A PROMISING CLUE
It was about four o'clock on the following afternoon when a wagon drawn
by a pair of husky horses moved along the shore of Lake Solitude, many
miles away from the town of Hickory Ridge.
This vehicle was filled with lively lads, all of them in the faded
khaki uniforms that, as a rule, distinguish Boy Scouts the wide world
over.
Counting them it would be seen that they numbered just seven, and this
included all of those whom we met on the road under the spreading
branches of the big oak, and Mark Cummings in addition. Since the
entire membership of the Wolf Patrol consisted of eight, it was plain
that the only one now lacking was the unfortunate Hen Condit.
After making up their minds to exert themselves to the utmost in hopes
of finding the runaway, and bringing him back home, Elmer and the
others had set to work preparing for the campaign.
The patrol leader gave such advice as was required by some of the
others, telling them to go as light as possible, since they would have
to be moving around, and ordinary camp material could not be considered.
If they were compelled to remain out in the open for one or more
nights, there were plenty of ways whereby they could secure shelter
without carrying along such a cumbersome thing as a tent.
Each fellow had his rubber poncho strapped to his pack. Elmer and Lil
Artha carried a gun each, not that they expected to shoot any game, but
to use as a threat should they be faced by a desperate escaped jail
bird. Besides this the boys had seen to it that each one had some sort
of food supply, in the shape of sandwiches, dried beef, and such things
as could be most easily packed.
As Lil Artha had gaily declared, they expected to be like "Sherman's
bummers," and live off the country as they went along, though willing
to pay ready cash for any and all eggs, fowls or bread secured from
farmers' wives.
Josh had arranged to "tote" a coffee pot along, together with a supply
of the ground bean; while Landy had a capacious frying-pan fastened to
his pack, which the others just knew would be frequently tripping him
up, and making all sorts of noises when they wanted to steal silently
along.
Just what they meant to fry in that pan no one fully knew; but they
were strong in "hopes," and believed that things would turn up to
satisfy their hunger when the sensation became too acute.
The team had been hired at the town livery stable, and they had been on
the road now since early in the morning, for it was a long way up to
Lake Solitude.
As this region had been the scene of some of the earliest camps of the
Hickory Ridge scouts, of course, the conversation covered many memories
connected with those experiences.
The horses had shown signs of playing out some miles back; but Lil
Artha proved himself to be an artful as well as clever driver. He
managed to coax them along, and there was little doubt now that they
would reach their intended destination inside of a short time.
This was a farmer's place that lay adjacent to the swamp at the head of
the solitary lake. Here they would arrange to leave their team while
searching the dark recesses of the swamp. As all of them had had
considerable experience in such unsavory places they believed they knew
fairly well how to go about the hunt.
"Well, we ought to fetch that old farm mighty soon now, I should think,
Elmer," remarked the driver, as he flecked the back of the off-horse to
disturb a big green fly that was trying to stab the sweat-covered
animal in a tender spot.
"From what I've been able to find out, and what I know in the bargain
from my own experience up here," the patrol leader explained, "the head
of the lake lies just beyond that patch of willow trees, and we'll see
the farmhouse as soon as we make the next turn. Easy there, Art, you
came near dumping us then."
"The pesky old road is so narrow it's hard to keep going straight,"
complained the other, in disgust; for one wheel had, indeed, slipped
over the edge, and their escape from a bad spill had been what Lil
Artha himself would have called a "close shave."
"I reckon suh, Sassafras Swamp must lie over in that direction then?"
remarked Chatz, pointing as he spoke.
"Just what it does," replied Elmer.
"It looks particularly gloomy, I should say," remarked Toby.
"Swamps always do, you must know," Elmer told him; "some of them are
always half dark even in the middle of the day. That's because of the
jumble of vines that hang from tree to tree, and the canopy of branches
overhead. Why, down South, as Chatz here can tell you, where Spanish
moss covers the trees, it's almost dark in some swamps."
"But, Elmer, there's one thing I just don't understand," suggested
Landy.
"Out with it then; and if I can explain I'll be only too willing," he
was told.
"Supposing now for the sake of argument that stranger was a bad man who
had escaped from a sheriff somewhere, when being taken to the
penitentiary; and that he managed to get a strangle hold on our chum,
Hen Condit, so that the other just had to do whatever he was told--get
all that, do you? Well, if they skipped out of Hickory Ridge night
before last, how under the sun could they get away up here in a day or
so?"
"Yes, it's something like thirty miles, I should say, Elmer, and it
takes that boy Johnny a day and a night to get to our place with his
load, all down-grade, too. You remember that Hen Condit never was
anything to brag of in the line of a long-distance walker."
"He may have made up his mind that he had to do some tall sprinting,"
said the other, "when he realized what a hornets' nest he'd stirred up
back there."
"Yeth," remarked Ted Burgoyne who had been listening to all this talk
with certain ideas of his own, "and lots of times it ithn't tho very
hard to get a lift on the road. Wagons and autoth happen along, you
know, and the farmers around here are thoft things, you thee."
"I was just going to say that same thing, Ted," Elmer remarked, "when
you took the very words out of my mouth. Yes, they may have had a
lift; or else Hen had to stretch himself to do the tallest walking of
his career. All of which is based on the supposition that they did
come away up here, and are hiding right now somewhere about Sassafras
Swamp."
"You're figuring on what Johnny said, eh, Elmer?" asked Mark.
"I'm figuring on a whole lot of things," replied the other; "and among
them is the fact that some unknown man has been using the swamp for a
hiding-place of late."
"P'raps we'll learn a heap more about it after we stwike the farm we're
heading for," suggested Ted.
"And there, if you look now you can see the house among those trees,
with smoke coming out of the chimney at the kitchen end," said Elmer,
pointing ahead.
Lil Artha deliberately took chances by removing one hand from the
lines, and vigorously rubbing his stomach with it.
"Oh! I know something of what bully suppers farmers' wives c'n serve
up," he hastened to say, throwing all the longing he could into looks
and words; "and here's hoping we get an invite to stay over there till
morning. If they are very pressing, Elmer, I entreat you not to hurry
us off. Things can wait that long, and we don't expect to do much in
the night-time, you remember."
The patrol leader made no rash promises. He simply smiled, and started
to talk of other subjects; so poor Lil Artha, who did feel so empty
after such a little lunch by the wayside, was left in suspense.
"What's this farmer's name?" asked Toby.
"Trotter," replied Elmer. "You know Johnny Spreen is really a bound
boy, and he has to work for the farmer until he gets a certain age,
when he is supposed to be given a sum of money, and be his own boss.
That's the law."
"Well, all I hope is that we pick up some decent clue around here,"
said Lil Artha; "Yes, and a bully supper in the bargain, that'll fill a
horrible vacuum, and put us all in fighting condition."
Their arrival created something of a sensation. Dogs began to bark,
roosters to crow, cows to moo, and even a donkey started to bray in a
fearful fashion. Immediately Johnny Spreen, the boy who trapped
muskrats in the winter, came running out from the big barn where he was
probably milking some of the cows, for he held a three-legged stool in
one hand as though it might be a weapon of defense.
The farmer, a long, lanky individual with a keen face, also bobbed in
sight, holding a currycomb; while at the kitchen door could be seen the
buxom figure of his wife, evidently bound to learn what was happening
even if her dinner did burn in consequence.
Three tow-headed, wild-eyed little Trotters, who had been playing at
teeter with a plank laid over a carpenter's "horse" for a seesaw,
ranged themselves all in a row, and gaped their fill at the strange
spectacle of a wagonload of boys all dressed pretty much alike.
"Are you Mr. Trotter?" asked Elmer, as he jumped down, and the other
came forward toward him.
"That's my name, son; what fetches the hull lot of you up this way?
Ameanin' to camp on the lake-shore, it might be? I've heard about the
scouts daown at Hickory Ridge; Johnny yonder's been apinin' to jine 'em
this long time back, but, of course, it ain't to be thunk of, with him
so far away."
"Yes, we are the members of the Wolf Patrol, Mr. Trotter," said Elmer,
who wanted to make a good friend of the farmer in the start. "I'm
Elmer Chenowith; perhaps you know my father, or some of the other
fellows' parents."
He thereupon introduced each one of the boys by name, and even
mentioned the fact that the father of this one or that occupied a
prominent place in the business or professional world of Hickory Ridge
town.
"We haven't exactly come up here to camp out this trip, Mr. Trotter,"
continued the patrol leader, after bowing to the farmer's wife who had
first darted indoors to see that her supper was not burning, and then
hurried to join them.
Elmer knew that the truth might just as well come out in the beginning
as later. On this account he did not intend to hold anything back, but
be perfectly frank with the owner of the lake farm.
"What might be your object then, son?" asked the tiller of the soil,
possibly feeling a bit of natural curiosity in the matter.
"Ask him first of all, won't you Elmer," pleaded Lil Artha, as though
he feared lest this important matter be lost sight of in the confusion
of affairs; "whether he c'n spare us some eggs, and a few broilers to
take into the old swamp with us?"
"I guess ma c'n let you have what you want along them lines," replied
Mr. Trotter, "though seems like somebody's been amakin' free with her
layin' hens lately. They keep disappearin' right along. Sometimes I
think it's a mink that's gettin' 'em, but they ain't any signs of sech
a critter around; 'cause you know a mink'll kill as many as a dozen
fowls in one night, and jest suck their blood."
Elmer exchanged suggestive looks with his mates.
"From what you say, sir," he remarked quickly, "your fowls are carried
off bodily. Is that it?"
"They jest keep on gettin' less an' less right along," the farmer
admitted. "Me and Johnny here was thinkin' o' settin' up with guns to
see if we could get a crack at the chicken thief, whether he was a
mink, a badger, or a two-legged raskil."
"That's what we was meanin' to do," agreed the said Johnny, glad to
have his name mentioned in the matter at all.
"Well, we've got a hunch, Mr. Trotter," said Lil Artha, bound to get
his say in the affair, "that we might put you wise about that same
thief."
"I'd shore be glad to hear it," declared the farmer; "Johnny here has
been asayin' as heow he b'lieves thar's a feller ahidin' out in the
swamp, 'cause he seen his tracks. I even reckoned on sendin' for a
neighbor o' mine, Bay Stanhope, that's got some hounds used to
follerin' people, an' see if we could run him daown."
"Well, Mr. Trotter, that is exactly what we scouts propose doing," said
Elmer. "And now if you'll listen to something I've got to tell, you
can understand what sort of interest we've got in this thing."
So in as few words as possible he narrated the story of how Hen Condit
had acted in such a queer way, robbing his uncle and guardian, and
actually leaving a silly letter that fastened the crime on his own
shoulders.
"He was seen by one of my chums talking with a strange man just the day
before this happened," continued. Elmer. "We believe that man was the
same unknown party who has been hiding in Sassafras Swamp for a time
past, and as you've just told us, living off your flock of fowls.
Johnny here, down in the hay market, gave me something he picked up in
the swamp near some ashes. Here it is, Mr. Trotter, and all of us
believe firmly it is part of a steel handcuff which was filed in half,
showing that the man must be a desperate character escaped from jail."
At that the farmer's wife uttered a little shriek, and began to look
frightened.
"Hennery," she told her husband authoritatively, "you go git your gun
right away. And Johnny, chain the bull-dog close to the kitchen door.
After this I'm meanin' to make sure the bar's in place when I'm left
alone, and Moses kept inside the house along with me."
Elmer guessed that the said Moses must be the bull-dog. He also
figured that, as a rule, the animal was kept indoors nights, which
accounted for his not having interfered with the carrying off of the
farmer's chickens.
Mr. Trotter was plainly deeply interested by this time in the story
connected with the coming of these seven scouts.
"Sure I'll do all I kin to help you land the critters, boys," he
assured them. "But that swamp is some big, an' I guess as haow you'll
have all you want to do achasin' through the same. Supposin' naow you
let things rest till tomorry, and make an early start. Mebbe we might
bag the raskils this very night, if so be they try to make another haul
on my feathered stock, aimin' to git a turkey this time."
Of course, Elmer could see through a grindstone that had a hole in its
center. He knew very well that the shrewd farmer wanted to make use of
them in order to protect his property; but it served Elmer's purpose
just as well to readily agree to the proposition.
As for Lil Artha, his eyes were almost popping out of his head with
suspense; he was also licking his lips after the manner of a hungry dog
when scenting a bone.
"We'll stop over with you then, Mr. Trotter," agreed the patrol leader;
"and before morning try to figure out our plan of campaign looking to
rounding up the chicken thieves who are believed to be hiding in
Sassafras Swamp."