it was now late in the afternoon, and the drizzling rain had stopped; but the sky remained dull, and a chill wind was blowing. the sun, which might have guided him, had not shown itself all day. he tried vainly to find it by holding his knife blade vertically on his thumb and twirling it round in hopes that it might reveal a faint shadow. he might have secured an outlook from the top of the hemlock, but his leg was scratched and sore and one sneaker torn almost apart. he realized now how exhausted he was. for a moment a panic fear seized him; then he remembered what red deer had once told him, in case he should be lost in the woods, “don’t get rattled—keep your shirt on.”
“but i can’t even do that,” said gordon.
he sat down on a bowlder. “if i ever hear harry call this a peak again, i’ll—” suddenly a thought came to him. the wind had not shifted; it was still in the east. he stood facing it, holding his left arm outstretched, sideways. “that ought to be the north,” said he. looking where his hand pointed, he noticed a small hole in a tree trunk near him. a worm seemed to be hanging out of it, but as he approached it gave a sudden whisk and disappeared. it was no worm, but a mouse’s tail, and he recollected with great elation (for he seldom forgot anything) that a field-mouse almost always dwells on the south side of a tree. so, with the wind and the mouse-hole agreeing as to the compass points, gordon started north.
he believed that camp was a mile and a half or two miles distant, and he sorely regretted now that he had not blazed the way for his return. but he went straight ahead, as he thought, pushing through the underbrush until he found himself in comparatively open land. there was no outlook here, and he was too stiff to climb a tree. nevertheless he fancied that one or two objects were familiar, and was convinced that he was heading directly for camp.
wet, shivering, sore, and tired, he plodded on. when he believed he was within call, he shouted, but there was no answer. he would give another shout a little farther on. presently he came to a thicket, and in a few moments stood, limp and weary, staring about him in amazement, in the very spot of his fight with the lynx. there was the hemlock. there was the pool.
very much discouraged, he sat down to rest, kicked off his battered sneaker, which was of no further use, and took a long “think.” he knew that he had done what people lost in the woods are almost sure to do—walked in a large circle.
“that’s a funny thing when you come to think of it,” he said; “we must be built lopsided.”
as he tugged his rebellious stocking into place, another idea came to him. well he recollected one evening when red deer (in his civilized role of dr. brent) had sat on the porch talking with mr. lord. he, gordon, had sat in the background catching and retaining everything like a sponge. he remembered dr. brent’s telling his father an interesting theory to account for this tendency of people to walk in a circle. the theory was that the heart, beating on the left side, throws extra strength and activity into the left leg, so that one unconsciously edges to the right. “now,” thought gordon, “if i just limp a little more on my sore leg, that ought to straighten things out.”
so, when he had rested, he started north again, resolving to keep this mischievous inclination of the heart in mind and counteract it by limping uniformly with his left leg. that his limping very nicely balanced the extra strength was demonstrated (to his own complete satisfaction, at least) when an hour later, shoeless and shirtless, but with a radiant smile, he limped into camp just as harry was beginning to think of going in search of him.
“harry, i don’t have to limp as bad as this, but i’ve made a wonderful discovery.”
“where’s your shirt?”
“wait till you hear—i’ve had a great adventure! you know we’re all lopsided, harry, on account of our hearts; we’re not built true, and i’ve thought of a way—”
“all right, come in here and get dressed. lucky you’ve got another shirt and a pair of sneakers. what have you been into now, you little son of trouble?”
“shall i begin at the beginning, harry?”
“certainly! let’s hear it all!”
so gordon recounted his adventure with his wonderful discovery as a climax, and harry listened with a dry smile. “guess it was a lynx, all right,” he said.
after supper harry displayed an elaborate drawing of a model aeroplane which he had made on the inside cover of his book. ever since he had left mr. danforth’s hospitable roof, his thoughts had run somewhat on penfield and his model. the result of his studying the diagram was that he had written penfield a letter on the fly leaves of the book and stuffed it in his pocket to mail as soon as he should strike a post-office. it read:
dear pen:—
be sure to soak your clockwork in kerosene oil. if you can’t hit on any whalebone, get an old umbrella and use the ribs. the silk will make good covering, too. drop a glass bead on your propeller axle—it will do for ball bearing. put some vaseline on it. be sure to have your covering hang a little over the back of the planes to hold the air a second, and i think the cover of a fountain pen would do better than a gas tip to hold your sticks together—it’s lighter. hairpins are handy, too. maybe you’ve got one of those bamboo porch screens that pull up and down. the strips would be great if you’re making a curved plane. if your sisters have any old hats with flowers on them, you’ll find good thin wire inside the stems. peel the green stuff off. the wire would be just the thing for binding your frame corners, too. don’t get discouraged. we’ve got them beaten already. only don’t be too reckless with your glue, and have plenty of oil on your cog chain. and don’t have your propeller go too fast—it only cuts a hole in the air. if you could get hold of one of those little hoops ladies embroider on, you could cut it in half and you’d have good rudder frames. if you need strong spring wire, the sides of a pair of spectacles would be just the thing. you might find some good stuff in a willow chair. be sure not to have any flat surfaces against the air.
we’ll try to see you before we go home. we’re up on bulwagga mountain now—still hunting. hope to get a clue this afternoon or night.
your friend, harry arnold.
p. s—if you can’t get hold of a lady’s hat, maybe miss crosby, over at buck mansion, can fix you up. tell her i deduced that she has a few. gordon had a fight with a lynx—how’s that? lost his shirt and gained an adventure.
the night continued cloudy, and the boys had no alternative but to turn in again with neither information nor clue. and this was especially unfortunate since the moon was rising later each evening and soon all hope of night searching would have to be abandoned.
“kid,” said harry, “i don’t think they’d have gone north of this—i can’t get that woods down there out of my mind. but we could never follow the stream down, old boy, not with your leg as it is. it means more climbing than walking. it looks to me as if the stream would be a series of waterfalls. then i wouldn’t dare go far from it without a compass.”
“harry, now don’t spoil it all, whatever you do. i won’t vote for sending up a signal—there’s no use asking me. we’re going to find them. and everything is going fine. gracious, i was scared when i lost that compass, but now i know it’s the regular thing to do, harry. now, there was a fellow they called the black ranger, and he did the same thing, and it said that without food or compass and limping from his wound, he pressed on with dauntless courage. and we’ve even got the limp, harry—if it don’t go and get well before we find them. we ought not to find them, harry, till we are well-nigh exhausted.”
“how’s that?”
“we ought to drag ourselves, weary but triumphant, into camp.”
“hmmm,” said harry.
he lay awake long, thinking. they might kindle a large signal fire on the mountain, but that, if it were seen, would lessen the triumph of finding the camp. it would be, in a way, calling for assistance, and he did not like the idea any more than gordon did.
the morning dawned dull and cloudy; it bade fair to be a repetition of the previous day. gordon slept long, and when he awoke he found the shelter empty save for himself. while he was pulling on his things, harry came in, his mood wholly out of keeping with the weather.
“hello there, kiddo! here are some minnows for breakfast.”
“hello! i guess we won’t see any sign of campfire to-night. doesn’t this weather beat all!”
“don’t grumble about the weather now. this is just the day to do my sewing. i’ve got to patch up your stocking and fix you up generally, so that if you should meet any maidens you’ll be in shape to recount your adventures.”
“what’ll be our next move, harry?”
“our next move will be to explore that woods down there. that’s the likeliest place for camp that they could strike in this vicinity, it seems to me. it’s between the two forts, it’s flat woodland, and it’s got a stream running through it—this stream that begins up here. so i think we’d better get right down there and not waste any more time up here.”
“but when we get down on the mountain side, harry, we won’t be able to see where we’re going.”
“we’re going down just the way we came up,” said harry, “and strike into the port henry road. i think we’ll hit a road that goes around the northern end of this old mountain and skirts the shore, and we’ll follow that along till we strike the stream in level country. if they’re down there at all, they’re near the stream—you can be sure of that; and we’ll follow along the stream to the lake. i shouldn’t be in the least surprised if we found them.”
“but if we don’t?”
“then we’ll go on to port henry, and i’ll buy a regular spyglass there if they have such a thing—and on to bald knob.—and if the collar button’s under the bed, we’ll find it, or break our necks in the attempt!”
“or drop in our tracks is better, harry.”
“well, we’ll do that, then. so now for minnows and coffee and—do you want bacon?”
“surely.”
“bacon it is, and then the sewing circle. dump that spool of thread out of the coffee pot, will you? kid, you’re a horrible sight! you look as if you’d been through a sawmill.”
by ten o’clock they were picking their way down the western slope toward the port henry road. it is probably the easiest descent from the southern peak, but it was difficult for all that. noontime found them again in open country, trudging along the road toward the little village of port henry, which is on the lake shore about three miles north of the mountain. instinctively, each took a side of the road, watching it closely as they went along. now and then harry would pause to examine a trampled spot near the roadside. every suspicious stone was carefully scrutinized, then kicked aside for any secret it might be hiding. usually their inspection was only casual, and they discovered nothing which justified them in pausing. footprints were out of the question considering the length of time which had elapsed and the rain which had fallen. every time harry paused, gordon looked expectantly over and asked, “what did you strike?” and harry would answer, “nothing.”
they had almost reached the crossroad when harry stopped to examine a little hole in the ground, no larger in circumference than a broom stick. he stuck a twig into the hole, finding that it was about six inches deep.
“locust hole?” asked gordon, going over.
“don’t think so,” harry answered, pulling the grass carefully away from it. “it’s octagon-shaped, isn’t it? let’s have a match.” he held the match down. “humph, seems to go to a point, doesn’t it?”
they stood looking at each other.
“morrel has an octagon-shaped staff, hasn’t he, kid!”
gordon’s face was an ample substitute for the recreant sun.
“we’ve found them! we’ve found them, harry!” he shouted.
“let’s sit down and think,” said harry, quietly. “kid, that crossroad ahead there would take us round under the mountain, under the precipice, and so into the woods below.”
“harry, we’re on their trail!”
“you don’t call a hole in the ground a trail, do you? this is nothing but a poor, weak, sickly little apology for a clue. so don’t go up in the air. in the first place, has morrel an octagon staff, or hasn’t he?”
“he has, harry.”
“all right, now you’re talking. evidently they stopped and talked here. that stick must have been stuck down pretty well into the ground to leave a hole that would stay there after the rain we’ve had in the last couple of days. but if they knew they wanted to get into that woods, why didn’t they come up the shore? what were they doing away in here west of the mountain? let’s take a look at that road for a little way.”
they could see by the map that the crossroad skirted the northern slope of the mountain and ran along the bay shore, under the precipitous east wall, and thence into the woods. but surely if the oakwood troop had come up from ticonderoga knowing their destination, they would have taken another and easier way to reach it.
with their inspection of the crossroad, the weak, sickly little clue grew to robust proportions.
“here’s where mac got hungry, kid,” harry commented, kicking a piece of silver paper. “let’s see, now, if we can make anything out of all this.” he looked smilingly round.
meanwhile, gordon’s observant eye had discovered something which gladdened his heart,—a true, out-and-out scout sign. a little way down the crossroad, along the right-hand side, a small square was scratched with stone on a rock, with an arrow pointing from one of its sides. it did not take gordon long to take three paces from this stone in the direction of the arrow.
“let’s have your ax, harry.”
in a minute more, both boys were sitting by the roadside poring over a few words written on a piece of paper, which puzzled them more than they helped, however. it simply said, in what appeared to be a hasty scrawl:
“if any of you come back this way, follow blazing.”
“if any of them come back this way,” repeated harry. “what in the dickens have they done—separated?” in a moment the answer came to him. “kid,” he said, “i may be all wrong, but i have an idea that some of them went on into port henry to hire boats. that’s why they were up as far as this. probably they couldn’t find half a dozen canoes and dories farther down. here’s where they separated. some went on, and the rest stayed here—you can see they loafed around here—look at the chocolate wrapper. mac can’t sit down a minute without eating—he’ll weigh a ton if he keeps on. maybe the fellows that went on expected to make arrangements for boats and perhaps come down the lake in them. anyway, the boys that waited here probably thought that some of them might come back along this road expecting to find them, so when they decided to go on they left this. i can’t make it out—they’ve been here, that’s sure, and they’ve blazed a way off this road down a ways. come on!”
they started down the road, watching carefully for any signs. gordon was almost too excited to speak.
“oh, harry, won’t it be great when we find them! what’ll we say?”
they came to a blazed tree and turned into the woods. other trees were blazed at intervals of a few yards, leading deeper and deeper into the forest. they were now shut off from any outlook and did not know in what direction they were traveling; but they followed the blazing, and before long the lake showed in silvery patches through the trees.
“harry,” said gordon, stopping, “let’s decide how we’ll act. i say, let’s just walk in as if nothing had happened and sit down. when they ask us questions we’ll just answer kind of careless, and stretch ourselves, you know, as if we didn’t want to be bothered. i’ve been thinking, harry, and i believe that’ll be better than dragging ourselves into camp, hungry and exhausted, but with dauntless courage. you see, the trouble is, harry, there’s really enough food left in our packs for several days more. by rights we ought not to find them till about three days after our—what is it they call food, harry?”
“grub?” suggested harry.
“no—means of something or other—”
“means of sustenance?”
“that’s it, harry,—till our means of sustenance is exhausted. then again, harry, i don’t really look so very bad—i mean i don’t look bad enough.”
“you look very dressy, kid.”
“now, keep quiet about that, harry. i mean i don’t look as if the bleak wind had penetrated to my very—”
“you look as if you needed a pair of stockings,” said harry. “we’ll have to get some in port henry. you’ve got an extra pair, but you ought to have two good pairs in case we should happen to go—”
“ha! what did i tell you? didn’t i say you’d be going there again? and now you want to use me for a scapegrace!”
“a what?”
“well, you know what it is when you want to do a thing and lay the whole blame on somebody else.”
“oh, that’s a scapegoat.”
they had walked on and now reached a spot where they stopped short. it was within a few yards of the shore. before them was a large charred spot, covered with ashes. a rough pole rested horizontally between two saplings. a stream flowed into the lake near by. the ground was trampled, and they could plainly see stake holes. clearly, there had been a camp here.
both boys stood silent, contemplating the deserted spot.
“well, what—do—you—think—of—that!” said gordon.
“kid,” said harry, after a minute, “this is where we saw the smoke from dibble mountain—just about where i thought. we didn’t see it from bulwagga that first night because it wasn’t here.”
“correct; be seated, master arnold.”
“what do you say, kid?”
“i have only one thing to say, harry. we have been handed a large and juicy lemon.”
“let’s go down and look around the shore.”
the shore was sloping in one place—an ideal spot for hauling up canoes; but no sign was there, not the slightest ruffle in the sand, to indicate that any boats had been there.
“maybe they went back the way they came, harry.”
harry paid no heed to this remark, but walked about the shore, stooping now and then, examining it closely. he walked along the stream to its nearest point to the deserted camp, but found nothing. gordon sat on a large rock by the shore, watching him.
“harry, you look like an uncle tom’s cabin bloodhound.”
harry, meanwhile, had taken a stick and prodded it into the water under the rock. “pretty deep, eh?” he said. then he felt of the rock by gordon’s side. his finger rested on what appeared to be a wet spot, but it was perfectly dry. he leaned down and smelled of it. “take a whiff of that, kid.”
gordon smelled it. “you can’t prove anything by me, harry.”
harry vaulted on to the rock and sat by gordon’s side. “you’d better read up what your old college chum, general baden-powell, has to say about smelling clues, my son,—that’s a grease spot.”
“maybe somebody laid a frankfurter there,” suggested gordon.
“more likely it was an oily rag out of a motor-boat. now, kindly keep your seats, ladies and gentlemen; the show is not over.”
but gordon, heedless, had taken a flying leap, and was sniffing the spot with inquisitive enthusiasm.
“i smell it! i smell it!” said he. “oh, harry, i smell it! it’s gasoline! eureka! excelsior! or whatever they call it!”
“i think not,” said harry, quietly. “it was a wipe rag. probably the engine went on strike—as it naturally would if walden monkeyed with it. i never thought walden’s bungling would be any use, but i believe he’s done us a good turn here. let this be a lesson to you, my son, never to smoke cigarettes.”
“harry,” said gordon, dramatically, “i never shall. but kindly tell me what that’s got to do with a motor-boat—or with walden, either—he doesn’t smoke.”
“no, nor any other scout. and you show me a fellow that smells an oil stain in the open air after two days of rain, and i’ll deduce for you whether he smokes cigarettes or not. you can take that little sermon from your patrol leader, and if you don’t believe me, ask red deer.”
“if i ever see him again, professor arnold.”
“you’ll see him again, all right,” said harry, examining the grease spot. “do you understand latin?”
“i can tell if there’s any quinine in a prescription, harry.”
“well, listen to this: in hoc signo vinces.”
“harry, don’t tell me they’re in hock!”
“no, some one came down here in a motor-boat, got the rest, and went chugging back again.”
“you’re a perfect ghoul!,” cried gordon, mimicking miss crosby. “you’ve picked up a loose chug—you know you have! it’s just wonderful!”
“do you want to know what in hoc signo vinces means, you little monkey?”
“i shall never be happy till i find out.”
“well, then,” said harry, pointing to the grease spot, “it means, “by this sign thou wilt conquer.”
“but i don’t see how you know they went off in the motor-boat, harry. even supposing there was a motor-boat here, there’s nothing to show the fellows went off in her. it might have been just somebody that stopped here to visit the camp.”
“well,” said harry, “they didn’t go back the way they came, that’s sure. they’d never have left that note under the rock if they’d gone right back past it. there’s no other road leading away from here, and i don’t believe they’d have struck right across country. i’m pretty sure they wouldn’t follow the railroad track either, so there’s nothing left but the motor-boat. we shall now count the railroad ties from here to port henry.”
