FINDING OUT
Lanky was once more himself. The look of gloom had vanished from his
thin face, and he turned an eager glance on his comrade.
“I’ve been thinking,” Frank went on, slowly, as he sometimes did when
he was trying to grasp an idea, “that we ought to do something to
settle this business about whether there really is a little child in
the charge of the old queen, or not.”
“Hear! hear!” burst out the other, pretending to clap his hands.
“If it turns out that there isn’t any such thing as the child you
believed tried to attract your attention, then the sooner we give up
all this foolishness, why, the better; you understand, Lanky?”
“But if there _is_ such a little girlie, Frank?”
“We’ll stay in the game, make sure of that,” replied the other, in a
determined tone that told Lanky what he might expect.
“Oh! I agree with you all right, about that, Frank,” he observed; “but
the question is, how under the sun can we do it? That sly old queen
knows how to slip the child away every time we happen to be seen coming
around the camp.”
“Well, we must make out _not_ to be seen, then, next time,” was the
matter-of-fact way Frank put it.
“Do you mean we’ll sneak back, and see what’s goin’ on, right now;
sorter creep up through the bushes, Injun fashion, and peep, unbeknown
to any of the gypsies? Tell me, is that what’s got you, Frank?”
“Well no, hardly that, Lanky,” replied the other. “In the first place
it’s getting kind of late, and I promised to be home by five, sharp.
Then, though perhaps you haven’t noticed it, there’s a gypsy boy
trailing us right now. No, don’t turn around and look, because that
would tell him we knew all about his following us. Wait till we get to
that bend, and then you can see without showing that you’re bothering
your head about him.”
“Wow! that’s what I call going some, Frank,” remarked Lanky, presently.
“You saw him then; didn’t you?” asked the leader of the boys.
“Right you are; and he’s certain sure follerin’ us, to see that we
don’t play a double game, and sneak back in the direction of the
camp,” was Lanky’s admission.
“And you can understand that a boy wouldn’t be up to any such trick
unless some other person had told him to do it?” Frank continued, with
convincing force.
“That must mean she did it,” Lanky admitted.
“The old queen, and no other. So, you see, we couldn’t turn back now
without her knowing about it; and that would give the alarm. Why, by
to-morrow morning these same gypsies would be miles away on the road to
nowhere; and it’d be the hardest kind of business getting on the track
of them again.”
“Well, when _can_ we come back?” asked Lanky; “to-morrow afternoon?”
“For one, I don’t feel like waiting that long,” the other declared.
“Say, could we try it to-night, Frank?” asked Lanky, eagerly.
“I’m willing to come,” replied his companion; “if your folks will
let you out. Look over here to the right, and you’ll see a little
rise of ground. And, Lanky, if a fellow sat on top of that, with a
pair of field glasses in his hands, what would hinder him from seeing
everything that happened in the camp?”
“There’s a clear line between, as sure as anything,” admitted the other.
“And if they have their fires going, as they generally do in the early
evening, why, the glass would work O. K. I’ve looked through it at the
moon, and Jupiter, Venus and that crowd of worlds in the night sky. Is
it a go, Lanky?”
“Put her there, Frank,” replied Lanky, thrusting out a hand with a
boy’s impetuosity. “Why, I’d back you up, no matter what sort of a
harum-scarum scheme you gave me. But this isn’t anything like that; I
consider that it’s the boss idea. Why, we can crawl up there and just
watch for keeps, without a single gyp bein’ any the wiser. Call it a
go, Frank!”
“Then that’s settled, and I’ll meet you at the big elm at, say, seven,”
Frank proposed. “It doesn’t get real dark till after eight nowadays,
you know; and we’ll have plenty of time to wander up this road.”
Lanky was greatly pleased over the new development. Coming on the tail
of his recent gloom, it was all the more acceptable to him. When he
later on parted company with his chum, his last words were:
“Don’t fail to be there at seven sharp, Frank! It’d knock me into
flinders if you didn’t show up. I’d be tempted to come alone, and make
the try, though chances are I’d only turn it into a foozle by my
clumsiness.”
“You can depend on me,” was what the other said, positively.
Frank would have liked to take his father fully into his confidence,
and get his sanction for the strange little errand that was about to
occupy the time of himself and Lanky that night. But it happened that
Mr. Allen had stayed at the house of a friend whom he had been visiting
that afternoon; and Frank’s mother was lying down, with a headache; so
it seemed that even had he wanted to, he could not have taken either of
his parents into his secret just then.
A little before seven he went out, without anyone paying any particular
attention to his action. Possibly the mother supposed Frank was going
to church, for he and Lanky both sang in the volunteer choir.
But the boy really believed he had good reasons for absenting himself
from his regular seat in the organ loft that night. And under his coat
he carried the field glasses which he had spoken of to his chum.
Lanky was waiting for him, and kicking his heels against the base of
the big tree that had been appointed as a place of meeting.
“Gee! aren’t you late, Frank?” he asked, a little pettishly.
Just then the church clock boomed out the hour of seven, as if saving
Frank the trouble of making a reply.
“I reckon I’ve been here half an hour, and countin’ the minutes,”
admitted Lanky, candidly, as they started off on a brisk walk.
Evening was just coming on, and there were some clouds covering the
heavens as the sun went down, which gave Lanky new cause for anxiety.
He would not be happy a single day if things went too smoothly.
“Reckon now there’s a storm just wantin’ to sail along this way, to
upset all our calculations about Wednesday,” he grumbled.
“Oh! I guess not,” Frank tried to console him by saying; “weather
reports say dry weather and warmer for the whole eastern half of the
country for the first three days of the week, beginning to-morrow. I
looked it up this morning. Forget it, and let’s think only of what
we’re trying to do right now.”
When they saw anyone approaching they stepped into the nearby woods,
and let the other pass by. Perhaps this looked a little suspicious,
but then Frank was afraid that one of the gypsy men might happen that
way, and hurry back with a report that was apt to create some little
excitement in the queen’s van.
“Aren’t we gettin’ pretty near that little rise, Frank?” asked Lanky,
when they had been making progress for some time.
“Be there in five minutes or so,” was the confident reply; for Frank
had the happy faculty of taking note of distances, by objects to be
seen along the way; and as a rule he was able to tell to a fraction
just where he was, when going over a route he had traversed before.
He turned out to be a true prophet, too; for about the time that limit
had expired Lanky remarked in a thrilling whisper:
“I can see the rise right now, Frank; we’d better turn off the road,
too, because there’s somebody coming with a rig. It might be one of
those jockeys from the camp.”
Frank hastened to comply with the suggestion, and they were soon making
their way through the woods that led up to the bare mound, which the
boys had selected as a place for making their observation.
They crept along with extreme caution, because the camp was not far
off, and both of them feared lest a gypsy man might be wandering around
about that time, and would discover them unless they used unusual care.
Presently they ascended the little rise.
“Say, this is a good place to see from, all right,” commented Lanky.
Frank, instead of replying, was starting to focus the field glasses on
the camp of the nomads, plainly seen through the open lane. Although
night had by this time fallen fully, several fires were burning in the
camp, and these lighted up the entire place where the wagons and tents
were.
The gypsies were either moving about, or else sitting near the fires,
evidently eating their supper. Lanky almost held his breath while Frank
looked.
“See anything of her?” he asked, finally, unable to hold out longer.
“Take a chance, and see for yourself,” was the reply, as the glasses
were thrust into his hands; and there was a note of satisfaction in
Frank’s voice that gave the other a thrill.
He quickly held the ends of the twin tubes to his eyes, and ten seconds
later Frank heard him chuckle, as though greatly pleased.
“She’s there, Frank, sure as you’re born!” Lanky ejaculated.
“Softly, now, old fellow,” warned Frank.
“You saw her; of course you did, Frank?” continued the tall boy,
quivering with delight. “She’s eating beside that girl we met--Mena,
the queen called her. There, the old woman is scolding her, Frank! I
can see her shaking a finger at the child, and I believe the little
thing’s crying, too.”
“What happened?” asked Frank.
“The old queen leaned over and slapped the little thing twice right on
her ear. She’s pointin’ up at the wagon right now; and, yes, siree, the
girl climbs in, as if she was afraid to stay outside any longer. Frank,
that settles it; doesn’t it? The girl is there, we know that now; don’t
we?”
For answer Frank clutched his chum’s groping hand, and squeezed it.
“And we keep right along in the game, waitin’ to hear from Mr.
Elverson; don’t we, Frank?”
“That’s what we do; and I’m hoping that it comes out just as you’re
expecting, Lanky, because you sure have got yourself keyed up to
top-notch speed right now. But perhaps we’d better be getting back to
town. If we hurried, we might reach there by eight, and lend a hand at
that anthem in the choir.”
“Oh! I’m willing, all right, Frank,” declared the now light-hearted
Lanky; “we just hit the right nail on the head when we came out here,
and spied on that camp. Poor little thing! Say, that old woman’s got a
temper, all right; and I reckon that child ought to be taken away from
her, even if she doesn’t prove to be the long-lost Effie Elverson. Come
on, Frank, let’s run a little along the road.”