjusted. The rough tossing about the Flying Fish had received had jammed the needle valve, but that was all. Presently all was in readiness to get under way once more with the little boat's proper motive power. The "jury rig" was speedily dismantled Merritt swung the flywheel over two or three times, and a welcome "chug, chug!" responded.

"Hurray! she's working," cried Hiram.

"As well as ever," responded Merritt. "Now for the shore. By the way," he broke off in a dismayed tone, "where is the shore?"

"I know now," rejoined Tubby in a confident tone. "Off there to the right. You see, that steamer was hugging the coast preparatory to heading seaward—at least, I'm pretty sure she was, and that would put the shore on her port side, or on our starboard."

They chugged off in the direction Tubby indicated, and before long a joyful cry from Hiram announced the sudden appearance of lights.

"What are they?" asked Merritt.

"Don't know—they look like bonfires," rejoined the other lad. "I wonder if we have been lucky enough to pick up Topsail Island?"

As they drew nearer the lads soon saw that it was the island that they were approaching, and that the lights they had seen were campfires ignited by order of the anxious young Patrol leader to guide them back.

In a short time they had anchored the Flying Fish opposite the camp, and jumped into the dinghy left at her moorings when they embarked.

"A fine scare you've given us," cried Rob, as they landed and flung down their afternoon's catch. "We were afraid for a time that you were lost in that black squall—it blew two of our tents down, and we were mighty anxious about you, I can tell you."

"You did not alarm our folks?" asked Hiram anxiously.

"No, I thought that it would be best to wait. Somehow, I thought you'd turn up safe. Where on earth have you been and what has happened? You look as pale as three ghosts."

"Towed to sea by a shark—caught in a squall—almost run down by a liner—and so hungry we can't talk now," sputtered out Tubby comprehensively.

"All right; come on up to the fire and get dried out and pitch into the grub."

After such a meal as it may be imagined the young scouts indulged in, they told their whole yarn of their adventures to the listening Patrol. A short time after they concluded—so long had it taken to relate everything and answer all questions—the mournful call of "Taps" sounded and it was time to turn in. Little Digby alone, who was to do sentry service, remained on duty.

Merritt's dreams were a strange jumble. It seemed to him that he was being towed to sea on the back of a huge shark, by a big liner with a row of blazing portholes that winked at him like facetious eyes. Suddenly, just as it seem he was about to slip off the marine monster's slippery back, he thought he heard a loud cry of "Help, scouts!"

So vivid was the dream and so real the cry that he awoke trembling, and listened intently while peering out through the tent flap.

There was no sound, however, but the ripple of the waves on the beach and the "hoot hoot" of an owl somewhere back in the woods on the island.

"Funny," mused the boy, as he turned over and dozed off again, "that certainly sounded loud enough to have been a real, sure enough call for help."



CHAPTER XVIII

JOE DIGBY MISSING

"Merritt! Merritt, wake up!"

The boy sleepily opened his eyes and saw bending over him the pale features of Rob, whose voice quivered with suppressed excitement as he shook the other's shoulder.

"I didn't hear reveille blow yet. What's up? Have I overslept?" murmured the young corporal.

"No, it's not six-thirty yet—barely after half past four, in fact. But young Digby—he had the night watch, you know—and was to have been relieved at three o'clock. Well, Ernest Thompson, his relief, roused out at that hour, but not a trace of Digby was to be found!"

"What!" The sleepy boy was drowsy no longer. "Digby gone?"

"Hush! We don't know yet. Don't wake any of the others. Thompson and I have skirmished around ever since it began to get light, and we have not been able to find a trace of him."

Merritt was out of his cot while his leader was still speaking, and ten minutes later, during which time the boys exchanged excited questions and answers, he was in his uniform and outside the tent.

The sun was just poking his rim above the western horizon and the chilly damp of early dawn lay over the island. The sea, as calm almost as a lake, lay sullen and gray, scarcely heaving. Behind the sleeping camp a few shreds of mist—the ghosts of the vapors of the night were arising like smoke among the dim trees. At the further end of the assemblage of tents, and beyond the smoldering fire, stood a silent figure, that of Ernest Thompson.

"Have you explored the island thoroughly?" asked Merritt under his breath. Somehow the dim hour and the situation seemed to preclude the idea of loud talking.

"Of course not. Not yet," breathed the other in the same tones. "We will break the news to the rest of the Patrol after breakfast. It's no use alarming them yet."

"It isn't possible that he went off on an early fishing expedition?"

For answer, Rob waved his hand toward the water, where the Flying Fish lay rocking gently at her anchor. Ashore the dingy lay as Merritt and his companions had left it the night before.

"But what can have happened to him?" burst out Merritt, as they made their way over to Ernest Thompson's side.

"I cannot think. It is absolutely mystifying. I am going to start for the captain's place now. He may be able to throw some light on the affair."

Merritt shook his head.

"Hardly likely. If there is no trace of Joe Digby on this side of the island, it is improbable that Captain Hudgins knows anything about him."

"Well," rejoined Rob in a troubled voice, "we've got to try everything. I am responsible for his safe keeping while he is in camp. I blame myself for allowing the kid to go on sentry duty at all."

"No use doing that," comforted Merritt; "there's one thing sure, he can't have melted away. He must be somewhere on the island. There are no wild beasts or anything like that here to carry him off, so if we keep up the search we must come upon him sooner or later."

"That's what makes the whole affair the more mystifying," rejoined Rob. "What can have become of him?"

"Well, if he's on the island, we'll find him," he continued; "and if he isn't—"

"We'll find him anyway," declared Merritt in a determined voice.

"That's the stuff!" warmly exclaimed the other. "And now I'm going to take a cruise round to the other side of the island, and see if I can find out anything there."

A few seconds later he was in the dinghy and sculling out over the water to the speedy Flying Fish. In a short time he was off.

As the "chug chug" of the motor grew fainter, Merritt turned to young Thompson.

"Don't breathe a word of this to the others till we know for certain that Digby has vanished," he said.

The other boy nodded.

"I understand," he said, and the look with which he accompanied the words rendered Merritt perfectly confident that he would be obeyed.

"And now let's rouse out Andy Bowles and get him busy with that tin horn of his," cheerfully went on Merritt, walking toward Andy's tent.

That youth was much surprised to find that it was morning, but tumbled out of his cot in double-quick time, and soon the cheerful notes of reveille were ringing out over the camp, on which the sun's rays were now streaming down in that luminary's cheerful morning way.

The soldier who immortalized himself by sing the words: "We can't get 'em up, We can't get 'em up, We can't get 'em up in the morning—, We can't get 'em up, We can't get 'em up, We can't get'em up at a-a-l-l-l!" to the stirring notes of the army's morning call had never been in a camp of Boy Scouts. If he had he wouldn't have written them, for before the last notes had died away the camp was alive and astir, with hurrying lads filling tin washbasins and cleaning up.

The cook and "cookee" for the day—Jim Jeffords and Martin Green—soon had their cooking fire going, and presently the appetizing aroma of coffee and fried ham and eggs filled the camp.

"Give the breakfast call, Andy," ordered Merritt, as the proud if flush-faced cooks announced their labors complete, and with a clatter and bang of tin dishes and cups the Boy Scouts sat down to breakfast.

"Where's Rob and Digby?" demanded Andy Bowles, as he dug his spoon into an island of oatmeal completely surrounded by an ocean of condensed milk thinned down with warm water.

The moment that Merritt had dreaded had arrived.

"Why, he and Rob went off early to see the captain," he said. "I guess they'll be back soon."

"Pretty early for paying social calls," commented Andy, too busy with his breakfast, however, to give the matter more attention, for which Merritt was duly thankful.

After breakfast Merritt ordered a general airing of bedding, and the side walls of the tents were raised to let the fresh air blow through them. Still there was no sign of Rob. Merritt grew so anxious that he could hardly keep from pacing up and down to conceal his nervous state of mind. However, he stuck to his duties and oversaw the first routine of the morning without betraying his anxiety to any of the lads under his charge. At last there came the awaited chug chug of the returning boat, for which he had been so eagerly listening, and Rob appeared rounding the little point below the camp. In the craft was another figure, that of the captain himself.

Merritt's first hope when he saw the two persons in the boat—namely, that one of them might be the missing boy—was promptly dashed, and he instinctively guessed by Rob's silence as he dropped the anchor and he and the captain tumbled into the dinghy that there had been no news.

"No," said Rob, shaking his head dejectedly as they reached the shore, "there isn't anything to tell. The captain is as much in the dark as we."

"Well, you'd better have some breakfast," said Merritt, after he and the captain had exchanged greetings, "then we can go ahead and notify the others and institute a thorough search."

"That's the stuff, my boy," agreed the veteran. "Overhaul ship from bilge ter royals, and if not found, then take a cruise in search uv."

Rob ate his meal with small appetite, but the captain, urging on his young companion the necessity of "filling his hold," devoured prodigious quantities of food, and then, arising, suggested that the time had come to "pipe all hands aft and read orders."

The boys had been so busy about their morning tasks that fortunately none of them, except Tubby, whom Merritt had told of the disappearance, had found time to notice Rob's return or ask questions; so that when he announced to them that Joe Digby was missing it came as a stunning shock.

"Now, boys," said Rob, after he had communicated the full details, so far as he knew them, of the circumstances of the disappearance, "there is only one thing to do, and that is turn this island inside out. It won't take long, but I want it done thoroughly. Don't leave a stone unturned. If after a painstaking search we find nothing on the island, we'll know we have to look elsewhere. You are all fairly good woodsmen by this time, and can trail by signs as effectively as first-class scouts. Use your eyes, and good luck."

Merritt at once assigned searching parties, he and Rob and Tubby taking the center of the island and the others being detailed to search along the shores in two separate squads for any trace of their missing comrade.

"Call me a lubber if this ain't the most mystifyin' thing I've run my bow into since the Two Janes, uv Boston, brig, lost her bearings in a fog and fetched up off Iceland," declared the captain, who had elected to accompany the three leaders of the Patrol. "But drown or swim, sail or sink, we'll find that kid if he's on deck."

The searching parties construed this speech as a sort of valedictory to them as, indeed, the captain intended it—and greeted it with a cheer.

"The first scout that finds a trace of Joe is to light the four 'smokes', meaning come to council," was Rob's last order. "Light them on as prominent a place as you can find and we will all meet in camp to hear the news."

The searching parties at once separated, one striking off to the right, the other to the left and the three young leaders and their grizzled friend making a dead set for the center of the island.

If Joe Digby was to be found, the look of determination on the face of each scout showed that it would not be the fault of his young comrades if he were not.



CHAPTER XIX

SAM REBELS

In the meantime on a small island in the Upper Inlet a strange conference was taking place. Three youths whom our readers will recognize as Jack Curtiss, Bill Bender and Sam Redding; were in earnest consultation with the unkempt and unsavory individual whom we know as Hank Handcraft, the beach-comber.

"Well, the job's put through, all right," Hank was saying, as the three sat outside a small tent in front of which was a smoldering fire, about which the remnants of a meal were scattered.

"Yes, but now we've got to tackle the hardest part of it," said Jack, knitting his brows. "I've got the letter written and here it is." As he spoke he drew from his pocket a sheet of paper. "The question is who to send for the money when the time comes."

"Oh, Hank is the man," said Ben, without an instant's hesitation. "We must not appear in this at all."

"Oh, I am the man, am?" put in Hank, with no very gratified inflexion in his voice; "and what if I am caught? I'm to go to prison, I suppose, while you fellows get off scot-free."

"As for me," said Sam Redding, who was pale and looked scared, and whose eyes, too, were red-rimmed and heavy as if from lack of sleep, "you can count me out. I want nothing to do with it. You've gone too far, Jack, in your schemes against the boys. I'm through with the whole thing."

"Well, if you're that chicken-hearted, we don't want you in it at all," sneered Jack, although he looked somewhat troubled at his follower's defection. "All we want you to promise is not to split on us."

"Oh, I won't peach," promised Sam readily.

"It will be better for you not to," warned Bill Bender; "and now let's figure this thing out, and quickly, too. We haven't got any too much time. They'll have discovered the kid has gone by this time and the alarm will be spread broadcast."

"I thought, when he yelled like that last night, we were goners sure," remarked Jack, scowling at the recollection. "It's a good thing those kids sleep as hard as they do, or we'd have been in a tight fix."

"Oh, well, no good going back to that now," dissented Bill. "How was the young cub when you left him, Hank?" he asked abruptly.

"Oh, he'd got through crying, and was lying nice and quiet on his bunk," remarked Hank, with an amiable chuckle, as though he had just performed some praiseworthy act, instead of having left little Joe Digby locked in a deserted bungalow on an island some little distance from the one on which the conversation related above was taking place.

"Well, that's good," said Bill; "although crying, or yelling, either, won't do him much good on that island. He could yell for a week and no one would hear him."

"No; the water's too shallow for any motor boats to get up there," agreed Hank. "I had a hard job getting through the channel in the rowboat, even at high water."

"Is the house good and tight?" was Jack's next question.

"Tight—tight as the Tombs," was Hank's answer, the simile being an apt one for him to use. "The door has that big bolt on the outside that I put on, besides the lock, of which I carried away the key, and the shutters are all nailed up. No danger of his getting away till we want him to!"

"Couldn't be better," grinned Jack approvingly. "Now, here's the letter. Tell me what you think of it?"

Opening the sheet of paper, the bully read aloud as follows:

"MR. AND MRS. DIGBY:

"Your son is safe and in good hands. I alone know where the men who stole him have taken him. But I am a poor man, and think that the information should be worth something to you. Suppose you place two hundred dollars under the signpost at the Montauk crossroads to-night. I will call and get it if you will mark the spot at which you place it with a rock. Look under the same rock in the morning and you will find directions how to get your boy back.

CAPTAIN NEMO."

"What do you think of that?" inquired Jack complacently, as he concluded the reading of his epistle.

"A bee-yoo-tiful piece of composition," said Hank approvingly, with one of his throaty chuckles; "the only thing is—who is Captain Nemo?"

"Why, so far as delivering the letter and getting the money is concerned, you are," said Jack decisively. "Eh, Bill?"

"Oh, by all means," assented Bill.

Sam was not included in the conversation, and gazed sullenly straight in front of him as he lay where he had thrown himself on the fine white sand.

"Oh, by no means," echoed Hank derisively. "Say, what do you fellows take me for, the late lamented Mr. Easy Mark? If you do you have another think coming."

"Now look here, Hank," argued Jack, "what's the objection? All you've got to do is to take this note ashore, give it to some boy to deliver, and then go to the crossroads at whatever time to-night you see fit and get the money."

"Of course," Bill hastened to put in, "you've got to bring it to us for proper division."

"Oh, I have, have I?" chuckled Hank. "Well, what do you think of that? I'm to do all the work and you fellows are to get the bacon! That's a fine idea—not! Four into two hundred doesn't go very many times, you know."

"Not four," corrected Jack, "three. Sam is out of this. He's too much of a coward to have anything to do with it," he added, mimicking Sam's tone.

The boat-builder's son reddened, but said nothing in reply to the bully's taunt.

"Well, three, then," went on Hank; "that's not percentage enough for me. If I'm to have anything to do with this here job, I want half the money. You fellows can split the rest between you!"

Jack and Bill exchanged blank looks.

"Now, look here, Hank, be reasonable," began Jack in a tone meant to be conciliatory.

"Now, look here, Jack, be sensible," echoed Hank mockingly. "You seem to forget that you owe me something for the job we did on those uniforms the other night, and that other little errand you performed on the island. You've got a very convenient memory, you have. Why, I daresay those kids would have given me a nice little wad of tobacco money to have told just who took their Sunday-go-to-meetin' suits, but did I peach? No, you know I didn't; but," he added, with rising emphasis, "if I don't get what's coming to me pretty soon, I will."

"Well, you idiot," began Jack truculently; "haven't you got your chance now?"

"If I choose to take it—yes," was the rejoinder; "but I don't know as I will. It seems to me I hold all the trumps and you are at my mercy."

"Why, you insolent dog!" bellowed Jack, rising to his feet from the position in which he had been squatting. "For two cents I'd knock your bewhiskered head off!"

He advanced threateningly, but Bill, seeing the turn matters were taking, and realizing that more was to be gained by peaceful methods, intervened.

"Now, Jack, shut up. Stow that nonsense," he ordered sharply. "Look here, Hank, we'll accept your terms. Half to you if you carry it out successfully."

"And if I don't?"

"Then we'll all have to shift for ourselves. This part of the country will be too hot to hold us. I mean to go out West. I've got a cousin who has a ranch, and I think I could get along all right there if the worst comes to the worst."

"See here, I don't agree with your way of dividing the money," began Jack, an angry light in his eyes. "Look—"

"Look here, Jack," cut in Bill sharply, "if you don't like it, it doesn't do you any good. If you object to it, keep out. Hank and I form a majority. You chump" he added, quickly, under his breath, as Hank turned away and began to "skip" flat stones over the water, "don't you see he takes all the responsibility? It's a cinch for us to get away if anything goes wrong."

"Yes, it's a cinch we get cheated out of our share of the money," argued Jack, with an angry glare in the direction of the unconscious Hank.

"Beggars can't be choosers," argued Bill. "You know, as well as I do, that if we are implicated in this affair it means serious trouble. Our parents wouldn't stand for it, and we should be disgraced. By doing it this way we get some of the proceeds—I admit not our fair share but what's to be done?"

"Well, I guess you are right, Bill," assented Jack, with a shrug. "It's go ahead now; we've gone too far to draw back."

"That's the line of talk," grinned Bill, "and when we've each got fifty dollars in our pockets, silenced Hank with a golden gag and had our revenge on those kids, we'll be able to talk over future plans. I'm sick of school. I hate the idea of going back there. I've half a mind to strike out for the West anyway."

"Do you think I could get a job on your cousin's ranch?" asked Jack.

"I don't doubt it a bit," rejoined Bill. "You're a good, husky chap, and brawn and muscle is what they need in the West."

"Yes, I'm husky, all right," conceded Jack modestly. "Sometimes I think that I don't get full opportunities to expand here in this wretched country hole."

"No, the West is the place," agreed Bill, with an inward smile, "as the newspapers say—one can expand with the country out there."

Their conversation was broken in upon by Sam, who demanded in no very gentle tones:

"Well, who's going ashore? I'm off."

"No hurry, Sam," said Jack in a more amiable tone than he had yet used that morning. "Let's sit around here a while and enjoy the sun—we might take a swim after a while."

"If you don't come now you'll have to swim ashore," grunted Sam, arising and brushing the sand from himself. "I'm going back to Hampton. I'm tired of camping out here."

He walked toward the beach and prepared to shove off the dinghy, preparatory to sculling out to the hydroplane, which lay a few rods off shore in the channel.

"Hold on, Sam," cried Bill; "we're coming. Don't go away sore."

"I'm not sore," rejoined Sam, in a tone which belied his words, "but I don't think you fellows are doing the right thing when you maroon a kid like Joe Digby on a lone island, in a deserted bungalow in which you'd be scared to stop yourselves."

"Why, what's got into you, Sam?" protested Jack. "It's more a lark than anything else."

"Fine lark," grunted Sam, "scaring a kid half to death and then writing notes for money. It's dangerously near to kidnapping—that's what I call it, and I'm glad I'm not in it."

Both the others looked rather uncomfortable at this presentation of the matter, but Jack affected to laugh it off.

"Pshaw!" he exclaimed, "it's a little bit rough, I know, but such things do a kid good. Teach him to be self-reliant and—and all that."

"Sure," agreed Bill, "you don't look at these things in the right light, Sam—does he, Hank?"

Hank, who had shuffled toward the dinghy at the conclusion of these edifying remarks, agreed with a chuckle that Sam had no sense of humor, after which they all got into the dinghy and we sculled off to the unlucky hydroplane.

It didn't take long to get under way, and the little craft was soon scudding through the water at a good pace, towing the dinghy behind her.

"Better put us ashore before we get into Hampton," suggested Bill. "We don't want to be seen about there more than can be helped."

"That's where you are wrong," objected Jack. "We'll put Hank ashore up the coast, but the more we are seen about the place the better. It won't look as if we had anything to do with the Digby kid—in case things do go wrong."

So it was agreed that Hank was to be landed in a small cove a few miles farther down the coast, from which it was a short cut across country to the neighborhood of the Digby farm.

Then he was to waylay the first likely-looking messenger and entrust the note which Jack had read to him for delivery. After that he was to spend the time as best he could in suitable seclusion, and after dark conceal himself near the sign-post. He was not to make any attempt to secure the money if any one hovered about the place, but if the coast was clear he was to go boldly in and take it.

Hank was landed at the spot agreed upon, a short time later, and the other three then resumed their journey for the hydroplane's home port. As they turned seaward Jack pointed mockingly to Topsail Island, which lay a short distance on their port bow.

"I'll bet there's plenty going on there right now," he grinned.

"Right you are," assented Bill.

"Hullo," he added hastily the next moment; "what's that?"

He pointed toward the island, and the occupants of the homing hydroplane saw, slowly rising from it in the still air, four straight columns of blue smoke.

"Looks like a signal of some kind," suggested Jack after a scrutiny.

"It's coming from about the place where we grabbed the kid," added Bill, a note of apprehension in his voice.

"I wonder what it signifies?" demanded Jack, whose face began to bear a somewhat troubled look.

"I can tell you," said Sam shortly, turning round from the wheel.

"You can?"

"Yes."

"Well, hurry up, then—what does it mean?" Jack spoke sharply at Sam's deliberation.

"It means," said Sam slowly, as if he wanted every word to sink in, "that the Boy Scouts have picked up your trail."



CHAPTER XX

THE HUNT FOR TENDERFOOT JOE

Rob, Merritt, Tubby Hopkins and Captain Hudgins rested, perspiring under the noon-day heat, on a group of flat rocks at the highest point of the island. Their search had been fruitless, and their downcast faces showed it.

"How ever are we going to break the news to his parents?"

Merritt it was who voiced the question that had been troubling all of them.

Before any one had time to frame a reply the captain, whose keen eyes had been gazing about him, gave a sudden shout:

"There's that smoke yonder yer boys were lookin' fer," he exclaimed, pointing.

"Four columns of it," shouted Rob, "hurray, boys, that means news! It's 'Come to counsel.' Come on, don't let's lose any time in getting back."

Rapidly the boys stumbled and ran forward over the rocks and pushed on among the dense growth that covered the hillside they had climbed. They hardly noticed the obstacles, however, so keenly were they bent on getting back to camp and learning the news which they knew must be awaiting them. They covered the distance in half the time it had taken them to ascend the hillside and were met in the camp by the body of searchers—Andy Bowles, Sim Jeffords and Ernest Thompson—who had swung off to the left or mainland side of the island.

"Well, boys, what news?" breathlessly exclaimed Rob, "we saw the counsel smoke and hurried down at top speed."

"Well, there's not very much, I'm afraid, Rob," began Andy, "but we found something that may give us a clue. About half a mile down the beach there's the distinct mark of a boat keel where it was drawn up on the hard sand and the marks of three separate pairs of feet."

"Good," exclaimed Rob, "that's something and half confirms my suspicion. Go on, Andy, what else?"

"Well, we examined the marks carefully and found that two pairs of feet wore good shoes and the third a very broken, disreputable pair."

"Yes," exclaimed Rob, while the others listened breathlessly.

"Of course that indicated to us that three persons must have carried Joe off—for I don't think there's much doubt now that he was carried off, do you?"

"I don't," said Rob sadly, "but for what possible motive?"

"I have it," suddenly exclaimed Tubby Hopkins, snapping his fingers, "you remember the day of the aeroplane model contest?"

"Yes, but what—" began Rob.

"Has that to do with it," finished Tubby for him. "Everything. It was Joe who first told the committee that Jack's model was a bought one and so lost him the fifty-dollar prize."

"By cracky, that's right!" assented Rob, "and you think that Jack and his gang have carried him off in revenge for it?"

"Looks that way to me," nodded the stout youth.

"Why, they wouldn't dare," began Andy Bowles.

"Oh, yes, they would," amended Rob bitterly, "they'd dare anything to get even on us for their fancied wrongs. But whose could have been the broken ragged shoes?" he asked, suddenly taking up another train of thought.

"Hank Handcrafts, the beach-comber's," suggested Tubby.

"Gee Whillikens! I'll bet a cracker that's the solution," cried Andy, "and now I come to think of it I heard, before we left, that Jack and his gang had gone camping."

"Where?"

"Up around the Upper Inlet somewhere. You know that's full of islands and as there's no drinking water there few people ever think of frequenting the place. If they wanted to do anything like carrying off Joe that is where they would have been likely to go."

"You may be right, Andy. It's worth looking into, anyway," declared Rob. "I'll leave a note here for the others and we'll take a run over there in the Flying Fish. If Joe is there we'll get him out."

"And in jig time, too," chimed in Ernest Thompson.

"Come on, boys, get some gasoline, hop in the dinghy and let's get aboard. We've got to move fast if we're to accomplish anything. You get the boat, Andy, while I write a line to tell the others what we've gone after."

The young leader hastily ran into his tent and sitting down at the table dashed off these lines:

"Boys, we think we have a clue to Joe's whereabouts. Have gone after him. Keep camp in regular way while we are gone. Hiram Nelson is leader, and Paul Perkins corporal, in our absence.

"ROB BLAKE, Leader,

"Eagle Patrol, B. S. of A."

With a piece of chalk the boy marked a rough square and an arrow on a tree—the arrow pointing to a spot in the sand in which he buried the letter.

"Now, then, come on," he shouted, dashing toward the boat, "shove off, boys, and if Joe's in the Upper Inlet we'll find him."

"Hurray," cheered the others, much heartened by the prospect of any trace of the missing boy, however slight.

"Give way, boys," bellowed the captain, who had insisted on coming along armed with a huge horse pistol of ancient pattern which he had strapped on himself in the morning when the news of Joe Digby's disappearance reached him. "This reminds me uv the time when I was A. B. on the Bonnie Bess and we smoked out a fine mess of pirates in the Caribees."

"Regular pirates?" inquired Andy as Rob and Merritt bent to the oars.

"Reg'lar piratical pirates, my boy," responded the old salt, "we decorated the trees with 'em and they looked a lot handsomer there than they did a-sailin' the blue main."

Further reminiscences of the captain's were cut short by their arrival at the Flying Fish's side. They had hastily thrown two cases of gasoline into the dinghy before they shoved off so that all that remained to be done was to fill the fast craft's tank and she was ready to be off.

"Hold on," warned Rob, as Tubby Hopkins was about to secure the dinghy to the mooring buoy, "we'll tow her along. We may need her. There's lots of shoal water in that Upper Inlet."

"Right yer are, my boy; there's nothin' like bein' forehanded," remarked the captain as Merritt bent over the flywheel and Rob threw in the spark and turned on the gasoline. After a few revolutions an explosion resulted and the Flying Fish was off on the mission which might mean so much or so little to the anxious hearts on board her.

"Do you know the channel," asked Merritt as Rob with his eyes glued on the coast sent the Flying Fish through the waves, or rather wavelets, for the sea was almost like a sheet of glass.

"I've been up here once or twice after duck," rejoined Rob, "but it's a tricky sort of a place to get through. However, I guess we'll make it."

As they drew nearer the shores the boys made out an opening which Rob said was the Upper Inlet channel.

"Say, Tubby, get out the lead line and let's see how much water we have," directed Rob as the color of the ocean began to change from dark blue to a sort of greenish tinge, lightening in spots, where the shoals were near to the surface, to a sandy yellow.

The stout lad took a position in the bow and swinging the lead about his head cast it suddenly ahead of the Flying Fish's bow.

"Slow down," ordered Rob, and Merritt cut down the motor to not more than two hundred revolutions a minute.

The lead line, tagged with different colored bits of flannel at each fathom length, sang through the stout lad's fingers.

"By-a-quarter-three," he called out the next instant.

This meant that three fathoms and a quarter or eighteen feet three inches of water was under the keel of the little craft.

"Nough fer a man-uv-war," grinned old Captain Hodgins.

Slowly the Flying Fish forged ahead till right under her bow lay a patch of the yellow water.

"By-a-half-two," came a sharp hail from the fat youth, who had once more heaved the lead.

"Cut her down some more," sharply ordered Rob, without turning his head, "we draw only three feet so I guess we'll do nicely for a while."

"Great hop-toads, there's regular shark's teeth ahead," commented Captain Hudgins, pointing to the still shallower water indicated by the lightening tint of the channel.

"By-one-by-a-quarter-one!" came sharply from Tubby, as the Flying Fish seemed hardly to crawl along the water.

"By-a-half!" came an instant later, meaning that only three feet of water lay right ahead.

"Stop her," roared out Rob.

But he was too late. Instantly, almost as Merritt's hand had flown to the lever, the nose of the Flying Fish poked into the sandbank and her motor with a gentle sigh came to a stop.

"Hard a-ground!" roared the captain, "too bad and with a fallin' tide, too."

"Full speed astern," came the next order.

The propeller churned up the water aft into a white turmoil. The Flying Fish trembled in her every timber, and began to slide slowly backward from the treacherous shoal.

"Safe, by the great horn spoon!" roared the captain, fetching Andy Bowles a slap on the back that almost toppled the small bugler into the water.

"For a time," said Rob quietly, "come ahead a bit, Merritt."

Slowly the little vessel slid ahead once more. Rob seemed fairly to feel his way through the narrow channel he had picked out and finally the Flying Fish, after as much coaxing as is usually bestowed on a balky horse, floated in the deep water beyond the sandy bar.

Eagerly the boys looked about them as they "opened up," as sailors call it, the narrow stretch of water known as the Upper Inlet. It did not take them long to spy the island with the tent on it in which the conversation between Jack and his cronies, and the mutineer to his plans, had taken place.

"There's their camp!" shouted Rob, eagerly sending the Flying Fish ahead at full speed, "now we'll find out something."

"And, maybe, use this." The captain, as he spoke, grimly produced his formidable weapon and flourished it about.

"No, none of that," sternly rejoined Rob, "the Boy Scouts can take care of those fellows—without using firearms."

"You bet," rejoined Merritt, grimly "muscling up," "we'll show 'em if it comes to a fight."

But bitter disappointment awaited the boys. As we know, the camp was deserted and no trace or clue of the whereabouts of its occupants was to be found. In the tent, however, lay a piece of blotting paper with ink-marks on it. It was the material with which Jack had dried his letter.

"Anybody got a mirror?" asked Rob. "This blotter may help some if we can read what's on it."

"I've got a pocket one," said Andy Bowles, who was somewhat particular about his person and always carried a small toilet case.

"That will do; let's have it."

Rob seized the bit of looking glass and held the blotter to it.

"Just as I thought," he exclaimed a minute later, with a cry of triumph. "It's Jack Curtiss' writing, though he has tried to disguise it, and they've got Joe hidden somewhere. Look here, they want $200 for his return."

"Yes, but what good does it do us to know that," objected Merritt, when the sensation this announcement caused had subsided. "They evidently had him here overnight and then deserted the camp for fear we'd pick up their trail. They've taken Joe with them."

"By the great sea-serpent, that's right," grunted the captain, "it's a blind trail, boys!"



CHAPTER XXI

SAVED BY "SMOKE MORSE"

Each member of the party regarded the other blankly.

The captain was right. The deserted camp was only a blind trail and they had all their work to do over again.

"The first people to communicate with are Joe's parents," mused Rob. "That note will be delivered very shortly, as the longer they delay the more dangerous it will be for them."

"That's right," agreed Merritt, "Jack and his gang will not let the grass grow under their feet now that they know the chase must be on. What can they have done with Joe?"

Rob had been looking about him with the instinct of the Boy Scout. He was anxious to ascertain if there were not something tangible, some clue on which they could base a search for the missing member of the Patrol. Suddenly something remarkable struck him about the tracks that lay about the tent.

They were all four those, of persons of larger growth than Joe Digby and mingling with them unmistakably was the broken-shoed track of Hank, the beach-comber.

"Boys," announced Rob suddenly, "Joe has not been here at all."

"Not been here at all," echoed Merritt, amazedly.

"I mean what I say. Look at these tracks. There is not a footmark here that could by any chance be his."

The others scrutinized the maze of foot-prints with the same care as had Rob and were forced to come to the same conclusion. There was no question about it—they would have to seek elsewhere for a trace of the lad.

But where?

They gazed about them at the stretch of lone bay or inlet, the sparse scrub grass and vegetation fringing it on the shore side and wheeling sea-gulls swooping and soaring above the shoal waters.

Then Rob's gaze rested carelessly on a closed and seemingly deserted bungalow, occupying the island above them. As his eyes fell on it they suddenly became riveted and then grew wide with surprise.

A stream of smoke was issuing from the fieldstone chimney roughly constructed at one end of the apparently deserted dwelling.

"There's some one living in that bungalow," he exclaimed, as he made the discovery, "maybe whoever it is can give us some clue to where Joe Digby is."

They all gazed intently at the weather-beaten old house from which the paint was scaling, adding to the note of desertion sounded by its closed shutters and forlorn-looking yard.

As they looked, astonished at the idea that the barren structure should actually house a human being, a sudden thought struck Merritt.

"Suppose Jack Curtiss and his gang are there?" he said.

"Hardly likely," rejoined Rob, "however, we'll get over there and find out just who is making that smoke."

Suddenly the old captain, who had been watching the smoke closely, gave an astonished snort.

"What's the matter, captain?" asked Rob, who was about to walk to the water's edge and get ready to shove off the dinghy.

"Why, there's somethin' queer about that thar smoke," responded the old salt.

"Queer—how do you mean?"

"Well, watch it a minute—there—see! now stops—now it starts ag'in—then it stops—wha, do yer suppose is happenin' to it?"

Rob knitted his brows and watched the phenomenon to which the captain had called attention with narrowed eyes.

There was no question about it the smoke was certainly behaving "queerly" as the captain put it.

The blue vapor emerged from the chimney now in a copious puff and then, for a space, would cease, only to roll forth once more in larger volume. The boys watched it in some astonishment.

"What can they be doing, do you suppose?" Merritt asked.

"I have no idea. It's past me to say," responded Rob, "it comes out in puffs like—like—by hookey! I've got it!" he broke off with a shout, "like the Morse code!"

"Somebody signaling?" stammered Merritt.

"That's it—watch!"

The smoke, which had not been visible for some seconds, now emerged from the stone chimney once more and the boys, fascinated, watched it closely with burning eyes. There was no doubt whatever about it now. It was signaling.

Four short puffs.

"Four dots—that's H," exclaimed Rob, trembling with excitement.

The smoke ceased.

"Here comes some more," shouted Merritt.

One short puff from the chimney.

"E, one dot, that's E sure enough," translated Rob.

The others stood like figures carved in stone as their leader read off the strange signals.

Puff! A longer period of smoking by the chimney—then two sharp puffs.

"That's L," interpreted the leader of the Eagles. Before they could say a word the chimney took up its message once more.

Puff—a long puff—another long one, and then a short one.

"Dot—dash—dash—dot," exclaimed Rob.

"That's the letter P," put in Merritt.

"That's right, old man," shouted Rob, slapping him on the back, "and we've found Joe Digby. That smoke signal spelled Help in the Morse code."

"You're right," shouted Merritt, "come on, Cap, come on, boys, we've got to get a move on and get it on quick!"

They dashed toward the dinghy and a few seconds later had once more embarked and were speeding toward the desolate and forsaken bungalow. Somehow they managed to get ashore in the dinghy without anyone being spilled over the side in their desperate hurry and a minute later were pounding at the door.

"Joe—Joe Digby," shouted Rob in a strange, strained voice.

"Here," came back the answer in a feeble tone, "oh, boys, I'm glad you've come."

Furiously Rob shook the door.

"It's locked," came the voice from inside, "I tried to break it down. Too weak, I guess. Try the shutters."

At each window in turn the Boy Scouts sought to effect an entrance, but in vain. The owner of the place had screwed up the window coverings too tightly for them to be opened without tools.

The rescue party came to a momentary halt.

"I've got it," shouted the captain suddenly, "we'll have him out uv there in two shakes uv a drake's tail."

He produced his formidable old pistol and waved it grimly.

"Come on, boys," he yelled, darting round to the front of the house—the side on which the door was.

"What are you going to do?" demanded Rob, as much mystified as the rest at the old eccentric actions.

"Watch me," grinned the captain as he gained the door.

"Stand clear!" he bawled at the top of his lungs, "stand clear uv the door inside there, Joe!"

"All right," came back the reply, "I'm in a corner."

"Now, stand by ter receive boarders!" roared the veteran as he placed the muzzle weapon at the lock and pulled the trigger.

"Bang!"

There was a roaring explosion from the wide mouthed weapon and a cloud of smoke filled the air. But simultaneously there came a sound of ripping, tearing and splintering and the lock of the door, shot clean out by the heavy charge, clattered down to the floor on the inside of the room.

An instant later Joe Digby, pale and trembling from privation, surprise and happiness all mingled in one, was in the midst of his friends and fellow scouts.

"I don't know what made me think of it," he explained in answer to eager questions about the smoke telegraph message. "It was what the books call an inspiration, I guess. There were plenty of loose boards—fragments of old packing cases lying about, and luckily they had not taken my matches. I built a blaze and then, while it was still smoldering, I covered it with an old strip of sacking that I wetted with some water out of the bottle they left me."

"It made about as good a signal, as one could want," responded Rob warmly, "but now tell us about your capture, Joe, how did it happen?"

"Why, you see," exclaimed the lad, his voice growing stronger as he proceeded, "I was just thinking it was about time to wake my relief when I heard a rustling noise in the bushes back of the camp. I walked up there to investigate, for I thought it might be some animals—maybe the captain's pigs."

"Keel haul them lubberly swine," from the captain.

"But, as you shall hear, I was mistaken. Hardly had I reached the edge of the dark shadows than I was seized and a hand put over my mouth. I had only time to let out one yell for help."

"The one that woke me," put in Merritt, in parenthesis.

"That was it; I guess," went on the small lad, "well, I was picked up and carried some little distance to where they had a boat, and thrown into it. Then the three men who were in the boat rowed to an island with a tent on it and there two of them got out. The other, a fellow with a big beard and very dirty, then rowed over to this place with me and, after putting some bread and a bottle of water inside the door, closed and locked it.

"I carried on like a baby, I guess. I cried for a long time and shouted, but no one came. Then I grew quieter and tried to find some way of escape but the shutters were all fastened and the door was too strong for me. I tried to clamber up the chimney once but I had to give it up. Then suddenly the thought of making a smoke came to me and then I improved on that idea and used the Morse code that Rob has been drumming into me. I never thought that I might be able to use it to save my life maybe—or at least a lot of hunger and misery."

"Could you recognize the men who took you if you saw them again?" asked Rob earnestly.

"I'm not sure," responded the small lad, "one of them I would know—the one with the beard. The other two wore masks. But I think their voices sounded like Bill's and Jack's. I'm sure of the man with the beard though."

"Hank Handcraft," exclaimed Merritt.

"Oh, that's who it was," cried the small lad, "I thought somehow the voice and something about the man seemed familiar. He's that old beach comber who lives outside Hampton."

"That's the son uv a sea-swab," roared the captain, "oh, if I could only get my hands on him, I'd—"

The fate the captain had reserved for Hank was doomed not to be known, for as he was speaking Paul Perkins gave a sudden shout:

"Look—look there!" he cried, pointing.

Sneaking up to the tented island was the familiar outline of Sam Redding's hydroplane.



CHAPTER XXII

THE ESCAPE OF THE BULLY

The group standing about the newly rescued lad on the veranda of the deserted bungalow galvanized into instant action.

"Jack Curtiss and Bill Bender are in her!" shouted Rob, "come on, scouts, we'll get after them while we can."

With a shout the Boy Scouts ran for the boat and speedily pulled out to the Flying Fish. Hastily as they executed this move, however, the two in the other boat had had time to head her about and start at top speed for the mouth of the inlet.

"Clap on more sail, my hearties," roared the captain, almost beside himself with excitement, "I want ter get my hands on them two piratical craft."

Rob, with a look of grim determination on his usually pleasant face, held the Flying Fish true on her course, but, heavily laden as she was, she could not make her usual speed and the hydroplane soon distanced her. Jack Curtiss stood in her stern and waved a mocking hand at the Boy Scouts as the light-draft craft shot over the shoals and shallows with case while the Flying Fish had to lose much time and way by threading in and out seeking the deeper water.

"Douse my toplights, I can't stand that," bellowed the irate Captain Hudgins. "I'll put a shot in that jackanapes' locker."

With these words, and before any of the boys could stop him, he rose to his feet and sent a bullet from his ponderous revolver flying in the direction of the fleeing motor boat. It missed and hit the water near by, sending up a little fountain of spray.

Even at the distance they were the occupants of the Flying Fish could see the fear which this warlike move inspired in the bully and his companion. They threw themselves flat in their boat till only the hands of Bill, who was steering, were visible.

They need not have feared, however. The captain's hasty move brought down on his head Rob's wrath, though the young leader could not find it in his heart to be really angry with the old man who had been irritated past endurance by the bully's mocking defiance.

"Shiver my garboard strake," he exclaimed contritely, when Rob pointed out to him that he might have killed one of the occupants of the hydroplane, "shiver my garboard strake, lad, I saw red fer a minute just like I did that time the Chinese pirates boarded the Sarah Jane Butts in the Yellow River."

Although there was not much hope of catching the two, Rob stuck to the chase even when he realized the scouts were outdistanced, and in fact kept his attention so closely riveted on the other craft that when there came a sudden jar and jolt and the Flying Fish stopped with a grunt and a wheeze, he realized with a start that he had not been watching the treacherous channel and was once more fast on a sand bar.

With a last shout and a yell of defiance the bully and his companion, who had by now got over their fright, shot out on to the ocean and rapidly vanished.

"There goes our hope of catching those two crooks," cried Tubby angrily, while the engine of the Flying Fish was set at reverse. "It's all off now. They know that we have rescued Joe and they'll fly the coop for some other part of the country."

"I suppose they came down here to get their tent, not realizing we'd be here so soon," observed Andy, which indeed was the fact.

Fortunately the Flying Fish was not very hard aground and a little manipulation got her off into deep water once more.

"I guess those two chaps are almost in Hampton by this time and getting ready to leave town," observed Rob as the motor boat forged ahead, once more.

"This will be the safest thing for them to do," exclaimed Merritt, "they are in a serious position this time. Kidnapping is a dire offense."

"I wonder what they came back for?" said Tubby suddenly.

"No doubt to get their tent and the few things they had left on the island," vouchsafed Rob, skillfully dodging a shoal as he spoke, "maybe, too, they intended to see how Joe was making out."

"I wasn't making out at all," said the small lad, with a shudder at the recollection of his imprisonment.

"Never mind, Joe, that's all over now," put in Merritt.

"I'm glad it is," answered the small lad, "and just think, if I hadn't been a Boy Scout and understood that code I might have been there yet."

"That's true enough," said Rob, "for we had about made up our minds that the bungalow was deserted, and were not going to bother investigating it, till we saw the smoke."

About an hour later the boys landed once more in camp, where their reception by the others may be well imagined by my young readers.

"And now comes the final chapter in the career of Messrs. Jack Curtiss and Bill Bender," said Rob decisively, "I'm going to take a run up to Hampton. Joe, you'll come along, and you, Merritt, and Tubby. If that letter was delivered, as I imagine it was, Joe's parents must be in a terrible state of anxiety by now and we must hurry up and see them at once."

"Right," agreed Merritt, and a few moments later, having left the captain and the others ashore, the Boy Scouts and their young leader were speeding toward Hampton. With the craft lightened as she was, they made good time and arrived at the yacht club pier speedily.

News of the events which had transpired at the island had evidently reached the town, for Mr. Wingate himself, with Mr. Blake and Merritt's father were at the landing as the Flying Fish glided up to it.

The three elders were almost as enthusiastic as the boys had been over the safe recovery of Joe, the details attendant on which Rob rapidly sketched to them. He had hardly concluded and had not had time to ask how they knew of the kidnapping when a wild-eyed man in faded old farm clothes, accompanied by an equally distracted woman, came rushing down to the wharf.

"Where's them Boy Scouts? I allers knew no good would come of my son joining 'em," the man shouted. "I'll give a hundred dollars fer a boat that'll take me ter Topsail Island in ten minutes."

"'No need of that, Mr. Digby," said Rob quietly stepping forward with his hand on Joe's shoulder, "here is Joe safe and sound."

"Great hopping watermelons!" yelled the farmer, rushing at his son followed by his wife. Together the worthy souls almost squashed the small lad like a butterfly under a harrow. But at last the first greetings were over and the farmer turned to the somewhat amused group of boys and men who were looking on.

"My, what a fright we had," exclaimed Mrs. Digby, a motherly-looking woman, dabbing at her eyes with capacious pocket handkerchief, "we gets a letter tellin' us that our boy be kidnapped."

"Yes we know all about that, Mrs. Digby," put in Mr. Blake, "you recollect your husband telephoned to the chief of police here about it, and expecting news from the island, we came down here."

"So he did, so he did," cried Mrs. Digby, "oh, dear me, Mr. Blake, I'm in such a takin! I hardly know what I'm sayin'."

"Consarn them Boy Scouts," sputtered the farmer, returning to his original grievance, "if Joe hadn't a joined them none of this would have happened."

"Oh, yes it would and worse in fact," said Mr. Blake quietly, "from what I have learned of the affair it was your lad's knowledge of the Morse code, which every Boy Scout must know, that saved him when he was confined on the island."

"That's right, pop," piped up the lad himself.

"Wall, I don't know nothin' about Horses, codes," grunted Mr. Digby, somewhat mollified, "but if it saved Joe here it must be all right."

"Then your animosity toward the Boy Scouts is somewhat modified," smiled Mr. Blake, "let me tell you just what happened. As a matter of fact the whole trouble dates back to the day your son exposed the contemptible trick by which Jack Curtiss hoped to win the aeroplane model prize contest."

The banker drew the farmer aside and related to him the story that had been previously narrated by Rob.

"I want ter shake yer hand, boy," exclaimed the fanner, darting at Rob at the conclusion, "I want ter shake all yer hands," he yelled in his enthusiasm.

"Bless my soul," exclaimed Commodore Wingate suddenly, "we are clean forgetting about those two young rascals who tried to extort the money from Mr. Digby. We must get after them at once and their accomplice who, I suppose, is, the man delegated to take the money from under the rock."

"What do you suggest?" asked Mr. Blake.

"That we hasten to the office of the chief of police and then get into my car and ferret them out if possible," said the commodore briskly, "they must be made to suffer for this."

"I don't believe that Sam Redding had any hand in it," put in Rob as Merritt mentioned the name of the boat-builder's son. "You know that all our investigation only pointed to two persons, Jack and Bill, and their assistant, Hank Handcraft."

A short time later Merritt, Tubby and the Digbys being left behind on the landing, a high powered car, containing Rob, his father, Commodore Wingate and the chief of police of Hampton shot out on to the road leading to the farm owned by Jack Curtiss' father. Inquiry at the Bender home had already developed the fact that Jack and Bill had left there hurriedly a short time before, saying they were going out to the Curtiss place. The party was doomed to disappointment, however, so far as the hope of catching Jack or his accomplices at the farm was concerned. Old Mr. Curtiss informed them that his son had taken the family buggy and driven furiously off down the road with Bill Bender a short time before.

"He got a hundred dollars from me," explained the old man simply, "he told me he was goin' ter invest it in some rich mining stock his friend Bender had promoted but—what's the matter, gentlemen," he broke off, noticing the half-pitying look on the faces of the men in the automobile. Mr. Blake hurriedly explained the attempted extortion of which Jack had been guilty.

"What, Jack—my son!" exclaimed the old man in half daze at the stunning intelligence, "my boy Jack do a thing like that? Why, it can't be true. I don't believe it."

"I'm afraid, nevertheless, it is," rejoined Mr. Blake, but the old man only shook his head.

"I'll not believe it," he kept repeating.

"I wish that so good a father had a worthy son," remarked Mr. Blake as the car shot out of the farm and out upon the highroad in the hope of overtaking the buggy.

At the Digby farm the machine was turned off to take the cross roads and at this spot they encountered a buggy coming toward them driven by a farmer friend of Mr. Blake's.

"Seen a rig with Jack Curtiss and Bill Bender in it?" shouted the banker as the car was slowed up by Commodore Wingate.

"Down the road a piece driving like the Mischief," responded the rustic pointing back with his whip, "but you're wrong 'bout ther' bein' only two of them; that no-good beach-comber, Hank Handcraft, was in there with them."

With a shouted word of thanks the car dashed forward once more. It was evident that, realizing that their game was up, Jack and Bill had picked up Hank, and, with a sense of loyalty for which Rob certainly would not have given them credit, were trying to save him too.

"Where can they be headed for?" wondered Mr. Blake as the car dashed forward.

"I can hazard a guess," exclaimed Commodore Wingate, "for the Sunnyside railroad station. If they make a train they may escape us yet."

"Je-rus-a-lem," exclaimed the chief of police, a man named Applegate, pulling out a huge old-fashioned silver watch, "there's a train due in a few minutes now; if we don't make it, they'll slip through our fingers!"

Faster and faster the car roared forward and suddenly as it shot round a curve the little station of Sunnyside came in sight. Tied outside it was the buggy and horse of farmer Curtiss and on the platform stood three figures that the party in the auto made out at once as Jack Curtiss, Bill Bender and their unsavory ally.

The road took a long curve at this point and while they could see the station the pursuers had the mortification of knowing that it would be some minutes before they could reach it. As the car bounded forward, swaying like a rocking ship over the rough roads, there came a sudden sound that made Rob's heart bound.

The long whistle of an approaching train.

Faster the machine shot onward roaring like a battery of machine guns going into action. Its occupants leaned forward with eyes glued on the group on the platform.

The trio of whom the autoists were in pursuit had by this time realized that they were the objects of the chase and were nervously staring up the track down which was fast approaching the train by which they hoped to escape.

The auto was still a good two hundred yards from the station when the train rolled in and, hardly stopping, started to move out again.

"Stop! stop!" yelled Chief Applegate, at the top of his lungs, and the others waved their hands frantically. The engineer looked back at them with a grin.

"Some more idiots missed their train, Jim," he remarked to the fireman, "I might have waited for them but we're five minutes behind schedule time now."

The fireman nodded understandingly and as the auto, in a cloud of dust, dashed up to the little depot the train, with a screech that sounded like the last defiance of the bully, shot round a curve and vanished with a cloud of black smoke.

"Beaten!" gasped the chief.

"We can telegraph ahead and have them arrested in New York," suggested Rob.

"No, perhaps it is all for the best," counseled Mr. Blake, "the parents of both those boys are respected citizens, and it would be a cruel grievance to them were their boys to be publicly disgraced. Let them work out their own salvation."

And so Jack Curtiss, Bill Bender and Hank Handcraft vanish for a time from the ken of the Boy Scouts, leaving behind them no regrets, except it be those of their parents who were for many months bowed down with the grief and humiliation of their boys' misdoings.



CHAPTER XXIII

SCOUTS IN NEED ARE FRIENDS INDEED

"Ta-ra-ta-ra-ta! Ta-ra-ta-ra-ta! Ta-ra-ta-rata! Ta-ra-ta-a-a!"

Andy's bugle briskly announced the last morning of the Boy Scouts' camp on Topsail Island. Already the first breath of autumn had begun to tint the leaves of the earlier fading trees, and the chill of the early dawn was noticeable.

During their stay in camp the lads had profited in every way. The scout program as sent out for camps by headquarters had been gone, through with some modifications, and Sim Jeffords had qualified as a first-class scout while Martin Green, Walter Lonsdale and Joe Digby, once more as merry as ever, were all fitted for their second-class scout diplomas. The prospect of another patrol in Hampton had been discussed and the outlook for one seemed favorable.

As the last notes of Andy's call—to turn to the subject of the opening of this chapter—rang out the tousle-headed, sleepy-eyed scouts appeared from their tents and found themselves enveloped in a fleecy mist—such a light fog as is common on that part of the Atlantic coast at this season of the year.

"Pretty thick!" was Rob's comment as he doused his face in his tin basin.

"Hull-o-o-o!" suddenly hailed a voice from the water, "got any breakfast fer an old shipmate?"

Through the fog the boys could make out the dim outline of the captain's motor boat even if it's apoplectic cough had not already told them it was there.

"Sure, come ashore," hailed Merritt.

A few moments later the hearty old seaman was sitting down with the lads and performing miracles of eating.

"It's a good thing we haven't all got your capacity," remarked Rob, laughing, "or that provision tent wouldn't have held out very long."

"Wall, boys," observed the captain, drawing out a black pipe and ramming some equally black tobacco into it with a horny thumb, "a full hold makes fair sailin', that's my motto and 'Be Prepared' is yers. A man can be no better prepared than with a good meal under his belt. Give me a well-fed crew and I'll navigate a raft to Hindustan, but a pack uv slab-sided lime juicers couldn't work a full-rigged ship uv the finest from here to Ban-gor."

Having delivered himself of this bit of philosophy, the captain passed on to another subject.

"Hear'n anything uv them varmints what slipped their moorings on the train?" he asked.

"We heard that they had gone West," rejoined Merritt, "but to just what part I don't know."

"That thar Sam Reddin' boy clar'd himself uv all suspicion, did he?" went on the old man.

"Yes, after he had admitted that Jack Curtiss and Bill Bender and himself stole our uniforms and robbed you—"

"Consarn him," interrupted the captain.

"You needn't grumble, his father paid you back all that was taken," observed Merritt.

"That don't lessen the crime," grunted the captain, "heave ahead with yer yarn, my boy; yer was sayin' that that Reddin' boy admitted everythin'."

"Well," continued Rob, "in consideration of his confession, it was agreed not to prosecute him and he seems to be a reformed character. He absolutely denied, though, having had anything to do with the kidnapping of Joe Digby here, and I believe he is telling the truth."

"The truth ain't in any uv them fellers, that's my belief," snorted the captain, "and if ever I get my hands on that thar Jack Curtiss or Bill Bender I'll lay onto 'em with a rope's end."

"Oh, we'll never see them again," laughed Rob.

It may be said here, however, that in this he was very much mistaken. Rob and his friends did meet the bully again and under strange circumstances, in scenes far removed from the peaceful surroundings of Hampton.

"Fog's thickenin'," observed the captain squinting seaward.

As he remarked, the mist was indeed increasing in density, shrouding the surroundings of the camp completely and covering the trees and bushes with condensed moisture, which dripped in a slow, melancholy sort of way from their limbs.

"Bad weather for ships," observed Merritt.

"Yer may well say that, my lad, and this is a powerful bad part uv the coast ter be navigatin' on in a fog. I've heard it said that there's a lot uv iron in the Long Island shoals and that this deflects the compasses uv ships that stay too near in shore in a fog. I don't know how that maybe, I don't place a lot uv stock in it myself, but I do know that steamers and vessels uv al kinds go ashore here more than seems ter be natural."

As he finished speaking there came, the fog a sound that fitted in so well with subject of his conversation that it almost an accompaniment to it.

"Who-oo-oo-oo!"

"A steamer's siren," exclaimed Rob.

"That's what it is, lad," assented the old sailor, as the sound came again, booming through the fog with a melancholy cadence.

"Who-o-o-o-o-o!" roared the siren once more.

"I'll bet the feller who's on the bridge uv that ship is havin' his own troubles just about now," remarked the captain, "hark at that!"

The whistle was now roaring like a wounded bull, sending distinct vibrations of sound through the increasing fog billows.

"Thick as pea soup," commented the captain, refilling his pipe, "reckon I'll have ter stay here till she lifts a bit. Wind's hauled to the sou'west too. Bad quarter means more fog and smother."

"Who-o-o-o-o!" boomed the siren of the hidden vessel once more, and this time it was answered by another whistle somewhere further off in the fog.

"Two uv 'em now. Stand by fer a collision," shouted the captain, while the scouts, intensely interested in the development of this hidden drama of the fog, clustered about him.

"Who-o-o-o-o! Who-o-o-o-o! Who-o-o-o-o!" came the nearest siren.

"She's standin' in shore," shouted the captain, "boys, she's in grave danger."

"What's she coming in for?" asked Merritt.

"I suppose her skipper thinks he's got plenty uv water under his keel and wants ter give a wide berth ter the other vessel," explained the captain. "Boys, if only we had a big bell or a steam whistle we could warn them poor fellows uv their peril."

"It does seem hard to hear them blundering in and not be able to warn them," agreed Rob, "there should have been a lighthouse put on these shoals long ago."

"Right yer are, boy, but the government is a slow movin' vessel and hard ter get under way."

The boys had to laugh at this odd way of expressing the difficulty of getting new lights erected, but they knew as well almost as their companion the dangers of the ocean off this part of Long Island.

The whistle boomed out its wailing note again.

"Closer and closer," lamented the captain, "what's the matter with those lubbers? Yer'd think they'd have a leadsman out."

All at once the catastrophe for which they had been more or less prepared happened. So quickly did it come that they had not time to speak.

The echoes of the last note of the siren had hardly died out when there came a loud explosion.

"Bang!"

"A signal gun," roared the captain.

"They are calling for help?" asked Rob.

"That's it, my boy. They've struck, just as I thought they would."

The distress gun sounded again.

"They're in a bad mess by the sound uv that," said the captain.

"It doesn't sound as if they were more than half a mile or so out," remarked Rob.

"I guess they're not. Hark at that! They must be scared ter death."

The gun was fired three times in rapid succession.

"They'll never hear that at Lone Hill life savin' station," grimly commented the captain, "and this fog's too thick fer them ter see her."

"Do you imagine she is badly damaged, captain?" asked Rob anxiously. The idea of the stranded ship lost in the dense fog affected him strangely.

"Can't tell," the captain replied to his question, "may have stove a hole in herself and be sinking now."

"Can't we do something to help them?" asked Merritt eagerly.

"Only one thing we can do, boy, and that's full uv danger."

"What is it?" demanded Rob, ignoring the last part of the captain's speech.

"Get in ther boat and go out thar to 'em. If they're sinkin' we can help 'em a whole lot, and—"

The captain stopped short in amazement.

Rob, Merritt and Tubby had already started for the beach and Hiram, "the wireless scout", was close on their heels.

"Well, douse my toplights," exclaimed the captain, rising to his feet and lumbering after them, "Yer can't beat the Boy Scouts."



CHAPTER XXIV

A MEETING IN THE FOG—CONCLUSION

"Can you make her out?"

Five pairs of eyes peered through the mist that hung like a white pall an every side of the Flying Fish.

"Stop that motor a minute, while I listen!"

In compliance with Rob's order Merritt shut down the panting engine.

"What's that noise off there?" asked Hiram suddenly.

"That sort of throbbing sound?" rejoined Tubby Hopkins.

"That's it, sounds like a big heart beating," put in Rob.

"I guess that's their engine. They're tryin' ter back her off," suggested the captain.

"Give them a blast on that fog-horn and see if they answer," said Rob suddenly.

Hiram took up the big brass fish-horn, used as a fog signal on the Flying Fish, and blew a loud, long call.

After an interval of waiting, from out of the mist came the wail of the stranded ship's siren once more.

"There she is, right in there," declared the captain, pointing seaward into the mist. "Steer right on that tack, Rob, and we'll pick her up pretty soon."

The motor was started up once more and the Flying Fish forged ahead through the smother. Suddenly Rob, with a sharp cry of:

"Stop her!" swung his wheel over sharp and the Flying Fish headed about.

The gleaming black rampart of a large vessel's side had suddenly loomed up dead ahead of him.

"Ahoy! aboard the steamer," roared the captain, framing his mouth with his hands, "what ship is that?"

"The El Paso from London to New York," came back a hail from somewhere above them in a somewhat surprised tone, "who are you?"

"The Flying Fish of Hampton, Long Island," responded Rob, with a laugh.

"Never heard of her," responded the voice, "we're hard aground on one of your Long Island shoals it seems."

"That's what yer are," exclaimed the captain, "how come yer ter be huggin' the shore so hard?"

"Trying to avoid a collision with another vessel."

"Are yer all right?" bellowed the captain.

"Seem to be. So far as we can find out there's not a plate started, but if you're from the land we've got a couple of passengers we'd be thankful if you'd take ashore. Will you come on board?"

"Sure, if yer'll drop a Jacob's ladder," bellowed the captain at the invisible speaker.

"In a minute."

The conversation had been carried on without either of the parties to it being able to see one another, but the captain of the vessel—for he had been the boy's interlocutor—now came off the bridge and with some of the crew watched two sailors lower a Jacob's ladder and make it fast to the rail.

"Now we go aboard," said Captain Hudgins, clambering up the swaying contrivance as nimbly as an athlete, "make our painter fast ter the ladder, Rob."

This being done, the boys followed the veteran on board. The steamer, when they gained her deck, puzzled them a good deal and it was not till her captain, a genial blond-bearded Britisher, explained to them that she was a cattle ship that they understood the utility of the wooden structures with which her decks were obstructed.

The captain explained that these were pens for the cattle she expected to take back to England, from which country she was returning after having taken over a large consignment of steers.

"Which," went on the captain, "brings us to my passengers. They are Mr. Frank Harkness and his son, of Lariat, a small cattle town in the West, where Mr. Harkness has a large ranch. They were his cattle that we took over and as he had difficulty in engaging a berth on a liner at this time of year, when the passenger ships are crowded, he decided to return with us. Here is Mr. Harkness now," he added, as a tall, bronzed man, with a long coat draped over a pair of broad shoulders, and a wide-brimmed sombrero above keen eyes, approached.

"Visitors from the shore, captain?" he inquired, a pleasant smile illuminating his clean-shaven, sun-browned face.

"That's what they are," rejoined the captain, "just dropped in on us, don't you know."

"You mean we dropped in on them," amended the other with a laugh, "come here, Harry," he called, raising his voice, "we've got some company out of the fog."

In response to his call a lad about the age of Rob appeared from the after-end of the ship, where the cabins were, and greeted the boys with a smile and a nod. He, like his father, wore a sombrero and was quite as sunburned. For the rest he was well-knit and athletic looking and had evidently lived an out-door life.

"Well, we are getting plenty of experiences away from the ranch, eh, Harry?" observed his father, after the boys and the captain had introduced themselves and there had been a great and ceremonious hand-shaking all round.

"We just naturally are," responded the rancher's son. "Say, captain," he went on, "when do you expect to get off?"

"If we are not too badly hung up we ought to get off at high-water," rejoined the Britisher.

"That won't be till late to-night," observed Rob.

"If I could only get a tug we might do better," observed the captain, "in fact, since I've had the engines going I don't think we can back off under our own power."

"Have you got a wireless?" asked Hiram, his pet subject uppermost.

"Yes, but our operator went ashore in London and I guess he had too good a time; anyhow he never showed up so we had to cross without one."

"Is she working?" asked Hiram interestedly.

"Sure, there's plenty of 'juice' as the operators, call it. I tried to work it coming over," laughed Harry, "but outside of getting a proper shock, I didn't do much."

"I'll send out a signal for a tug," said Hiram quietly, "there's a station at Island. They'll pick up the message and transmit it."

"What—you can work a wireless?"

"A little bit," said the lad modestly.

"Come on, I'll show you the way," said the delighted captain, starting off with Hiram, and followed by the others.

"Say, don't think it personal of me, will you?" remarked Harry Harkness to Rob as they followed, "but would you mind telling me what you all are wearing those uniforms for?"

"Why, we're Boy Scouts," rejoined Rob proudly, and went on to explain just what the organization is.

"Say, that's great," exclaimed Harry enthusiastically, "I'd like to form a patrol out at Lariat. Do you reckon I could?"

"I don't doubt it," rejoined Rob, smiling the Western enthusiasm.

"By cracky, I'll do it," went on Harry Harkness, "I'll make it a mounted patrol and if we don't get old 'Silver Tip' then, besides all the other sport we'll have, call me a coyote."

"Who or what is old Silver Tip?" asked Rob, somewhat interested in his breezy new acquaintance.

"Silver Tip is a grizzly," explained Harry, "a grizzly bear you know. Dad says he's the biggest he's ever seen and he seems to bear—excuse the pun, please—he seems to bear a charmed life. All the boys on the ranch are crazy to get a shot at him, but they've never been able to."

"Say, that sounds bully," agreed Rob, "I wish I could get out West for a while."

"It's a great country," said Harry sagely, as they entered the wireless room, where Hiram was already bending over the instrument sending out a message for aid, while the blue spark leaped and crackled across its gap. The others gazed on admiringly as Hiram, having completed his message, adjusted the detector on his head and awaited an answer.

It soon came. Tugs would be dispatched as soon as the fog lifted, the operator at Fire Island announced.

"That's a weight off my mind," breathed the captain, while Harry hastily confided to his father that the lads who had boarded the vessel out of the mist were Boy Scouts.

"The fog is lifting," announced Rob, as they streamed out of the wireless room.

"Yes, the wind has shifted," remarked Captain Hudgins. "I guess it was that sou'west breeze that brought the mist. She's hauled ter the nor'west now, and in an hour's time it will be clear."

"I wonder if you boys can put us ashore," said Mr. Harkness, as the group walked aft to the captain's cabin; "I would be very grateful if you could. It seems that it will be some time before the steamer is cleared, and I am anxious to make a train for the West."

The boys agreed to land the ranchman and his son as soon as the fog cleared off, which, as the captain had prophesied, it did in about an hour's time. The boys had spent the interim in exploring the ship and listening to Harry Harkness' tales of the ranch and the marvelous exploits of Silver Tip, the huge grizzly, who derived his name, it appeared, from a spot of white fur on his breast. In fact, so fast did they get on, that by the time Harry and his father were called by Captain Hudgins to embark in the Flying Fish, the boys had become fast friends.

The run to the shore was made quickly and by landing the two travelers at a point above Hampton they were enabled to make a train that would land them in the city in time for dinner. Mr. Harkness whiled away the trip by plying the boys with all sorts of questions about the Boy Scouts and seemed greatly interested in their answers. Altogether the boys felt quite sorry when it came time to part at the wharf at Farmingdale, the place where the rancher and his son were put ashore.

"Well, good-bye, boys," said Mr. Harkness, holding out a big hand to Rob, who took it and was amazed to find a twenty dollar gold piece slipped into his palm by the ranchman.

"Oh, I couldn't think of taking that," he said, insisting on handing it back despite the ranchman's protests, "I appreciate your motive, but I couldn't think of taking any money for an ordinary courtesy."

"By Sam Hooker, you're right, boy," cried the ranchman heartily, "and it's a privilege to meet such a bunch of fine lads. I thought all you Easterners were a bunch of stuck-up tenderfeet, but I find I'm wrong—anyhow so far as the Boy Scouts are concerned."

A few minutes later the rancher and his son were hastening to the railroad station, followed by the boys' eyes. As they entered the depot, just in time to catch the New York train—they waved a hearty farewell and the boys waved and shouted in return.

"We've only known them a few hours, but I feel as if I'd just said good-bye to two friends," said Rob as they turned away and prepared to go back to the island in their boat and break camp.

"So do I!" said Tubby; "I wonder if we'll ever see them again."

"No, I guess they're kind of ships that pass in the night,"' laughed Merritt, "however, I'm glad we did them a good turn."

The boys, however, were destined to meet the ranchers again and to have many strange and exciting adventures, among which the ultimate downfall of Silver Tip was to be one. Could they have looked into the future, too, they would have seen that in the Far West they were to face dangers and difficulties of which they had as yet never dreamed and were to be the victims of the malicious contrivings of Bill Bender and our old, acquaintance, Jack Curtiss.

A few weeks after the events related above there was great excitement in Hampton over the announcement that Merritt's courageous act of life-saving and the achievements of the other young scouts of the Eagle Patrol were to receive official recognition. A field secretary of the organization arrived at the village one evening and was met at the depot by the Patrol in full uniform, and with the village band drawn up at their head. Proudly, under the Eagle standard, they marched to the Town Hall, which had been illuminated in a style the villagers would never have believed possible and were greeted by the local committee headed by Commodore Wingate and Mr. Blake.

"Three cheers for the Boy Scouts!" came from a voice in the back of the crowded hall after the honors had been distributed and the advances in rank announced.

The shout that went up cracked the plaster on the ceiling of the venerable building.

"Speech, speech," shouted one of those individuals who always do raise that cry on the slightest excuse.

Rob Blake, very red and protesting, was hustled to the front of the stage on which the Scouts had been drawn up.

"I can't make a speech," he began.

"Hear! Hear!" shouted the crowd, most of whom couldn't.

"But on behalf of the Boy Scouts I want to thank you all and—and—"

The rest was drowned by the band which, having been quiescent for ten whole minutes, could maintain silence no longer and blared out into that favorite of all village bands, "Hail to the Chief."

"Come on, let's get out of here," whispered Rob to Merritt, whose breast was decorated with the coveted bronze cross and red ribbon, which is the highest honor a scout can attain.

As they slipped out upon the darkened street a boy came up to them with an outstretched hand.

"I want to tell you I'm sorry for the part I played in the mean tricks Jack Curtiss and Bill Bender put up on you fellows," he said contritely, "will you shake hands?"

"Sure we will, Sam Redding," responded Merritt, extending his palm, while Rob did likewise.

"At that," added Merritt, "I guess we win."

And here, with their former enemy become a remorseful friend, we will, for the present, leave the Boy Scouts to renew our acquaintance with them in the next volume of this series which will be called: "The Boy Scouts on the Range."



THE END