The Banner Boy Scouts on a Tour Part 37

They were loth to have him go; but Joe was almost "all in" too, and Jack thought he ought to stay with the cripples. So Paul crawled away, with but one match in his possession, and feeling in anything but a cheerful mood, although he would not discourage his chums by saying a word that would add to the gloom.

He moved cautiously as he advanced, remembering how ugly that pit had looked when Bobolink struck his match; and not wishing to find himself tumbling into such a sink. Just how long he was creeping along in this way after leaving his chums Paul hardly knew, but he must have covered quite some distance. And thus far the current of air did not seem to warrant a belief that an opening was very close by.

He was feeling discouraged, and on the point of giving it up as a bad job when he tripped over some object that, of course, he had not seen in the pitch dark. In trying to save himself from falling he upset something that made quite a clatter as it struck the rocks; when to Paul's amazement he heard a voice call out:

"Who's that?" and accompanying the words came the scratching of a match.

CHAPTER x.x.xII

THE TIN BOX AGAIN

Paul stared, and well he might; as the match flamed up he found himself confronting a man who had evidently been sleeping on the floor of the cavern, for he had just thrown a blanket aside.

And Paul recognized him instantly as the party who had pa.s.sed them on that noon, in the rig which he imagined must have been stolen--the man he had reason to believe Joe suspected to be connected with the robbery of his father.

Feeling that he would be apt to receive a hostile reception here, Paul turned to run. He hoped that, as the match went out, the other would not know just where to look for him, and thus he might escape.

But to his surprise, as he turned he found that another man faced him, who must have been located at a point he had pa.s.sed while creeping along close to the wall.

Before Paul could dodge, this fellow had clasped his arms about him. The other was hastily lighting some sort of lantern, with which he seemed to be provided.

Although Paul struggled st.u.r.dily he was hardly a match for a full grown man.

"Keep still, you!" the fellow growled in his ear; "or I'll give yer somethin' you won't like. Bring the light here, Hank. Let's see what sort o' a critter we've bagged, anyhow."

Of course they knew the instant they saw Paul's suit of khaki, discolored even though it was from the rain and dirt.

"Huh! another o' them boy scouts you was tellin' me about, eh, Hank?"

grumbled the man who held Paul in his embrace. "What under the sun d'ye suppose he's doin' in here? Come to look us up, d'ye s'pose, pardner?"

Paul had already seen that the second fellow was even worse looking than the man named Hank, which he took to be a corruption of Henry. In fact, if ever there was a tramp who might be sentenced on his looks alone, this fellow could fill the bill.

"I don't know," remarked Hank, slowly, and scowling at Paul; "it doesn't hardly seem possible, though if I thought so, I'd be tempted to choke the young cub. Look here, what brought you up here, and who are you?"

"Yes," roared the second man, shaking Paul vigorously, "pipe up and tell us that, 'less you want us to do somethin' you wouldn't like. What d'ye want with us? How'd you ever git in here; and who's along with you? Say, Hank, didn't I tell you I seen that chief of police down on the road that comes up here from Tatum? I bet he sneaked around, thinkin' we'd try to cut out that way, 'stead of in the direction of Stanhope. Reckon you don't ever wanter go there agin, eh?"

"Shut up, Pim!" snapped the taller man, cutting the other short, much to Paul's regret; for somehow he just felt that the conversation was reaching an interesting point, and that if the tramp kept on he might have mentioned something worth while.

Thinking that he had better be frank with his captors Paul started in to tell of the terrible storm, and the destruction of the camp, followed by the flight of the Banner Boy Scouts along the mountainside in search of a safe refuge in the shape of a cave. When he told of how they had found such a place through mere accident the two men exchanged looks as though they believed Paul were inventing his yarn as he went along.

"What you say may be true, and again perhaps it ain't," declared the tall man called Hank; "and I reckon we'll just have to tie you neck and crop, so's to keep you from going back, and bringing a bunch of your tribe down on us. We're in possession here, and we don't want any more unwelcome guests. Pim, get a cord, and do him up!"

"Oh! please don't. What I told you was the truth, every word. I only wanted to find out if there was another opening to this cave. Don't make me a prisoner, mister! Please let me go!"

Paul shouted these words, and for a purpose. He wished to let his friends know of his predicament, believing that Jack would lead a rescue party instantly; and when three boys start to shouting in such a confined s.p.a.ce as a cavern they can make enough racket to cause one to believe a whole army is coming.

The two men were still struggling with their prisoner, and using more or less violence in forcing their wishes upon him, when there broke out a sudden series of whoops that rang through the place.

Half a dozen wildcats engaged in a mix-up could hardly have created more of a racket than did those three lads as they hurried toward the spot where the lighted lantern showed them their chum in the hands of two hard looking customers.

Hank took the alarm immediately. He seemed to be more timid than his companion, who showed signs of being willing to turn and face the advancing enemy until he noted that he had been left in the lurch. Then, growling, and showing signs of temper, he waddled after Hank, who bore the lantern.

"Paul!" called Jack, as they drew near.

"Here!" came the answer; and then the last match that Jack possessed was sacrificed in order that he might find his chum.

The first thing that Paul noticed was another lantern on the floor of the cavern.

"Here, light this, Jack, with that precious match!" he cried, after shaking the lantern to find out whether it contained any oil.

"What under the sun does it all mean?" gasped the breathless Bobolink.

Joe seemed to be just as anxious as either of the others to know, although he did not say a single word.

"I happened on two men who were sleeping here," said Paul. "Notice the blankets and the things for cooking, will you? They must have had a hold-out here. Perhaps they chased Ted and his crowd out of the cave, because, if you look, you can see that aluminum frying pan Ward Kenwood used to carry around with him, and which he must have forgotten in his hurry to leave."

"Did you know them, Paul?" asked Jack.

Paul turned so that he could watch Joe while he replied.

"I never saw the fellow called Pim before. He was a tough customer, too; either a regular tramp or a yeggman; and I guess from his looks he must have been ready for any game, from robbing a bank to stealing a farmer's chickens."

"How about the other?" Jack kept on.

"Well," said Paul, slowly, "you remember the man who drove past when we were at the side of the road that day, and whose wheel marks we saw all the way up here? That was the fellow. I had a good look at him. His companion called him Hank!"

"Oh! my, then it is really true!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Joe Clausin, apparently taken quite off his guard by this declaration on the part of the patrol leader.

Paul turned upon him then and there, and looked serious.

"Joe," he said, firmly yet kindly, "once you refused to tell me what you knew or suspected about this man. I hope you won't try to bluff us off again, now that you know he's here, and everything looks as if he might be the one who took your father's valuable papers."

As he spoke Paul stooped and picked something up that had attracted his eye. It had been lying among quite a quant.i.ty of clothing and other things. Probably these had been secured in various raids on clotheslines, where the good people of the farming community were airing Winter garments before putting them away in camphor in the chest.

"Look here, Joe, what do you call this?" Paul went on.

Joe could hardly speak, he was so excited.

"It's the tin box that my dad used to keep those papers in! Oh! Paul look inside and see if they're there!" he exclaimed, trembling with eagerness as he laid a hand on the arm of the patrol leader.

But Paul believed that his friend was doomed to disappointment, even before he opened the strange little tin box, which had been stolen from the store of the feed keeper in Stanhope.

"It's empty, you see, Joe," he said, turning it upside-down. "Look at it again, so as to make sure it's really the box."