Tom Slade on the River Part 5

"_The Fly-paper_, hey?" ventured Connie. "Look out for rotten branches, Garry."

Garry wriggled his way up among the small branches, as far as he dared, while Tom moved about at the wood's edge holding the lantern here and there.

"Nothing doing," said Garry, coming down.

"We're up against it, for a fact," said Doc.

"That's just what we're not," retorted Connie. "It seems we're nowhere near it."

"Gee-whillager!" cried Garry as he scrambled down the tree trunk. "Sling me over the peroxide, will you!"

"What's the matter?" asked Doc, interested at once.

"I've got a scratch. What Pee-wee would call an artificial abrasion."

"Superficial?" laughed Doc, pouring peroxide on a pretty deep scratch on Garry's wrist.

"See there?" said Garry. "Feel. It's sticking out from the trunk."

As Tom held his lantern a small, rusty projection of iron was visible on the trunk of the tree about five feet from the ground.

"Is it a nail?" asked Connie.

"Well-what-do-you-know-about-that?" said Garry. "It's what's left of a hook; the tree has grown out all around it, don't you see?"

It was indeed the rusty remnant of what had once been a hook but the growing trunk had encased all except the end of it and the screws and plate that fastened it were hidden somewhere within the tree.

"That tree has grown about an inch and a half thicker all the way around since the hook was fastened to it," said Doc.

"It's an elm, isn't it?" Garry said.

Tom thought a minute. "Elms, oaks," he mused, "that means about ten or twelve years ago."

"There are only two reasons why people put hooks into trees," said Connie, after a moment's silence; "for hammocks and to fasten horses to.

Nix on the hammocks here," he added.

"What I was thinking about," said Tom, "is that if somebody used to tie a horse here it must have been so's they could go into the woods. The trail goes as far up as the brook. Maybe they used to tie their horses here and go fishing. There ought to be a trail from this tree to where the trail begins in the woods."

"Probably there was-twelve years ago," said Doc, dryly.

"The ground where a trail was is never just the same as where one wasn't," said Tom, with a clumsy phraseology that was characteristic of him. "It leaves a scar-like. When they started the Panama Ca.n.a.l they found a trail that was used in the Fifteenth Century-an aviator found it."

"Well, then," said Garry, cheerfully, "I'll aviate to the top of this tree again and take a squint straight down."

"Shut your eyes and keep them shut," Tom called up to him; "keep them shut till I tell you."

"Wait till Tom says peek-a-boo!" called Connie.

Tom gathered some twigs that were none too dry, and pouring a little kerosene over them, kindled a small fire about six feet from the tree.

"Can you see down here all right?"

"Not with my eyes shut," Garry answered.

"Well, open them," said Tom, "and see if the leaves keep you from seeing."

"What he means," called Doc, "is, have you an un.o.bstructed view?"

There was always this tendency to make fun of Tom's soberness.

"Wait till I look in my pocket," called Garry. "Sure, I've got one."

"Shut your eyes again and keep them shut," commanded Tom.

"I have did it," came from above.

With a couple of sticks which he manipulated like Chinese chopsticks, Tom moved the fire a little to a spot which seemed to suit him better, then retreated with his lantern to the wood's edge.

"Now," he called; "quick, what do you see? Quick!" he shouted. "You can't do it at all unless you do it quick!"

"To your left!" shouted Garry. "Down that way-farther-farther still-go on-more. Hurry up! Just a-there you are!"

The boys ran to the spot where Tom stood and a few swings of the lantern showed an unmistakable something-certainly not a path-hardly a trail-but a way of lesser resistance, as one might say, into the dense wood interior.

"Come on!" said Tom. "I hope the kerosene holds out-I dumped out a lot of it."

Instinctively, they fell back for him to lead the way and scarcely a tree but he paused to consider whether he should pa.s.s to the left or the right of it.

"What did you see?" Connie asked of Garry.

"I couldn't tell you," said Garry, still amazed at his own experience, "I don't know as I saw anything; I suppose I sensed it, as Jeb would say. It was kind of like a little dirty green line from the tree and it kept fading away the longer I had my eyes open. It wasn't exactly a line, either," he corrected; "it was-oh, I don't know what it was."

"It was a ghost," said Tom.

"That's a good name for it," conceded Garry.

"It's the right name for it," said Tom, with that blunt outspokenness which had a savor of reprimand but which the boys usually took in good part.

"That's just about what I'd say it was," Garry agreed.

"That's what you ought to say it was," said Tom, "because that's what it was."

Doc winked at Garry, and Connie smiled.

"We get you, Steven," he said to Tom.

"Even before there were any flying machines, scouts in Africa knew about trail ghosts," Tom said. "They're all over, only you can't see them-except in special ways-like this. You can only see them for about twenty seconds when you open your eyes. If I'd have told you to look cross-eyed you could have seen it better."