The Hickory Ridge Boy Scouts: Under Canvas Part 3

"Just our luck!" muttered George, disconsolately.

"Well, what would you have?" demanded Toby, like a flash; "it ain't every bunch that can have a lot of fellows knock down their nuts for 'em, is it? Think of all the hard work it's going to save us. Elmer, the more I look at that grand little scheme of yours the better I like it.

Go it, Connie, Phil and your mates; keep the ball arollin' right along.

The more the merrier, say we. And now, Elmer, do we hide our rig somewhere around, so they won't happen on the same if they come to skip out of that grove in a big hurry?"

"That's the idea, Toby," Elmer told him; "turn out to the left here, and we'll like as not run across a good hide-out for the wagon. When we've got the nuts all sacked we can come back for the outfit, and head for home."

A short time later they found the place they were looking for. It offered concealment for the wagon and the mare; and Toby soon had the latter securely hitched to a limb.

"Fetch the bags along with you, boys," remarked Elmer at this stage of the proceedings, and picking up several himself as an example.

Toby saw that the others had cleaned out the entire a.s.sortment of sacks, which fact caused him to grin with satisfaction. He calmly secured the rather bulky package that lay in the bottom of the wagon, and trotted after the rest of the scouts.

They made a sort of detour in approaching the spot where all that noise announced a busy lot of boys covering the ground with sh.e.l.l-barks and other varieties of choice nuts.

"Whee! looky over there, Chatz; ain't that the house you c'n see through the trees? I never thought I'd ever have the nerve to come up here, and break in on the enchanted ground given over to hobgoblins and spooks and owls ever so many years."

When George said this in a low and rather shaky tone he clutched the arm of the Southern boy, and pointed toward the left. Of course Chatz eagerly followed the line of his extended finger; for he had been wishing to catch the first glimpse of the haunted house for several minutes back.

"Yes, that's it, all right, George," he replied, with a sighing breath, as though something he had long yearned to see was now before him.

"Come on, you fellows back there," said Elmer, who did not like to have them lagging so; and accordingly George and Chatz hurried their steps.

It was certainly anything but a cheerful place, for a fact. The trees were very much overgrown, and the undergrowth had year after year increased its hold until it would have been difficult to force one's way through this, only for wandering cows having made paths which could be followed.

"Elmer, I c'n see 'em workin' like beavers over there!" whispered Toby, who had forged alongside the leader, still burdened with that package which the others believed must contain some new fangled contraption of his connected with the science of aviation.

The five scouts gathered in a group, being careful not to expose themselves in a way to draw attention. They could see a boy in a chestnut tree, and plainly hear the rattle of nuts from the opened burrs, whenever he switched the branches with the long pole he was carrying, secured somewhere in the woods near by.

"Did you ever hear it hail nuts like that in all your born days?" gasped George as they stood there, sheltered by the bushes and watched operations.

"Oh! listen to him talk from the other side of his mouth, fellows?" Toby muttered. "George has seen a big light; he ain't a doubter any longer, you notice. He hears the rattle of the nuts, and sees 'em falling like hail. Talk to me about beavers and busy bees, that crowd would take the cake for business. Look at that one climbing to the very top of the hickory tree to get the best nuts that always grow up high. There he starts in slashing, and it's like a regular bombardment on the ground.

If they get away with all that lot I'll die of a broken heart. There never was, and there never will be again, such a bully chance to lay in a big winter's supply of nuts in double-quick time. And I never did like to take other people's leavings."

"Make up your mind to it we don't have to," Elmer a.s.sured him.

"Might as well make ourselves comfy while we're about it," suggested George, as he dropped down, and sat tailor-fashion, with his legs doubled under him.

"Yes, for we may have to stay here quite some time," admitted Elmer, copying his example without hesitation.

"Ain't it nice to watch other people working for you?" observed Ted, after a while.

"Only they don't know it," added George; "but, Elmer, suppose you give the rest of us a hint what you mean to do. I see you've been cutting the bark off that white birch tree, and got the same in your hand. It's used for marking canoes, and picture frames as well. Some persons even write on the brown back of the bark, but I don't think you mean to send them a notice from spookland, telling them that if they don't clear out instanter the bully old ghosts will grab them tight?"

"Not the kind of message you're thinking about," replied Elmer, smiling.

"In the first place I don't know what sort of hand writing ghosts would be apt to use; and then again, I don't believe they'd pay much attention to that sort of thing. Watch and see if you can guess now."

With that he rolled the large strip of bark so that it looked like a great cornucopia. So had Elmer seen Indian guides fashion a horn when wishing to call the aggressive moose on a dark night, away up in Northern lat.i.tudes.

"Oh! now I see what you're meaning to do!" exclaimed George; "that looks like a regular megaphone now, the kind they use when there's a boat race on, or at college games. You're going to throw a scare into them by whooping it up through a horn; is that right, Elmer?"

"You've hit it to a fraction, George, because that's exactly what I'm meaning to do with this birch bark horn. And as some of the bunch have started to slip down the trees even now, thinking they've got enough nuts on the ground to keep them busy picking the same up, we'll watch until they've gathered all they want, and then you'll see some fun--that is, it'll be fun at this end, but a serious business for them. Lie low when I give you the signal."

They hovered there for a full hour while the four boys were gathering the nuts, and stowing them away in sacks that had been brought for the purpose.

At last Elmer decided that matters had gone far enough. There were evidences that one of the boys had been sent to fetch the horses and wagon up, in order to load the numerous bags that had been filled. So cautioning his chums to lie low so they might not give the game away, Elmer raised the bark horn to his lips.

CHAPTER IV

"TO THE VICTORS BELONG THE SPOILS"

SO far as the other scouts knew, Elmer Chenowith had never seen such a mystery as a real ghost in all his life; and he certainly had not heard one groan, or give any kind of sound. Consequently his imagination was called upon to conjure up a series of queer, blood curdling noises such as an orthodox specter, fresh from the world of shades, might be expected to utter when tremendously excited.

Josh and George afterwards confessed that if they had not known it was the scout master who amused himself in this way, they too might have shivered in their shoes. As for the Southern boy, he lay there amidst the brush, and kept his eyes glued all the time on the face of Elmer, as though he dared not depend on his knowledge of facts, but must back this up with the positive evidence of his eyes.

Once Chatz even cautiously put out his hand, and gently felt of Elmer's khaki sleeve; it was a mute confession that while never a doubter like George, the boy from Dixie had to be convinced when it was a matter of superst.i.tion.

But the main thing, of course, was what effect Elmer's groaning might have upon the four boys who had stolen a march upon the scouts, and reached the harvest of nuts in advance.

No sooner had the first sounds begun to rise than they looked up with startled expressions on their faces. Of course, like nearly every other person in town, the quartette must have heard strange stories connected with the abandoned Cartaret place, for such things have a way of traveling from one end of a county to another, being eagerly repeated even by many who would scorn to admit their belief in such silly notions as ghosts.

Before coming up here perhaps Connie and Phil, with the other two fellows, may have talked things over seriously, and expressed many a fervid hope that their piratical operations might not be interrupted by any visit from a spectral guardian, such as was said to watch over the place.

The first thing they did was to stare at each other, while their mouths could be seen to open with astonishment.

Elmer changed his key, and gave them another sample of the weird sounds capable of being coaxed from a birch bark horn. He certainly was making a great success of his music, his comrades thought, as they lay there and waited to be invited to have a share in the proceedings, according to agreement.

Toby afterwards solemnly declared that he could see the caps of the four frightened boys start to rise, as their hair stood on end; though an element of doubt always surrounded this statement; for Toby was so excited himself that possibly his imagination worked over-time.

With the change in tune the boys seemed to regain in some measure the command of their faculties; at least they were able to rush close together, as though seeing protection in mutual sympathy. It was a plain case of "united we stand, divided we fall!" And clutching at one another they continued to shiver and listen,--meanwhile looking all around, as though more than half expecting to discover some terrible figure bearing down on them.

Elmer would have been only too happy to have provided such a specter for their accommodation; but unfortunately he had not come prepared to launch such a thing. Ghosts were hardly in his line; and in lieu of a specimen for exhibition purposes he was compelled to do the best he could with the material on hand; which is always a cardinal principle with scouts.

"Now!"

When Elmer hissed this single word his four chums knew that their time had come to get into the game. The snake had been "scotched, not killed," as Josh later on aptly described it. No matter how much frightened Connie Mallon and his cronies might seem to be, if they stood by their guns what would the advantage amount to? The affair must be turned into a regular rout in order that the scouts might reap the full benefit.

Accordingly all of them got busy immediately. George pounded on a hollow log with a heavy stick, and managed to produce a series of throbbing sounds that were likely to add to the consternation of the listeners; Ted clapped two stones together; while Toby and Chatz rattled the brush violently, and added a few choice groans of their own manufacture as good measure.

It was enough, yes more than sufficient.

Human nature had reached its limit, so far as those alarmed fellows were concerned. Undoubtedly they must have become convinced that their raid on the preserves of the ghostly guardian of the haunted Cartaret place had aroused the ire of the said defender, and that they were now in deadly danger of being seized by bony hands.

Of course Connie and his followers were raw novices in matters connected with haunts, and all such things, or they would have known that no self respecting ghost was ever caught giving public exhibitions of his oddities in broad daylight. The gloom of night, or the weird light of the moon, has always had a monopoly of these thrilling diversions.