"Who else is going to be a quitter or a loafer?" inquired Dave scornfully.

There was a pause. No one appeared to have a story that he wanted to try out on such a critical audience.

At last Dick remarked thoughtfully:

"As the man on the clubhouse steps said——"

Then he paused, as if he had forgotten the matter.

"Well," insisted Greg presently, "what did the man on the clubhouse steps say?"

"Eh?" inquired Dick, gazing at him with mock blankness.

"What did the man on the clubhouse steps say?" repeated Greg.

"Oh—er—that is—it's really a secret," Dick replied provokingly.

"Now, see here, none of that!" growled Tom.

"Eh?" demanded Dan, awaking from a light doze, with a start and a subdued snore.

"Dick Prescott, you tell us what the man on the clubhouse steps said!" ordered Tom.

"But I've just told you that it's a secret."

"None of that, now!"

"But I can't tell secrets!" pleaded Dick.

"It isn't a secret at all. It's a good story, and you've got to let it come out. We need a good one to get us started."

All now joined in the demand, but Dick shook his head protestingly.

"Honestly, fellows, it wouldn't be right for me to tell secrets," he insisted.

The inner bar that locked the door by night had been dropped into place ere the boys sat down to supper. But now Harry rose, went over to the door and raised the bar.

"Fellows," he called back, "give Dick Prescott just one more swift chance to tell us what the man on the clubhouse steps said. If he won't, then grab him and fire him out into the night until he knocks on the door and promises to be good."

Tom, Greg and Dave made a laughing bolt for their young leader.

"Some one's pulling the latch-string from outside," reported Harry Hazelton, too startled, for the moment, to let the bar fall. But Tom wheeled like a flash, leaped forward and dropped the bar back into place.

"It's the fellow, or fellows, who have been living here before we came," whispered Dan in a half-scared voice.



CHAPTER VIII

WORMING THE TRUTH FROM A WHINER

"Let me in—quick!" demanded a voice.

"Move on!" ordered Dave.

"Whoever they are, they can break in through the windows, at any rate," muttered Harry Hazelton, in a voice that was just a trifle unsteady.

"We have legal right to occupy this cabin," called Dick through the door. "No one else has any right to be here."

"I know that," answered the voice, "but let me in before I freeze!"

To the amazement of some of the others, Dick Prescott raised the bar and swung the door open.

In came a figure—that of a boy. His cap was pulled down over his ears, and a big tippet obscured most of his face. But Dick grasped him by the shoulder as the youngster started to enter, followed by a heavy swirl of snow.

"What in the world are you doing here, Hen Dutcher?" Dick demanded.

"Yes! What are you doing here?" chorused the rest.

"Lemme get near the fire?" begged Hen, in a choking, sobbing voice. "I'm nearly frozen."

"Don't shut that door yet," called Dan, moving forward. "We didn't know it was snowing. I want to see if it's a big snow."

"You bet it is," chattered Hen. "It's a blizzard, and I don't care how soon that door is shut."

"You're not giving orders here, remember," retorted Dan crisply, as he went to the open doorway. The others, too, crowded to the doorway. It certainly was a big snow. The flakes were of the largest size, and coming down thickly to the tune of a moaning wind.

"It wasn't snowing at dark, and now there are at least four inches," cried Greg.

"Five inches," hazarded Dave.

"How many, Dick?"

"Say, are you fellows going to freeze me to death?" called Hen Dutcher, his teeth chattering. He was facing the fire, roasting in front, but with chills running down his spine.

"Close the door, fellows. We can't see much to-night at any rate, and we'll see the whole storm in the morning," proposed Dick. "We don't want to see Hen freeze to death."

"Nobody invited him here!"

Dick turned, wondering who had made that remark, but he could not make up his mind.

"Take off your coat, Hen, and have some hot coffee. We have some left, and it will warm you," Dick went on, after the door had been closed and barred.

"I'll have supper and the whole thing," declared Hen promptly. "Don't you fellows expect to feed your visitors?"

"We'll feed you," Dick agreed, "though we had made no plans for visitors and didn't expect any."

Hen had some difficulty in getting off his coat.

"Are you as stiff as that?" asked Prescott, going to the other fellow's assistance.

"I tell you, I'm just about frozen to death," moaned Hen. "My, how cold it came on, just after dark! The wind began to howl, and I could feel the ice forming on my chin every time I breathed. I thought sure I was going to freeze to death in the woods. I'd about given up when I saw your lights."

"How long has it been snowing?" Dave asked.

"Don't you fellows know?" Hen demanded.

"No; we were in here, getting supper and then eating it. We didn't know that it had even started to snow."

"It wasn't snowing at dark, but it began some time after," replied Hen, as he took the chair Dick offered and sank into it before the warming glow.

"Don't get too close to the fire until you thaw out a bit," advised Dick. "If you do you'll feel it more."

"I feel it now," groaned Hen, beginning to moan. "My hands are frozen stiff."

They weren't really frozen, though the hands had been badly nipped. It was twenty minutes before Hen Dutcher cared to move over to the table. Even then he complained severely of the "stinging" in his hands, feet and chin.

"I'm going out," proposed Dave, reaching for his cap and coat. "I'm going to see for myself just how cold it is."

No one offered to accompany Darrin. He paused, outside, to tap on one of the window panes. Two minutes after that he was back, pounding for admittance.

"Br-r-r-r!" Dave greeted his comrades, as he stepped inside. "Say, I don't want any more of being out to-night. I'll bet it's away down below zero. And how the wind howls and cuts!"

It took Hen Dutcher, after he got started, considerable time to eat his fill. In the meantime the others, restrained by a sense of what was due from hosts, held back their curiosity.

"There, I don't believe I could eat another mouthful," declared Dutcher, at last, pushing back from the table.

"Now, Hen," invited Dick, "come over to the fire and tell us how you came to be here."

"Why, I just naturally was hereabouts," declared Hen evasively.

"That won't quite do," replied Dick, shaking his head. "What brought you into these woods to-night? Did you expect that we'd invite you in to join us?"

"Nope. Not quite," Hen replied, a crafty look in his eyes.

"Then out with the truth, Hen Dutcher!" broke in Dave.

"I don't have to tell you fellows, do I?"

"Yes, if you want to stay here to-night!" blurted Tom Reade.

"You fellows wouldn't put me out in the cold again!" dared Hen.

"Wouldn't we?" retorted Greg Holmes.

"I just wanted a tramp, and took one," replied Hen sulkily.

"That's too thin!" snapped Dan Dalzell.

"Then you fellows can invent your own story," offered Hen.

"Out with him, fellows!" called Harry Hazelton, making a dive for Hen.

"Don't you dare!" blustered Dutcher tremulously.

"Out with Hen, if he doesn't tell the truth, and the whole of it," advised Tom Reade.

"Dick, you ain't going to let these fellows do anything of the sort, are you?" quavered Hen. "Why, I'd die if I had to be put out into the storm again."

"Why can't you tell us the truth, Hen?" asked Dick quietly, fixing a searching gaze on Dutcher. Then, with a sudden flash of inspiration, Dick added, "Who was out this way with you?"

"No one," Hen replied.

"Don't tell us that," warned young Prescott. "Who were the other fellows in the crowd?"

"I tell you I came alone," Hen insisted, with rising color, as he shifted under Dick's steady gaze. "Fred and——"

"Fred—who?" cross-examined Dick.

"Nobody," Dutcher answered, his eyes on the floor.

Dick thought a moment before a great light dawned on him.

"So, Hen Dutcher, Fred Ripley and some of his crowd knew we were coming out here, and so they came along, too, and you with 'em, eh?"

"I tell you I wasn't with 'em," protested Dutcher.

"You walked all the way?"

"Most of the way."

"And how did Fred Ripley and his crowd come?"

"On a wagon, and——"

Here Hen Dutcher paused suddenly.

"I came alone," he bellowed wrathfully. "There weren't any other fellows."

"Don't you call Ripley a fellow?" pressed Dick. "You said that he and his crowd came on a wagon. So they're going to play pranks on us, are they?"

"I don't know what you're talking about," protested Hen hoarsely.

Dave, Tom and Greg fastened on Dutcher, dragging him out of his chair. This time Dick did not feel called upon to interfere.

"Now, you tell us all about this queer game!" commanded Dave Darrin, his eyes flashing warningly. "If you don't, we'll shake it out of you; or we'll roll you in the snow until we soak the truth out of you! What do Fred Ripley and his crowd mean to do out here to-night?"

"I—I don't know," gasped Hen.

"Yes, you do," warned Dave Darrin crisply.

"No, I don't!"

"Hen Dutcher," Dick interrupted firmly, "we are out here to enjoy ourselves, and we don't propose to be interfered with. We have a right to be here, and no one else has. We've wormed it out of you that Fred Ripley and some other fellows have come out here to torment us. Fred Ripley has no right to come here and play mean tricks on us."

"Who gave you the right to be here?" demanded Hen sullenly. "Wasn't it Fred Ripley's father?"

"Yes; but that gives Fred no right to be mean in the matter, and Lawyer Ripley would be the first to say so, if I went and told him."

"And then you'd be 'Sneak Prescott,'" taunted Hen.

"I didn't say I was going to tell Fred's father," Dick answered, his color rising, "and I haven't any thought of it, either. Any fellow of anywhere near my own size who calls me a sneak can have his answer—two of them," Dick went on, displaying his fists. "You know that well enough, Hen Dutcher. You're one of our own crowd—that is, you go to the Central Grammar with us, and yet you've joined in with some High School boys to bother us and spoil our fun. Who's the sneak, Hen? Who will the fellows at the Central Grammar call the sneak when they hear about this?"

Hen began to look decidedly uneasy. He was well aware what the Grammar School boys in Gridley did to one of their own number who was voted a sneak.

"I—I didn't mean any harm," muttered Hen, almost whimpering.

"See here," demanded Dick, another idea coming to him, "how much did Fred Ripley pay you to help work against us."

"He didn't pay me nothing," young Dutcher protested ungrammatically.

"How much did he agree to pay you, then? Come—out with it!" insisted Dick.

Hen saw the other chums pressing about him threateningly, so he almost blubbered:

"Said he'd give me a dollar if I did the trick right."

"So there was a trick?" cried Dick quickly; then added ironically: "Hen, you ought never to tell lies. You don't do it skilfully. You let out the truth, despite yourself. You've admitted that you've been hired to work against us—to help spoil our peace and comfort. Now, you've got to tell us all the rest of it, or you'll have to take the consequences!"

"Say, don't be mean with a feller!" pleaded Dutcher, ready to snivel.

"We're not mean with you," Dick insisted. "We've a right to protect ourselves, and we're going to do it. Besides, you joined us, and now you've got to be one of us and tell us the whole scheme against us."

"I didn't join you!"

"Do you belong to Fred Ripley's crowd, then? If so, you'd better join that choice gang! Grab hold of him, fellows!"

Dave Darrin and Tom Reade gripped Hen, on either side, with great heartiness. Dan Dalzell ran to unbar the door, after accomplishing which he turned to view what might follow.

"Are you going to tell us, Hen, what Ripley and his crew are plotting against us?" Dick insisted once more.

"They were going to come down here to-night," confessed Hen.

"What were they going to do here?"

"Scare you fellers."

"How?"

"Oh, they've got a lot of sheets, and a frame to rig up on Bert Dodge's shoulders. With the frame above him, and covered with sheets, Bert will make a 'ghost' about ten feet high."

"What else?" pressed Dick.

"Well, they've got a queer kind of whistle they can blow on, and it makes a long, loud moan, or a wail," explained Hen. "Whee! It gave me the creepy shivers the first time I heard it."

"Has Ripley's ghost party got anything else to make the night merry with?" questioned Dick.

"Some kinder colored fire, that they were going to light at quite a distance from here, to give an 'unearthly' glow through the woods."

"What else?"

"Oh, some other things," confessed Hen vaguely. "I can't tell you all that crowd has, for I didn't see it and they wouldn't tell me about it."

"And you turned on Central Grammar boys to help a lot of High School fellows out?" asked Dick in fine scorn.

"Well, I was crazy to have a day or two out here in the woods, and you fellows didn't ask me," protested Hen. "The other crowd did."

"Yes; because they wanted to use you for a tool against us. They wanted to make you their catspaw, Hen Dutcher. Oh, you must feel fine! And the other Central Grammar fellows back in Gridley will be so proud of you!"

"You don't have to tell 'em," urged Hen Dutcher pleadingly.

"No; we don't have to," confirmed Tom Reade. "But we can. And most likely we will. We want to separate the wheat from the chaff at the old Central Gram."

"But, please don't tell 'em," whined Hen.

"We'll see about that," said Dick Prescott. "We won't make a solitary promise. It may depend on how you act, Hen. Now, is there anything more you ought to tell us about what Fred Ripley's crowd intends to do?"

"No-o-o. I don't believe so."

"Who's with Fred Ripley?"

"Bert Dodge."

"Who else?"

Hen named five other young fellows, two of whom were rather worthless High School sophomores.

"And their plan," added Hen, unburdening himself, "was to swoop down here this evening, lay the lines for a first class ghost scare and then see you fellows start running and never stop till you reached Gridley. They've brought some provisions along with them, and they were going to move in here and camp, and laugh, and have a great joke about how the Grammar School kids got cold feet, and——"

"Where are they now?" Dick queried.

"They were going to my Uncle Joel's for a few hours, have supper there and then slip down here. But Uncle Joel's place must be four miles from here, and even he didn't know just where this camp was. So the fellows made me get the best idea I could from my uncle, and then sent me down here to find the place. They'll be mad 'cause I ain't back."

"More likely they'll come, without waiting for you, Hen," observed Dave Darrin grimly.

At this moment the latch-string moved; there was a click of wood against wood as the latch was raised.

"Fellows, it's our ghost party!" whispered Dick, hoarsely. "Stand close by me and sail in when I give the word. We'll do our best to make it hot for the ghost!"

There were varying degrees of bravery shown in that instant. Not one of the Grammar School boys dreamed that they could best Fred Ripley's crew in a rough-and-tumble, but Dick & Co. were all determined to be as "game" as possible.

It was different with Hen Dutcher. He turned pale and shook like a leaf.



CHAPTER IX

THE INTRUDER WHO TRIED TO BE "BOSS"

The heavy door was thrust open—and then the Grammar School boys had the surprise of their lives.

No swarm had invaded their camp. Instead a solitary man, clad in heavy overcoat, and with a cap pulled down over his ears, stamped into the cabin.

In his astonishment and dismay Dick Prescott could not repress the cry of:

"It's Fits—Mr. Fits himself!"

"I see you hain't forgot me!" snarled the fellow, as he slammed the door shut, dropped the bar in the place, and then stood with his back to that barrier.

"See here, you can't stay here," declared Dick, his eyes flashing.

"Can't, eh?" jeered the fellow. "And what's going to stop me?"

"We are. You've no business here."

"And if I don't see fit to go, my young bantam?"

"Then we'll put you out. We're smaller than you are, but there are seven of us—six, I mean," Dick corrected, after a glance at quaking Hen. "You'll find we can take care of you!"

"You kids, eh?" laughed Mr. Fits hoarsely. "Why, if you boys started in to climb over me I'd pick you off and scrunch you, like so many ants. Just try it and see!"

To make his bragging good, Mr. Fits crossed the cabin, helping himself to the chair by the table.

"I see you've got plenty of grub here," the big fellow went on. "I'll bother you to make me some hot coffee and get me the best you have to eat. Step lively, too! Any younker that doesn't move fast enough I'll pick up and swat, and then I'll throw him out in the snow to stay."

Saying which, with a savage snort, Mr. Fits rose and took off his overcoat, tossing it on to the next chair.

"What are you two whispering about?" demanded the rough intruder, eyeing Prescott and Darrin, who were now at the further end of the log cabin.

"Never you mind," Dave retorted tartly.

"Don't give me any impudence, younker!" growled Fits.

"Then don't talk to us," Dick advised.

"I can see that I've got to trim a couple of you," muttered the intruder sourly. "And then, too, I reckon my supper will be coming along faster."

"You'll get no supper here," Dick warned him.

"I won't, hey? Why not, I wonder?" leered the fellow.

"Because we have no poison to mix with the food," Dave retorted.

"I'll have that grub, and some good coffee, set on mighty quick!" growled the visitor. "If that doesn't happen, then I'll run you all out into the snow. You won't last long out there, I warrant you! It's a fearful night."

"Wait!" begged Hen Dutcher. "I'll wait on you, sir."

"No, you won't, Hen," spoke Dick sharply, firmly. "This man doesn't stay here. He's going to leave mighty soon, or he'll wish he had. If you do anything that we can't stand for, Hen, we'll put you outdoors with Mr. Fits."

"You wait on me, boy," ordered Fits gruffly.

"Yes, sir, I——"

"——won't," Dave finished for him snappily. "See here, Hen, you are of no account here. Look out that you don't make yourself too unpopular to be allowed to remain here to-night."

"I see that I've got to teach some of you young cubs a lesson," remarked Fits, rising from the chair.

"Look out that we don't teach you one!" cried Dick. "Watch him, fellows. If Mr. Fits gets too familiar, then sail into him!"

Dick snatched up one hatchet, Greg another. Dan made a rush for the bow and arrow, fitting a steel tipped arrow to the string. Tom Reade espied the crowbar, and reached it in two bounds. Dave Darrin caught up a stick of firewood, Harry Hazelton following suit.

Hen Dutcher didn't do anything except to slink away to one side of the big room. His bravery didn't go beyond the risk of telling lies.

"If Fits makes a move towards any of us, fellows," commanded Dick, in a tone whose steadiness surprised even young Prescott himself, "then the rest close in on all sides and give this big bully the best you've got."

"I wish there was a hatchet for me," growled Dave, whose eyes were flashing dangerously.

"Take this one," replied Dick, passing over his own hastily snatched-up weapon. Thereupon Prescott fell back for an instant, darting over to a pile of boxes and picking up the air rifle that had been brought along.

"Let's see if this air rifle is working?" pondered Dick aloud. He took quick aim and pressed the trigger.

"You dratted little pirate!" roared Mr. Fits, tensing for a leap forward. "I'll show you——"

"You'll get a lot more, if you don't quit trying to run things here," Dick threatened coolly.

Mr. Fits was waving his right hand aloft. Dick had struck the back of that hand with one of the pellets that the rifle carried in its magazine. The skin wasn't broken on that right hand, but the place stung, just the same, as Mr. Fits well knew.

"Hold on! Give him his supper, if he'll quiet down," urged Dave Darrin, aloud, adding, in a whisper to Dick:

"And while he's eating it I'll try to find the nearest house, and get men to come down here and grab him."

As cautiously as Dave spoke the big fellow heard him.

"Oh, you will, will you?" leered Fits. "Younker, how long do you think you'd live in the storm that's going on outside? It's a blizzard. If you don't believe me, go out and see. I'll wait till you come back."

For answer Dave ran to the door and opened it. A swirl of snow greeted Darrin in the face, and another big swirl of the white fluff blew in on the floor.

"Go right on out in the snow," jeered Mr. Fits. Dave did so, but the other five chums kept their gaze steadily on the unwelcome intruder.

"By Jove, fellows," muttered Dave, as he stamped back into the cabin, "the storm has grown so that I don't believe any of us could get through it for a distance of three or four miles."

"And you see," continued Mr. Fits, "I stay here to-night for one very good reason, if I didn't have any others. It would be plain manslaughter to make me go out into the storm. I'd simply die in it before going a mile."

"The snow is already up over my knees," confirmed Dave Darrin dismally, "and I believe it would be twice as deep before I'd been gone an hour."

"So you see it wouldn't be decent to put me out," jeered the big bully, "even if I were afraid of you younkers and your wild west outfit of toy guns and archery."

Dave closed and barred the door with a grim tightening around the corner of his lips.

"Now I'll trouble you boys to stow your amateur theatrical outfit in a corner and get me a whopping big supper," continued the big fellow, with a grin, as he returned to his former seat. "If you don't——"

He paused impressively, then added:

"If you don't I'll start something moving here that'll show you who's boss. Or, if you feel too respectable to like my company, then you can all put on your overcoats and step outdoors. Maybe you can find your way to some pleasanter place for the night."

"If we could get through the storm," whispered Dick to Dave, "then we might leave him here, and get to help who would come down and grab the scoundrel."

"We'd get along all right at the start," muttered Dave, shaking his head. "But I don't believe, the way the blizzard is coming now, that we'd get more than a mile or so before we'd all lie down in the snow and have to give up the fight. You've no idea, Dick, what a howler and piler this storm is. You ought to go out and try it."

"If you say it can't be done, Dave, I'll take your word. You've as much sand and fight as any of us."

"Supper!" yelled the intruder lustily.

"It's the cook's night off," jeered young Prescott.

"Oh, it is, hey?" roared the big fellow. "I'll show you."

Jumping to his feet, snatching up the chair on which he had been sitting, and holding it above his head, Mr. Fits charged.

The crisis in the affair had arrived.



CHAPTER X

IN THE GRIP OF THE BIG BLIZZARD

Dick Prescott was squarely in the way. He didn't flinch or dodge, either.

Like a flash he brought the air rifle up for use. But there was nothing wicked in Dick Prescott. Even against such a foe as this big intruder; Dick felt that it would be wrong, wicked, to aim for the face of Mr. Fits.

Instead, Dick aimed for one of the fellow's legs. The little buckshot went where aimed, but through the thick trousers and underwear the little missile had no painful effect.

"Get back, you lunatic!" quivered Dan, in the same instant, drawing the arrow to the head, ready to let drive.

But at that interesting moment another of the Grammar School boys saved the situation. It was Tom Reade, who, just as Mr. Fits started forward, and was still moving, thrust the crowbar between his legs.

Flop! Fits struck the earthen floor rather heavily, the chair flying over the head of Dick Prescott and landing beyond.

"Good chance!" cheered Harry Hazelton, bringing down his stick of firewood with a blow that resounded.

Tom Reade now raised the crowbar once more, standing where he could aim at the fellow's head. Tom was both too generous and too tender hearted to have struck a human being over the head with such an implement, even had Fits given provocation.

"Don't get up, Mr. Fits," warned Dick, still gripping the air rifle. "If you start to do so, it will be the signal for something to happen."

Their nerves tense from the peril of their surroundings, the Grammar School boys, none of whom were cowards at heart, even though they were pretty young, looked positively fierce in the eyes of the prostrate foe.

"You don't any of you dare hit me," he sneered, with an attempt at bluster.

"Don't we?" scowled Dave Darrin. "Then start something—we'll do the rest."

"Get back with that crowbar!" ordered the fellow sullenly. "Put that air rifle down, and drop that bow and arrow."

"Get up and make us," advised Dick Prescott almost placidly. "Now, Mr. Fits, I hope you realize that we're a few too many for you. As we suggested some time ago, we're going to order you out of here—and at once. And we're not going to take any fooling, either."

"But I can't go out," protested the big fellow. "Why, I'd be found frozen to death in the blizzard."

"You won't have to go far," Dick informed him. "You of course know, as well as we do, that there's a little cook shack at the rear of this cabin. There's a stove there, some firewood and two barrels of coal. Now, you're going there——"

"I won't."

"Yes, you are," Prescott asserted. "Unless you want us to beat you up and simply throw you outside into a snowdrift."

"But I'm hungry," protested Mr. Fits. "Also, it's mighty cold lying here."

"Stay right where you are," Dick went on sternly. "Hen, get this fellow's overcoat and throw it on the floor near the door."

Dutcher obeyed, though he seemed to feel decidedly nervous about it.

"Now, Hen," continued the young leader, "go to the food supplies and pick out two tins of corn beef. Got 'em? Also a loaf of bread. Put the stuff on the coat."

This was done.

"Now, Mr. Fits," went on Dick more steadily still, "it would be unwise for you to rise and walk to the door. We'd bother you if you did. But you can crawl over to your coat. Start!"

"What are you trying to do with me?" appealed the recent bully, in a voice that was now full of concern.

"Crawl over to your coat, and we'll tell you the rest of it. If you don't obey, promptly, we'll take the food part away. Start—crawl!"

Mr. Fits obeyed. He appeared wholly to have lost his nerve, but Dick wasn't so sure, for he ordered sharply:

"Watch out, fellows, that he doesn't play 'possum on us. We can't risk that, you know."

Mr. Fits, however, by dint of crawling, reached his overcoat and the food.

"Throw the door open, Dave," desired young Prescott. "Now, Mr. Fits, rise, get your things and hustle around to the shack at the rear. Woe unto you, if you try to turn and come back into this cabin! We won't stand any more of you."

Like one beaten, and knowing it, Fits shambled out into the storm. No one followed him to see that he reached the shack safely. Any man in good health could do far more than perform that feat.

"Shut the door and bar it, please," chattered Dan Dalzell. "Whew, but having that door open has made this place a cold storage plant!"

"Fellows," spoke up Dick, "if this blizzard is to continue, we'll presently freeze to death in here unless we get more firewood while we can."

"All right," grinned Dalzell. "I've a suggestion, and it's a bully one. We'll appoint Hen Dutcher a committee of one on the woodpile. Go out and study your subject, Hen, and bring in your report—I mean, a cord of wood."

"No, you don't!" protested Hen sullenly.

"Get on, now! Beat your way to the wood pile," ordered Tom Reade.

"No slang, please," mocked Dave. "How can a fellow who's going to work hard beat his way, I'd like to know?"

"If you don't think you'd have to beat your way, to reach the wood pile to-night," retorted Tom, "then just go out again and face the wind and storm. Hen, are you going?"

"No, I'm not," snapped Dutcher.

"Then I'm a prophet," declared Reade solemnly. "I can see you and me having trouble."

"I won't go," cried Hen, with an ugly leer. "I know what you want to do. You want to drive me out to that shanty, so that big fellow will jump on me. Go yourself, Mr. Tom Reade."

"It's too hard a storm for any one fellow to bring in the wood alone," interjected Dick. "I'll go, and so will Greg. Hen, you'll come with us."

"No, I won't."

"Yes, you will," Dick informed him. "We've got to leave some of the fellows here, to guard the doorway against Mr. Fits. We three will go and attend to it all, and the rest of the fellows will stay right by the door and see that Mr. Fits, who has been kind enough to go, stays gone. Get on your coat, Greg, and you, too, Hen."

"I'll stay and help guard," proposed Dutcher.

"A bully guard you'd make," jeered Tom. "Into your coat—or else you'll go without one."

Tom took hold of Hen by the collar, propelling him rapidly across the cabin floor. Dick and Greg were slipping rapidly into coats, caps, overshoes and mittens. Dick picked up the crowbar and Greg the lantern. Hen Dutcher, making the gloomy discovery that it must be work or fight, submitted sulkily.

"Don't hold the door open. Open it when we holler," was Dick's parting direction.

"Whew!" muttered Greg, as they stepped outside. The wind blew in their faces as they went around the end of the cabin, nearly taking their breath, while the snow proved, even now, to be above their knees.

"We can do this in the morning just as well," cried Hen, panting in the effort to make himself heard. "Let's go back."

"You try it, if you dare!" challenged Greg, waving the lantern in the other boy's face.

Even with that short distance to go, it took the three youngsters some little time to reach the great pile of logs. Sparks were flying from the chimney-top of the shack, showing that Mr. Fits was preparing to warm himself.

"And that's the way we've treated the fellow who stole mother's Christmas present, and mine," muttered Dick.

At last the boys reached the pile of logs. Dick tackled it bravely with the crowbar. Shortly he had half a dozen logs clear, though he was panting, both from the beating of the storm and from the hard labor he had taken upon himself.

"Get those in," called Dick. "While you're at it I'll pry more loose."

Hen Dutcher picked up the smallest of the logs, starting for the cabin, but Greg caught him by the shoulder.

"See here, Mr. Lazy, if you're going to pick out such easy ones as that, take two at a time."

"I can't," sputtered Hen.

"Then I'll turn you over to Dave Darrin when you get inside."

Hen thereupon picked up another small log, though he pretended to stagger under the double burden. Greg also carried two logs, and he staggered with good reason, for the weight was more than he should have attempted in the deep snow.

In the very little time that had passed the snow seemed to have grown much deeper. By the time the two wood-carriers reached the doorway and were admitted they felt as though they had done an hour's work of the hardest kind.

Dave Darrin stood just inside, booted and capped.

"Good enough," muttered Dave, holding out the air rifle. "Now, Greg, you take this pill-shooter and let me go out for the next wood. We'll send a new fellow every time."

"Then you can take my place, Darrin," proposed Hen readily. "Give me that air rifle."

"Humph!" was all Dave said, as he poked Hen outdoors before him, while Dalzell and Hazelton took the logs and stacked them at the further end of the cabin.

When Dave and Hen returned they carried but a log apiece.

"Dick says each fellow is to take only one log at a time," reported Dave. "In that way he thinks we'll last longer and get in more wood. Now, Hen will stay back. Tom, I see you're in your overcoat and ready. Come along with me. Dalzell get ready for the next trip, when I come back with my second log."

"And I'll be ready to help Dick with the crowbar," called out Hazelton, running for his coat.

In this way the Grammar School boys worked rapidly and effectively. Hen was the only one in the crowd who made any objection to the amount of work put upon him. Yet it was an hour and a half, from the start, before Dick would agree that there was wood enough in the cabin.

"For it may snow for three days, and grow colder all the time," Prescott explained. "By morning it may be impossible to get out at all. We don't want to freeze to death."

Truth to tell, the exercise had put all of the Grammar School boys in a fine glow. When, at last, the big lot of wood had been moved and stacked up inside, and they closed the door for good at last, not one of them, despite his hard work in the biting storm, felt really chilled.

"Now, what shall we do?" demanded Dave, his eyes dancing.

"Do you know what time it is?" asked Dick.

"Not far from ten o'clock."

"Yes; past bed time for all of us."

"Do you feel sleepy?" demanded Dave.

"I don't," chorused four or five.

"Let's sit up as late as we like, for once," proposed Greg Holmes. "That's part of the fun of camping."

"Humph! I want to go to bed," gaped Dutcher.

"Well, there's nothing to stop you, Hen," responded Dick pleasantly. "If you're really sleepy our chatting won't keep you awake."

"What bed shall I take?" inquired Hen.

"Any one that you like best. There are eight bunks to only seven fellows, you know."

Hen took a look, finally deciding on one of the two that were nearest to the chimney.

"What blankets shall I use?" he asked.

Dick looked rather blank at that question.

"Use the ones you brought with you," advised Harry Hazelton.

"But I didn't bring any with me," grunted Hen. "Hurry up, for I'm awful sleepy."

"Well, you see, Hen," Dick went on, "we're in something of a fix on the blanket question. Each fellow brought his own, and on a night like this any fellow who lends any of his bedding is bound to catch cold when the fire runs lower and the place gets chilly."

"But I gotter have blankets," whined Dutcher. "I can't freeze, either."

"I'll tell you what you do, Hen," Dick went on. "There are seven overcoats in the crowd. They'll keep you warm enough."

"But there's snow on the coats, or where the snow has melted its water," objected Hen. "I'll tell you what you do. You fellows are going to sit up and you can wait for the coats to dry. Let me have a set of blankets, and some other fellow take the coats when they're dry."

"Well, of all the nerve!" gasped Tom Reade.

"Hen," spoke Dave sternly, "if you can't wait for the coats to dry, then you can sit up in a chair by the fire and throw on another log or two every time you wake up with a chill!"

Finding that he couldn't have his own selfish way, Hen, with much grumbling, arranged the coats on two chairs not far from the fire. When he considered the coats dry enough he crawled into his chosen bunk, grumbling at the coarse tick filled only with dried leaves, and was covered by Dick and Greg. Then the other fellows, after replenishing the fire, sat down to spin stories.

"You tell the first yarn, Dick," proposed Tom.

"Too bad," replied Dick, with a shake of the head. "All I can think of is what the man on the clubhouse steps said."

"And what was that?" demanded Tom Reade, leaning forward.

"I can't tell you, just yet," replied Prescott.

"Go on! Yes, you can."

"No; it's a secret."

"What did the man on the clubhouse steps say?" insisted Dan, jumping up, seizing the crowbar and poising it over Dick's head.

"Put down the curling iron, Danny," laughed Prescott. "What the man on the clubhouse steps said is a secret, and I'm not going to tell you, just yet, anyway. Some day I'll tell you."

So Harry Hazelton started the ball rolling with a story. When it was finished Greg rose and went to the window at the rear of the cabin.

"I can't see any lights in the shack," he called back. "I guess Fits must have turned in."

"I wish we had something better than glass windows between that scoundrel and ourselves," muttered Hazelton. "After we're asleep all Fits would have to do would be to smash a light of glass and jump right in here on us. Chances are that we'd all go on sleeping soundly, too, while he gathered up the tools and then he'd have us by the hair when we did wake up."

"Well, then," proposed Darrin quietly, "we'll fasten the shutters."

"Quit your kidding," begged Dan.

"I'm not kidding."

"But you talk of closing the shutters. There aren't any—worse luck for us."

"Aren't there?" challenged Dave. "Say, didn't you fellows know that the cabin windows have shutters?"

"Have they?" asked Dick, jumping up.

"Surest thing going," Dave answered. "Come along and I'll show you."

He went over to one of the windows, which was set to run sidewise in top and bottom grooves. On account of the snow and the cold the window stuck a bit, but at last Dave had it open. Then he reached out and tried to pull the outside shutter along in its own grooves.

"Stuck with a bit of ice," Dave reported. "Harry, just bring the kettle."

Darrin then poured some of the boiling water upon the sill, where the shutter stuck. At his next effort the shutter moved. Dave closed it and pegged it so securely that no trick from the outside could loosen that shutter.

This was done in turn to all the other windows. Feeling secure now, the Grammar School boys found themselves drowsy. Between them they fixed up the fire. Then blankets were spread in six bunks, after which the tired youngsters undressed and crawled in under the bedding.

Silence and slumber reigned in that cosy log cabin in the center of the forest that was in the grip of one of the biggest blizzards in years.



CHAPTER XI

SIX BOYS AND ANOTHER IN COLD STORAGE

When the chatter had ceased and the fellows were all dropping off to sleep, the interior of the tight old log cabin was still aglow from the light of the fire. That light was so bright that, one after another, the boys turned over, their faces to the wall.

And then no sound was heard, save the weird howling of the wind outside, with an occasional sputter as a stray gust of snow swept down the broad chimney to the roaring fire. Every Grammar School boy, as he dropped off to sleep, knew that a big blizzard was still in progress.

"I wonder if I'll sleep a wink, for thinking of Mr. Fits, and what he may try to do to us in the night," thought Dan Dalzell, while his lids fell heavily. "If I do sleep, it will be to wake every little while with a start. Well, so much the better. If I wake often I'm likely to hear the scoundrel if he starts anything around here—when he—thinks—we're—so drowsy that we're dead to the world—and—gullup!"

That last exclamation was a snore. Dan was conscious of waking once, though at what time he did not know. He noted that the fire seemed to have burned very low, and that it was almost wholly dark within the cabin. Then he dozed. When he awoke once more he could see no glow whatever from the fire. The lantern that had been left lighted had flickered out. Dan felt oppressed by a sense of something awesome.

"What on earth can the time be?" Dan wondered, now quite wide awake and just slightly uneasy. As he peered about through the dark he made out what looked very much like a narrow ray of daylight through a crack in one of the closed shutters.

"It can't be morning," muttered Dan. "And yet—why is the fire out? We left a bully one going."

Dan had thrown his jacket on to the bunk before retiring. Now, he sat up, reaching for the jacket.

"Gracious but it's cold!" gasped Dan, as the chill struck him.

"Shut up!" growled Dave Darrin's drowsy voice. "Don't wake everybody."

"What's the matter?" chimed in Dick Prescott sleepily.

"It's—it's cold," chattered Dan, as he sank back under the blankets. Here he quickly warmed. And he had gotten what he had looked for, a battered old dollar watch and a box of matches.

"Keep under the clothes and you'll be all right," returned Dick soothingly. "But, my! With that fire out some of the fellows are going to have a cold time getting up and building one in the morning."

Dan's teeth chattered for a minute or two. Then he sat up once more, striking a match and holding up his watch. Dalzell stared incredulously at the hands and the dial before he tossed the extinguished match to the floor and sank back once more under the blankets.

"S-s-say, do you fellows know what time it is?" shivered Dan.

"What time?" called Dick and Dave softly.

"It's half past nine."

"Nonsense," ridiculed Dave. "It was after ten when we went to bed."

"It's after half past nine—in the morning," retorted Dan impressively.

"Glory, but I believe you're right," ejaculated Prescott. "I can see just a tiny crack of daylight over by one of the shutters."

"It's morning, all right," Dan insisted. "And the fire's out. Wake up, fellows! Who's going to start a new fire?"

"I will," volunteered Tom Reade. "Great Scott! No; I won't, either," he ejaculated, after having thrust his legs out of his bunk preparatory to jumping up. "Oh, don't I wish we could carry a million freight carloads of this cold air back with us! We could make our fortunes selling it to a cold storage company."

"I guess we'll have to call for two volunteers," laughed Dick, after having thrust a foot out. "I'll volunteer, for one. Who'll be the other?"

"Hen Dutcher!" came with wonderful unanimity from the others.

"Not on your life I won't!" retorted Hen with vigor. "I won't freeze myself for any gang of fellows, and that's flat. I'm going to dress by a warm fire when I dress."

"Well," said Dan ruefully, "as I woke all the others up, I guess it's up to me to volunteer. Say when you're ready, Dick."

"Now!" answered Prescott.

"Please don't be so sudden," pleaded Dan. "Give a fellow just a bit of warning. Count three; no, make it ten."

So Dick counted. At ten both he and Dan leaped from their bunks. They were sorry, the instant their feet struck the floor, which seemed at least twenty degrees colder than ice. Both shook and shivered as they pulled on their underclothes, shoes which they did not stop to lace, then shirts, trousers, vests and jackets.

"Br-r-r-r-r! M-m-m-m—!" was all the sound Dan could make. He was trying to frame words, but his teeth wouldn't stop long enough. Dick made a dive for a lot of excelsior that had come around some of their goods the day before. This he threw into the dead, cold fireplace. Dan, shaking as though with ague, brought a log and laid it across the excelsior. Dick brought some more firewood. In a short time they had it well heaped. Then Dick poured coal oil over the whole, and Dan, with palsied fingers, made three attempts before he could open his match box and strike a match. The temperature in the cabin must have been around zero, for it was twenty below outside that same morning.

At last the lighted match reached the oil soaked excelsior, but before it could ignite, the cold wind that was roaring down the chimney blew it out.

Dick was too cold to talk, but he made a dive for his cap, and held it in place over some of the excelsior, while shaking Dan miserably felt for another match. This time the tiny flame caught in the excelsior.

"It's a g-g-g-g-go!" chattered Dick.

"M-m-m-me for b-b-b-b-bed!" chattered Dan, racing back to his bunk in the starting light of the fire and diving in under the blankets.

But Dick Prescott stuck at his post. He saw the excelsior blaze briskly. Then the flames licked at the oil over the logs. Thirty seconds after that, and the cabin interior was fairly well lighted by the increasing blaze. Dick wouldn't go back to his bunk, but stood with his back as close as he dared to the fire. Yet the cold air was all around him, and, while his back baked the rest of his body was so cold that his teeth continued to play against each other in six eight time.

"Why don't you get back into bed?" called Tom Reade lazily from his warmth under blankets. But Dick stuck it out. When the first logs were a seething mass of ruddy fire Dick, now chattering less, brought more short logs and piled them on in place. The wind, that day, would take all the wood that was fed to the fire. Gradually Dick stopped chattering. At last he even felt comfortable.

"You fellows can get up now just as well as not," he announced.

Dan was the first to try it.

"Something like," he announced. That brought Dave Darrin out. One by one the other fellows followed—all except Hen.

"You don't catch me out of my bunk until breakfast is ready," announced young Dutcher.

Dick wheeled impatiently, at this hint, but Dave Darrin whispered in his ear:

"Let it go at that, Dick. But after breakfast we'll make him wash all the dishes—every one—and spend the rest of the forenoon slicking up around the place. If he refuses—well, we'll know how to bring him to time."

So Hen was ignored for the time being. Dan and Greg busied themselves in the first breakfast preparations. Dick and Dave, presently, went over to one of the windows, forcing it back and tugging at the shutter, which proved to be frozen in place.

"Bring some hot water, Dan, the minute you get it," urged Dick. This was soon ready and a small amount of it was poured around the sill, loosening the shutter, which was shoved back.

"Glory! Look at the storm!" cried Dick. There was a rush after the glass window had been closed.

Never had a prettier snow scene been exposed to view. The snow was still swirling down, while what had fallen was up level with the window.

"It's a good four feet deep, already!" cried Dave.

"And looks as though it would go on snowing for a week," added Tom Reade joyously.

"Fellows," announced Dick, "we're surely snowbound. That's something that we've often dreamed about. Say, wouldn't it be queer if we had a long spell of this sort of thing, and couldn't—simply couldn't—get back to Central Grammar by the time school opens again after the holidays?"

"If the food holds out it'll be fun," assented Tom Reade.

Soon another shutter was opened, admitting more daylight. When they got around to the rear window, and got it open, Dick pointed to the shack in the rear.

"Well, we know that Mr. Fits hasn't been out to-day," Prescott laughed. "Just look at his door. The drifts have piled against it, higher than the door itself."

Snow scenes, however, do not feed any one. So the boys turned back to the kitchen preparations. What if the bacon and eggs didn't look quite neat enough to suit a real housekeeper? The mess tasted good. So did the fried potatoes, made out of the left overs from last night's boiled ones. Coffee, bread and butter and "store pie." No wonder the youngsters, when they were through with breakfast, and in a cabin now warm from one end to the other, felt, as Dick expressed it:

"Say, we're at peace with the whole world, aren't we?" he asked.

"Yes," agreed Dan solemnly. "Mr. Fits is snowed in tight."

"We're even at peace with Hen Dutcher, the miserable shirk," rumbled Tom Reade.

"That reminds me," said Dick, turning. "Hen, it's up to you to wash all the dishes, and to do it tidily, too."

"I won't," retorted Hen defiantly. "I'm no servant to you fellows."

"Hen," observed Dick, with a light in his eyes that meant business, "it's past the time now for you to tell us what you'll do and what you won't do. We didn't invite you here, and you didn't pay any share of the expenses that we have been under. Accident made you our guest; we didn't really want you here at all. The same accident that makes it necessary for you to stay here for the present has kept away the rest of your crowd—Fred Ripley and his pals. While you stay here you'll do your full share of the work. If you don't, you'll soon wish you had. Now, your first job is to wash and dry the dishes. After that you'll tidy up the cabin. I'll show you what's needed in that line. Get to work!"

Hen had grown meeker during this address, for he saw that the other fellows approved all that their leader was saying.

"All right," he muttered; "I'll do it, but it ain't a square deal. I'm your guest and I ought not to work."



CHAPTER XII

BLIZZARD TOIL AND A MYSTERY

"Our old college chum, Mr. Fits, isn't stirring yet," reported Greg Holmes, after looking out through the rear window that offered the best view of the cook shack at the rear.

"Too bad," muttered Tom Reade, turning away from a front window where he was watching only the steady fall of the flakes. "If he were a neighbor worth having he'd come out and offer to shovel the paths."

"I wonder how cold it is outdoors?" pondered Hazelton aloud.

"Somewhere below zero, certainly," rejoined Tom. "Suppose we call that definite enough?"

"I'd like to get out into this storm," hinted Dave.

"So would I," nodded Dick with energy. "It would be fine to be out in the grandest storm that we've ever seen! Down in Gridley I suppose the folks have the sidewalks cleaned off."

"Don't you believe it," objected Dan Dalzell. "Not in this storm. Horses couldn't get through it to drag a plow, and it would take an army of men to shovel the snow away, for the wind will blow the snow back as fast as a fellow gets a few bushelfuls moved."

"Let's try it and see!" proposed Dick, jumping up and going for his overshoes.

"Mean it?" demanded Dave joyously.

"Surely I do."

"Then I'm with you." Dave ran to where his outdoor apparel lay. "Going with us, Tom?"

"It's a bad example to set some of these small boys," gaped Tom with his most venerable air, "but I'm afraid I can't stay inside while you fellows are enjoying yourselves."

Greg, too, hurried to get on his arctic overshoes and his overcoat. Then he pulled his toboggan cap well down over his ears and neck and donned his mittens.

"There are only two snow shovels," announced Dick. "What are the rest of you going to use?"

"Here's the fire shovel," answered Greg, producing it. "That will be good enough for me."

"Get the door open, Dave," called Dick.

Darrin unbarred the door, trying to swing it open. Tom Reade sprang to his aid, for the bottom of the door was frozen to the sill.

"Bring the hot water, Hen," called Reade.

"Get it yourself," grumbled Hen. But when Tom turned, and Hen saw his face, the latter made haste to bring the tea-kettle.



"I'd better pour the water," proposed Tom, taking the kettle. "Dick, you and Dave begin to yank on the door as soon as you see the hot stream trickling on below."

Reade made economical use of the water, yet it took considerable pouring to loosen up the door at the sill.

"Better go slow with that water," warned Dutcher. "It's the last there is in the place."

"Humph!" retorted Tom. "Once we get outside I guess we can dig our way to the spring."

At last the door yielded and swung open. A mass of snow blew in upon them. Dick leaped at the white wall beyond and began plying his shovel vigorously.

"It's light, and can be easily handled," he called back over his shoulder.

So Dave waited until Dick had made a start of three or four feet. Then he moved out beside his chum, while Greg, the iron shovel in hand, stood at hand waiting for the other two to make room enough for him to be able to help them.

Bump! went the door, for those inside, without coats or exercise, felt the cold that rushed into the cabin.

"Where to?" called Dave, for the wind carried their voices off in the howling blast. "To the spring?"

"We'd better," Dick replied, "as we're out of water."

Between the depth of the snow and the fury of the storm the Grammar School boys quickly discovered that they had taken a huge task upon themselves. After more than ten minutes of laborious shoveling all three paused, as by common consent, and looked at the work accomplished. They had gone barely a dozen feet, and under foot, all the way back to the cabin door, the snow was still some two feet deep.

The distance from the door to the spring being some ninety feet, it was plain that more than an hour would be needed for digging the way to the spring.

"What's the use of all this trouble?" shouted Greg. "We can melt snow, anyway."

"Snow water doesn't taste very good," objected Dave Darrin.

"Besides, we don't want to admit ourselves stumped by a little snow," urged Dick. "Come on, fellows; we can make it if we have grit and industry enough. Here goes!"

With that Dick Prescott began to shovel harder than ever, so the two chums added their efforts. Truth to tell, however, ere they had gone another six feet through the big drifts, their backs were aching. They could have progressed more rapidly, but for the fact that the wind blew much of the snow back into the trench they were cutting through the great banks of white stuff.

"Are we going to make it?" asked Dave dubiously at last.

"We've got to," Dick retorted.

"The other fellows ought to come out and help us," proposed Greg.

"That's not a very bad idea, either," Dick agreed, as he started shoveling once more. "Greg, go back and tell them what we want."

Prescott and Darrin went on shoveling, manfully, until Tom, Dan and Harry came wallowing along over what there was of a path and took the shovels.

After that, with twenty minute shifts, the work went along more rapidly, though once in a while one of the shovelers had to go back over the path, digging out where more snow had blown in.

Hen Dutcher was not asked to share in this strenuous work. He had enough to do in the cabin, and this outdoor performance was no work, anyway, for a whiner.

"Get the axe and some of the buckets," called Dick finally, as he, at the head of a shift, reached and located the spring. The water was, of course, covered with a thick armor of ice. Greg moved into position with the axe, striking fast and hard. Dave and Tom, with the snow shovels, moved back over the opened way, keeping it clear in defiance of the gale. As soon as Greg had the ice chopped away sufficiently, Dick, Dan and Harry began to carry water. There was a water barrel in the cabin.

"If we had filled this yesterday we wouldn't have had to work so hard to-day," half grumbled Dan.

"Well, we want to do something, don't we?" retorted Prescott. "What did we come out into the woods for? Just to sit around indoors and eat and sleep?"

With the utmost industry it took a long time for the youngsters to fill the water barrel.

"Now, we've enough for a week, anyway," remarked Dan, as he and Dick poured the last pailfuls into the barrel.

"Perhaps enough for forty eight hours, though we don't want to be too sure," replied Prescott. "We want water enough for cleanliness, for cooking and for drinking. That will be quite a lot, I guess."

The others now came in, for their outdoor exercise had taken up more than two hours of morning time.

"Wood, next, I suppose," remarked Tom, gazing regretfully at the already diminished pile of wood.

"No; there's wood enough to last until to-morrow; probably until the day after," Dave answered.

"But do any of you fellows see the storm stopping?" queried Dick.

"No," Dave and Tom both admitted.

"Then, as there's no telling how long this good old blizzard will last, we'll do well to stack all the wood we can carry into this cabin."

"Why not take a little rest first?" urged Dan. "I'll do my share of the work, all the time, but I'll admit that I'm tired just now."

"We can divide into two shifts, then," suggested Dick. "As I don't feel very tired, I'll get into the first shift. Tom, do you feel plenty strong?"

"Strong?" sniffed young Reade. "Humph! I'm ready, right now, to meet and vanquish the biggest Bermuda onion that you can produce."

Dave had already started for the door. These three leaders of boydom in Gridley began to ply their shovels vigorously, starting from a point in the path already made to the spring. Working through drifts, in some instances more than six feet deep, it was slow work. After twenty minutes they went back to the cabin, Greg, Harry and Dan coming out to take up the work.

Hen Dutcher was still toiling hard, for he had concluded that industry was the only way to save himself unpleasant happenings.

"How soon are you fellows going to knock off and begin to think about dinner?" demanded Hen.

"When we get good enough appetites, I suppose," laughed Dick.

"Appetites?" sniffed Dutcher. "Huh! I could eat one side of a beef critter, right now."

"Go out in the snow and help one of the fellows, then," advised Tom dryly. "After that you'll be able to eat the whole critter."

"But when are you going to eat?" insisted Hen. "It's noon now."

"We'll eat in another hour, I guess, if that suits the crowd," replied Dick.

"I'm ready to eat right now," coaxed Dutcher.

"But you don't belong to the crowd," retorted Dave Darrin grimly. "Unless you want to put up with bread you'll have to wait until the crowd is ready."

"Potatoes will be the first thing ready for dinner, Hen," observed Prescott mildly. "As you're not doing anything outdoors, you might get busy peeling a big pan of potatoes."

"See here," flared Dutcher, "I told you before that I'm no servant, and——"

But Dick had risen, for the clock informed him that it was time to relieve the shift out in the deep snow.

"Suit yourself, Hen," replied Prescott. "If you don't peel the potatoes, and some one else has to do it, then you won't eat any hot dinner to-day. That's flat."

"Isn't Dick Prescott just a mean bully?" growled Hen to himself, as the "relief" stepped outdoors to resume work.

"See that Hen keeps busy peeling and washing potatoes," Dick advised Greg in passing.

Then the three rested shovelers took up the task. The path was now approaching the cook shack at the rear of the cabin.

"Queer, isn't it," inquired Dave, "that we don't see a blessed thing of Mr. Fits to-day, and that there's no smoke going up his chimney."

"Perhaps he has left these parts," suggested Tom, rather hopefully.

"How could he?" Dave wanted to know.

"Maybe he went last night."

"I doubt if he could get away, even last night, at the hour when we turned him adrift," Darrin contended. "A man might have gone a quarter of a mile, but he couldn't go a whole mile."

"He hasn't been out to-day, at any rate," declared Dick. "There isn't a trace of a track anywhere near the shack."

"Let's dig up to that window and look in," suggested Dave.

This was done. A few minutes later the three boys stood at the window, glancing in at all they could see of the small interior. Beyond the stove and chairs there appeared to be nothing to see.

"Well, our dear friend Fits isn't on the premises—that's certain," remarked Dave Darrin.

Which conclusion might be true, or, again, might not.



CHAPTER XIII

A VISITOR BY THE AIR ROUTE

When the boys awoke next morning the fire was still burning, though there was not enough of it left to prevent a thin layer of ice forming over the surface of the water in the barrel. Tom Reade slipped from his bunk, drawing on shoes and trousers, and quickly placed a few more logs over the embers. A few minutes after that it was warm enough for the rest to slip out of their bunks and dress hurriedly—all except Hen Dutcher.

Greg soon busied himself, tea-kettle in hand, with thawing the ice around the bottoms of the sliding shutters.

"No tracks at the cook shack," announced young Holmes. "And say, fellows, it has stopped snowing."

"Well, for once in my life," smiled Dick, "I think I've seen enough snow. I just wonder how the folks in Gridley are getting through it."

"Oh, they must have the streets broken, after a fashion, and some sort of paths on the main sidewalks," responded Tom Reade judicially.

All were now at the windows, looking out over the scene. At only two of the windows, however, could a level view be obtained; the two others were completely blocked by piled up snow. The rest of the windows could be used for observation purposes when the Grammar School lads placed boxes on which to stand.

"The snow looks soft yet," declared Dave.

"It is soft; you can see that in the way that the wind catches it up in flurries," Dick argued.

"Then we can't get far in it to-day," decided Tom Reade. "We can't travel far over the snow until we have a cold spell for twenty-four hours that will freeze the top of the snow into a hard crust."

"When that crust comes we just will travel," muttered Dave.

"Getting tired of camp?" grinned Dalzell.

"No, Danny Grin; but you forget something."

"What?"

"We've got a duty to perform. As soon as we can get where there's a telephone, we've got to send word to the Gridley folks that Mr. Fits is in these parts."

"But Mr. Fits isn't here," Greg objected.

"That's so," Darrin admitted slowly. "And yet the rascal must be somewhere around, for he couldn't get far in such a blizzard as we've been going through."

"What I'm even more anxious about than Mr. Fits is telephoning the news to the home folks that we're all safe here, and as snug and comfortable as can be," Dick interposed. "Whee! But our folks must be worried about us. They'll never let us go camping again in winter."

"Oh, I don't know about that," argued Dave. "If we only prove to them that we can weather such a time as this, without sickness or disaster, they'll be ready to believe that we can take care of ourselves anywhere on earth."

"Why, there isn't anything very hard about taking care of ourselves here," Dick continued. "All we have to do is to show a little industry. We've got everything at hand that we could possibly need. But I wish the home folks knew how comfy and happy we are."

"I'd like to see myself out of this," grumbled Hen Dutcher, lying huddled in his bunk under the pile of overcoats. "Say, fellows, is it warm enough for me to get up yet?"

As all of the real boys in the party were already up, none of them thought it necessary to answer Hen, who presently slid out of his bunk and began to dress rapidly.

"What are we going to have to eat this morning, and when?" Hen wanted to know.

"I guess we'll have a light breakfast this morning," hinted Reade.

"Why?" demanded Dutcher, his jaw dropping.

"So we can have a better appetite for the turkey we brought along. Fellows, don't you think we'd better eat that turkey to-day? It may not keep."

"Turkey?" blurted Hen Dutcher, his eyes dancing with anticipated pleasure. "I didn't know you had any grub as fine as that."

"I've been thinking," proposed Prescott, "that we might as well have some of that turkey for breakfast this morning."

"Why, is it already cooked?" cried Hen.

"Oh, no," Dick admitted.

"Then let's have something else for breakfast and keep the turkey until noon," suggested Dutcher. "I can't wait for my breakfast."

"What do you fellows say?" asked Dick, putting it to a vote, but ignoring Hen. "Shall it be turkey for breakfast?"

"Turkey!" solemnly voted five Grammar School boys.

"I call it a shame to treat a fellow like this," grumbled Hen. "To make a fellow wait so long for his breakfast when he's starving to death!"

But none of the others gave any sign that they heard. Dick went to a shelf on which lay many packages of the food they had brought with them two days before. Dick took down a plain little wooden box and stepped to the table.

"Put on about eight eggs, and boil 'em hard, will you, Greg?" Dick asked. "Tom might tackle the coffee-making this morning. Dan and Harry can get potatoes ready."

"But where's the turkey, then?" queried Hen, watching Dick as he opened the box.

"Right here," proclaimed young Prescott, removing the lid.

"Why, that's—that's codfish, salted and dried!" exploded Hen.

"Well, isn't codfish Cape Cod turkey?" demanded Reade, with a grin.

"Is that the only kind of turkey you have with you?" asked Hen.

"The only kind," smiled Dick. "Don't you like codfish, Hen?"

"Not a little bit," grumbled Dutcher.

"Then you can cut out breakfast, and you'll have a fine appetite at noon," offered Dan consolingly.

"It seems to me that you fellows use me as meanly as you know how," flared Hen. "You ought to be ashamed of yourselves."

"We are," Tom assured the grumbler.

Though the codfish should have been soaked over night, Dick accomplished much the same effect by repeatedly scalding it. Then he put it on to cook in boiling water, and next made a flour sauce in the way that his mother had patiently taught him. The hard boiled eggs, after being cooled in cold water, were sliced up and put over the dish when it was ready. This, with potatoes, bread and butter and weak coffee with condensed milk, made a meal that satisfied all hands. Hen didn't like the meal, but he ate more of it than any one else.

"What are we going to do to-day for fun?" Dan wanted to know as breakfast drew to a close.

"Shovel paths and stock up with water and firewood, I guess," smiled Dick.

"Pshaw! I'm sorry it has to be all work, and that we can't have any fun," remarked Harry Hazelton. "I've just been longing to go hunting and get a rabbit for a stew."

"We'll be here for days and days yet," answered Dick. "I guess we'll be able to find plenty of fun before our camping frolic is over."

"It's fun, just being here and living this way," Darrin declared.

Something beat against one of the windows, causing the boys to look around curiously.

"Just a twig blown off from some tree," declared Tom.

"Is it?" floated back from Greg, who had leaped up and was now hurrying toward the window in question. "It's a pigeon—that's what it is. And the poor thing looks perishing, too."

In truth Mr. Pigeon did seem to be about spent. The poor thing huddled against the sash, as if trying to shelter itself from the biting wind and the fine dust of blown snow.

"Bring the tea-kettle, some one," called Greg, and Dick did so.

"Pour the water on so that I can get the window open," Greg directed. "Just enough to soften the ice so that the sash will move back. Be careful not to let any of the hot water scald the pigeon's feet."

Working gently, in order not to alarm the spent bird, Dick and Greg soon had the window open, and Greg drew in the all but frozen little flyer.

"Say, we can have pigeon stew, or pie, if anyone knows how to make a pie," cried Hen Dutcher.

"You scoundrel!" breathed Greg fiercely. "Your stomach makes a brute of you, Hen Dutcher!"

"Oh, what's the sense of being silly about nothing but just a bird?" insisted Hen.

"I'll fight any fellow who proposes eating this poor little wayfarer," announced Greg.

"Whatcher getting mad about?" snapped Hen. "Pigeons are made just for eating, and we can——"

"Hold this bird, Dan," urged Greg, passing the pigeon to Dalzell and stepping briskly toward Hen, who, alarmed, retreated, protesting:

"Huh! What are you getting red headed about? Can't you stand a joke?"

"I don't like your style of jokes," retorted Greg, stopping the pursuit. "Don't let me hear any more of 'em."

"In fact, Hen," added Tom, "your continued silence would be the finest thing you could do for us."

"See here!" called Dan. "This is one of our own pigeons—right out of dad's cote. This is the speckled one we call 'Tit-bit.'"

"Say, that seems almost like a letter from home, doesn't it?" asked Dick, his face beaming. "We'll give our friend the best we have. Put the little fellow in a box, in some soft stuff, not too close to the fire, Dan. And I'll start to boil some of the corn meal. That'll make good food for the little chap when he's feeling more like himself."

In less than half an hour Mr. Pigeon was feeling vastly better. He now hopped about the place, using his wings every now and then in a short flight. Dan was the only one who could get near the little creature now. So it was Dalzell who caught the pigeon and fed it its breakfast of corn meal mush when it was ready.

Soon after the pigeon took to flying more and more. He seemed attracted towards the windows, flying straight at them three or four times.

"Your pigeon isn't showing good manners, Dan," teased Tom. "He is showing as plainly as possible that he doesn't like this crowd."

"Most likely it's Hen he objects to," murmured Dalzell, with a grin. "But I'll tell you what I think Tit-bit wants. He's warm, fed and feels as strong as ever. What he wants, now, is to hit up a pace for Gridley and get back into the cote with his mates."

"How long would it take him to get there?" wondered Tom.

"Why, something like ten or twelve minutes, probably," Dan answered.

"Whee! If we could make it that fast we'd be taking frequent trips," sighed Reade.

"I wouldn't make the trip more'n one way. I'd stay in Gridley after I got there," grumbled Hen, but no one paid any heed to him.

"See here," broke in Dick suddenly, "if that pigeon wants to go home, and is able to, why can't we make him take a message for us? I believe we can—if some one at the other end would only see it."

"Dad always looks the birds over when he feeds 'em in the morning," Dan declared.

"Wait until I get a piece of paper," rejoined Prescott, almost breathless from the hold the idea had taken on him. He got the paper, drew out a pencil, and sat down to write, calling off the words as he wrote them:

"To the home folks. We're all here at the cabin, snug as can be, with plenty of water, firewood and food, and having a jolly time. Don't worry about us. We're having a jolly time."

"Tell 'em I'm here," begged Hen Dutcher. "My folks might like to know."

So Dick added that information and signed his name. Next he rolled the paper up into a cylinder.

"Dan, catch that precious bird of yours," begged the young leader. Dalzell presently accomplished that purpose. Dick tied a string around the pigeon's neck, loosely enough not to choke the bird, and yet securely enough so that the noose could not slip off. Then the paper cylinder was made fast to the string.

"Open the window on the side towards Gridley, Greg," called Dick. "When it's open, Dan, you give your pigeon a start."

As Dan let go the bird fluttered from the sill to the snow. Then, after a moment, little Mr. Pigeon spread his wings and soared skyward. Soon the boys had seen the last of the small traveler, still headed in the direction of home.

"Our folks will soon have the news," declared Dan proudly.

"And, oh—hang it!" gasped Dick disgustedly. "I forgot to add even a word about Mr. Fits!"

"Well, he isn't here with us, at any rate," Dave answered.



CHAPTER XIV

THE MYSTERIOUS VOICES OF THE NIGHT

"Wow! Wow-ow-ow-oo-whoo-oo-oo!"

It would be impossible to convey the weird sound in words.

Six boys and a whiner were asleep in their bunks in the log cabin when that awesome sound first smote the air.

Outside the wind had nearly died down. Dick Prescott, the first to waken, felt a cold chill creep down his spine.

"Wow-ow-ow-ow-ow! Whoo-oo-oo-oo-oo!"

"Wh-wh-what is it?" gasped Dan Dalzell, sitting up in his bunk.

"I don't know," Dick admitted.

Again came the fearsome sound, now louder than ever. Dave Darrin and Tom Reade were now awake and startled.

"What on earth can it be?" demanded Tom.

"It must be Fred Ripley's ghost party," suggested Greg.

"Bosh! Fred Ripley would have to be a real ghost before he could get over the deep snow in the woods," Dick retorted.

Once more came the sound, more piercing than ever. Dick leaped from his bunk and began to dress. Dave and Greg followed suit.

"We'll do our best to find out what it is, fellows," Dick promised them.

Hen Dutcher was chattering and half sobbing.

"If I—I ever g-g-get out of this alive," he chattered, "I'll never stick around y-y-y-you fellows again. I was a f-f-f-fool to let you fellows coax me into staying here."

"Get out, then!" retorted Tom Reade half savagely, as he landed on the floor and began to dress. All were soon up except Hen, who, when a more dismal and bloodcurdling wail than ever came along, hid his head under one of the overcoats that covered him.

"It's a wild cat—that's what it is," declared Greg Holmes.

"Only one objection to that idea," returned Dick Prescott. "No one has ever heard of a wild cat in these parts in forty years."

"Then it's some one out perishing in the cold," suggested Dave.

"Whoever might be out in the cold wouldn't have much time to yell like that about it," argued Dick. "A wayfarer, out in the cold and deep snow to-night, would soon lie down and freeze to death."

But now something happened that made the blood of all the listeners run cold.

"Dea-ath sta-a-alks through the for-r-r-rest!" came the wailing chant.

"That must be the Ripley gang," contended Dick.

"But how can it be? How could they get through the deep snow that won't bear 'em?" Tom wanted to know.

"Then what can it be?"

"Mr. Fits," suggested Harry Hazelton.

"But Fits isn't in the shack, or wasn't," Dave argued. "We haven't seen him around, outdoors or in the shack, since the night we ordered him to go there. If Mr. Fits got away from this neighborhood it was simply impossible for him to get back since then."

"A-a-a-all who he-ear my voi-oi-oice shall die-ie within the hou-ou-our!" came the wail once more.

"O-o-o-h! Please don't!" screamed Hen Dutcher, burrowing in under the massed overcoats. "Please spare me! I'll be a good fellow after this!"

"Keep quiet!" ordered Tom, striding over to the bunk and giving Hen three or four vigorous prods. "If you don't we'll throw you outside!"

"But it's just aw-aw-aw-awful!" chattered the terrified Hen.

Truth to tell, none of the boys were feeling at his best, just then. Dick's glance passed the face of the clock, showing the hour to be just midnight.

Had it been possible to travel through the forest, the Grammar School boys would have felt sure that it was Fred Ripley's crew. Then they would have gone forth to see what was up. But feeling sure that they were the only living beings in this part of the forest, it was impossible to account for the awful sounds that came from without. What made the wailing sound still more frightful was the fact that it all seemed a part of the wind that was now rising gradually. And the clearly uttered, sepulchral words made it all real enough. The wind never talks in words.

Again came the wailing, though this time without words.

"I never believed there were such things as real ghosts," declared Harry Hazelton.

"Then you're a fool. Everybody knows that there are ghosts—and they're fine people that do noble work!" proclaimed chattering Hen from under the weight of clothing. He was trying to win the favor of the ghosts.

"If there are any ghosts around here I wish one of 'em would pick you up in a sheet, take you away and drop you in your own home in Gridley," declared Tom, becoming decidedly irritated by this babyish imitation of a boy.

"Oh, please don't say that!" begged Hen piteously. "The ghost might hear you."

"If he does, and takes Tom's advice," hinted Dave, "we'll soon see it happen."

That was enough to send thirteen year old Hen burrowing more frantically than before.

The cabin was warm and bright inside. Dick, while trying to puzzle out the matter to his satisfaction, carried four more logs to the fire, one after another, and placed them.

Not one of the Grammar School boys had any desire to go to bed at that time, save Hen, who wouldn't dare to be anywhere else. In fact, the Dutcher youngster may have wondered whether he could stand on his feet if he slipped out and into his clothes.

One by one the boys found seats. Dan picked up the air rifle and sat with it across his lap.

"Whoever it is that's doing this trick has surely got us going," laughed Dick uneasily.

"He has," affirmed Dave. "I don't believe in ghosts, but, under the circumstances, this thing that's annoying us is more than some creepy. If we could explain it I don't believe we'd let it worry us any. But I suppose human beings are always most afraid of what they cannot understand."

The wailings came at less frequent intervals now, though they continued to be sufficiently awesome. But when the clock showed two minutes before the hour of one in the morning these words came in a blast:

"The hou-ou-our of de-eath is at hand. The Gr-r-rim Rea-eaper is at the doo-oor!"

"Then please, please, please—GO AWAY!" screamed Hen, his teeth clacking a bone solo.



CHAPTER XV

DICK STRIKES A REAL FIND

Then half an hour passed, a quarter-gale of wind making the only sound that came from outside.

"I think that must have been a sailor's ghost," remarked Prescott, at last, "and he got his bearings wrong. He said, half an hour ago, that he was coming in—but he didn't."

"How can you t-t-talk about g-g-g-ghosts like that?" shuddered Dutcher, whose face was still invisible to the others.

"We might as well go to bed," proposed Dave, using one hand to cover an imitation yawn that was intended to urge the others to courage. "Whatever wild spirit was traveling around here has wandered off in some other direction."

"Don't go to bed," pleaded Hen. "I won't have any one to talk to if all you fellows go to sleep."

For answer Tom Reade climbed up into his bunk, though he kept his shirt and trousers on.

"I'll tell you what," offered Dick. "We'll take turns staying up on guard, just in case something real should happen. The fellow who stays up will walk back and forth, to be sure of remaining awake. He'll also see to it that the fire is kept up."

"Who'll take the first watch?" Harry wanted to know.

"Let Hen do it!" came, in the same breath, from Dave, Tom and Greg.

"I—I wouldn't be any good at that," pleaded Dutcher anxiously.

"No," smiled Dick dryly, "I don't believe you would. As I proposed the guard stunt, I'll take the first dose of my own medicine. Later in the night I'll call Dave, and when he's through he'll call Tom. All you fellows pile back into bed and get some sleep."

"You take the air rifle, then," urged Dan, passing it over. As this rather insignificant weapon might possibly be of some use, in the event of more definite trouble, Dick accepted it.

One after another the fellows dropped off to sleep, all except Hen, who lay very still, with heart thumping wildly.

Half an hour after Prescott's tour of guard duty began three wild wails, wordless, smote the air, one after the other. Dave, Tom and Dan awoke.

"It's all right," Dick called to them, softly. "Nothing but noises. Don't be afraid but I'll call you if its needed."

So those who had a chance, dozed off. Hen didn't have any chance; his cowardly soul wasn't made for sleep when there was any danger about.

It was twenty minutes past three when Dick stepped over and nudged Dave gently, next whispering:

"It's about time for you, now. You call Tom at a little after five, and then tell him to call us all at seven o'clock."

Dave hurriedly dressed and took the air rifle from Dick, the latter then getting back into his bunk and soon dropping off in sleep.

"Seven o'clock! All out! Step lively! Change cars for breakfast!" were the next words that Dick Prescott heard.

By the time that the fellows had dressed, in the warm cabin, and had started to pry the shutters back, the first dim promise of daylight was showing in the east. A little later it was broad daylight.

By this time, too, after most of the fellows had slept soundly for hours, the situation seemed altogether different. Even Dutcher slipped out of his bunk and began to dress briskly.

"Say," he grinned, "but you fellows were somewhat scared last night."

"Yes," admitted Dave. "Weren't you?"

"Not a bit," asserted Hen bravely. "Sa-ay——"

He paused, looking around him in wonderment, then demanded tartly:

"What on earth are you fellows laughing at?"

"Laughing just to—to think what boobies we were when we had the brave Hen Dutcher with us to set us a better example," answered Tom Reade sarcastically. "No use in talking, Hen! You're the only fellow in this outfit that has any sand."

"Say, you needn't try to get too funny, now," remarked Hen suspiciously. "You fellows were all so scared that maybe you thought I was as bad as you. But I was only putting it on, just to see how far you'd all go."

"You must have been satisfied, then," returned Dick grimly, "for we surely were uneasy."

Hen blandly took to himself all the credit that was offered him for his "courage," seeing which the Grammar School boys winked slyly one at another, then busied themselves with the tasks of getting breakfast.

"To-day's programme will be more work, I suppose," began Tom, as the lads seated themselves around the table.

"As I see it, it will have to be a day of work," Dick nodded. "For that matter, we're learning that it's no use for boys to go camping, especially in the winter, unless they're willing to work."

"What's to be done first?" Dave wanted to know.

"Well, we'll need more wood, and more water," Prescott replied.

"As it doesn't make much difference which we do first, I'm for getting the wood, if that suits the rest of you. Our path of yesterday is blown over a bit with snow, but we can dig it out again in a little while. And, while we're at that, we may as well dig through to the cook shack again. I want to get a good look in there this time."

"Expect to find Mr. Fits there?" Dave asked.

"Hardly, if we didn't find him there yesterday. But, the more I think about it, the more I feel certain that the noises of last night were in some way connected with the shack."

"I'd like to believe that," muttered Tom. "If that's the case, some of us might sleep in there to-night and catch hold of the noise maker."

"Who'd sleep there?" grimaced Dan.

"Well," responded Reade slowly, "we might let Hen sleep there. He's the bravest of the lot, you know, and so he's just the fellow for the job."

Dutcher choked over the food he was swallowing, and shifted his feet uneasily.

Soon after breakfast was over Dick, Dave and Tom stepped outside with the shovels. Here and there the path had been left fairly clear, though at other points they had to shovel industriously through the new drifts. At last, however, they reached the same window through which they had looked in the day before.

"No sign of any one inside," muttered Dick. "Nor have we seen any signs of fire from the chimney. I can see the stove, now, but there doesn't seem to be any sign of fire in it."

"Let's dig around to the door," proposed Dave, "and go inside."

Accordingly the three bent to the new work. A few minutes later Dick gave a tug at the latch-string and the door swung open.

"It doesn't seem as cold in here as you'd expect to find it," murmured Reade.

"That's because we've just come from where it's a good deal colder," Tom answered.

Dick stepped over to the cook stove, raising a lid.

"Look, fellows; here are a few live coals left here yet."

Dave and Tom joined him, staring at the embers in some astonishment.

"Yet there's no one here, and no tracks in the snow outside," observed Tom. "Say, if the tenant of this place can go over the snow without leaving a trail, it does look rather ghostly, eh?"

"A ghost wouldn't need warmth," Dick retorted promptly.

"Then what's the answer?" challenged Dave.

Dick shook his head, but went to one window after the other.

"No one left or entered here by way of the window," Prescott soon announced. "It struck me that Mr. Fits might have used a window, instead of a door, but if so, there'd be tracks under the windows."

"Mr. Fits hasn't been here at all," Dave replied, with a good deal of positiveness. "When we turned him out into the storm he went somewhere else."

"Then how about the ghostly noises, and the embers in the stove?" Reade wanted to know.

"Ask Dick," prompted Dave.

"I can't tell you," laughed Prescott. "I guess you'll have to ask Hen Dutcher."

"Well, there's no one here but ourselves," Tom went on, as the boys stood staring about the tiny shack. "As far as finding anything here is concerned we may as well go about our task of wood gathering."

"I wish we could get at the bottom of the ghost mystery," muttered Dick wistfully.

"So do I," agreed Reade, "but wishes aren't snow plows, and never were. Fred Ripley and his cronies would be mean enough to come down here and spoil our rest at night, but they'd never be brave enough to face the long trip through the deep snow."

"Well, let's go along and get in the wood," Dick urged. So they went, and more than an hour was spent in carrying logs into the main cabin. Of course Greg, Dan and Harry assisted in this, while Hen was put to his usual morning task of washing dishes and straightening things in the cabin.

For dinner the main dish was a platter of steak, broiled over the wood ashes in the fireplace, where the fire was briefly allowed to burn nearly out.

In the afternoon water hauling was the main occupation, as well as the only sport, for the boys had tried the slight crust on the snow, and had found that it would not bear.

"If it grows colder, and stays so for twenty four hours," declared Dalzell, "then we'll have a crust on all this white stuff that will be strong enough to bear our weight. Then ho for tramping, and for hunting with the air rifle!"

"Huh-m-m-m!" answered Harry. "Rabbits and rabbit stew!"

After the water hauling the Grammar School boys settled themselves for some quiet enjoyment inside the cabin. Dave, Tom, Harry and Greg picked out books and sat down to read near the windows. Dick, on the other hand, elected to rove about the interior of the cabin, looking into odd nooks.

"This water barrel might be a little nearer the fire," proposed Prescott. "Then we wouldn't have to break a crust of ice mornings. Dan, you don't seem to be doing anything. Suppose you come and help move the barrel."

"All right," nodded Dalzell, jumping up. "Where do you want to put it?"

Dick pointed to the spot. As the barrel was two thirds full of water it had to be rolled carefully, to avoid upsetting or spilling. It was no easy task for the two boys.

"Hen, you might come and help us a minute," Dick proposed.

"Whatcher take me for?" Dutcher grumbled. Whereat Tom Reade glanced grimly up from his book to remark:

"Son, when you're spoken to, say 'yes, sir,' and hustle!"

Something in Tom's look induced Hen to move rather promptly. The three boys succeeded in moving the barrel a couple of feet toward the spot desired.

"Hullo," muttered Dick, halting and glancing down at the ground where the barrel had stood since their arrival. "Look at that stone."

The stone lay partly imbedded in the dirt flooring of the cabin. It was a flat, nearly round stone, some fifteen inches in diameter.

"That stone looks like a lid, doesn't it?" Dick asked.

"Cover to a gold mine," sneered Hen.

Dick did not answer, but stepped over, bent and began to pry at the edges of the stone. It did not move easily. Dan brought the crowbar and quietly handed it to his chum.

"What have you got?" demanded Tom, glancing up from his book.

"Don't know yet," Dick laughed.

By the aid of the crowbar Dick pried the stone loose from its setting in the ground.

"There's a hole underneath, anyway," announced Dick. "And—Geewhillikins! Fellows, drop everything but your good names, and come here—quick! Hustle!"



CHAPTER XVI

KEEN ON THE TRAIL OF THE PUZZLE

Breathless with excitement, Dick crouched over the hole in the dirt floor, unwilling to make a move until the other fellows had joined him. That didn't take long.

Hen Dutcher was one of the first to get a glimpse at what had filled Prescott with so much excitement.