THE CAMP IN THE WOODS.
Something over four miles from Oakdale Abel Hubbard reined his horse
into an old road which led from the main highway into the depths of the
woods. Fred and Roy, with their outfits, were in the wagon, and, the
time being short ere darkness must come on, they urged Hubbard to make
haste.
“Can’t hit any high places along this old road,” answered the fat little
village constable. “If I tried it, I’d bounce ye both out in no time.
’Tain’t fur to the pond now, so what’s the use to be in such an
all-fired rush? All I want to do is git back on to the main road before
it sets in dark.”
“But we’ve got some things to do ourselves,” said Roy. “We’ve got to
find the old raft and have it ready for use in the morning, besides
cutting firewood and getting settled down for the night.”
“That hadn’t orter take ye long. I’ll git ye there as soon’s I can. It’s
sort of an accommodation, anyhow. I wouldn’t think of making both trips
for anybody else unless they paid me twice as much.”
“You’re not very busy these days, are you, Mr. Hubbard?” asked Fred,
smiling a little. “It seems to me an easy way for you to pick up a
dollar.”
“Oh, I could be busy,” returned the man, “if I wanted to work for Lem
Hayden in his quarry or kilns, and I guess I could find a job in the
mills; but, as a regular commissioned officer, it’s my duty to be
unhampered and ready for anything that may turn up. If I was workin’ and
Sheriff Pickle happened to need me, I’d have to knock off.”
Real work had never seemed to have much fascination for Abel Hubbard.
“Then there are plenty of jobs a man might get around Oakdale,” said
Roy. “If a stranger should show up with references, he could find
something to do, couldn’t he?”
“Reckon he could, such as it was. I don’t cal’late them Dagoes in the
quarries bring many references.”
“You haven’t seen any stranger around town recently looking for work,
have you?”
“No, don’t think I have.”
“I didn’t know,” said Roy. “Last Saturday, while gunning with Fred, I
met a man who said he was in search of a job, and he asked me about the
chances in town. I haven’t seen anything of him since.”
“I generally take special notice of everybody that comes inter Oakdale,”
asserted Constable Hubbard. “I cal’late it’s good policy to do so. Ain’t
nobody new showed up lately, so I guess your man didn’t stop around
here.”
“I don’t believe he did,” said Roy.
Presently they reached the old camp, from which, through the trees, they
could get a glimpse of the pond. It did not take them long to jump out
and unload their belongings, which were carried into the camp, the door
being fastened merely by a wooden peg thrust through a staple. Hubbard
backed his wagon round, bade them good luck and drove off into the
shadows which were gathering in the woods.
“Well, here we are, Roy,” said Fred.
“Yes, and it’s up to us to hustle. Let’s look for that raft while it’s
light enough to find it. We can get together firewood later. Come on.”
Leaving their property in the camp, they hurried to the pond, and Hooker
led the way along the marshy shore. The water-grass and rushes stood
thick and rank at this end of the lake, and soon Hooker pointed out a
mass of dead brush in the midst of the reeds some distance from the
marshy shore.
“There’s the old blind,” he said. “You can see it is located so it
commands the cove beyond, and that’s where the ducks coming in to feed
usually ’light.”
“How does a fellow get out to the blind?”
“Wade. The water won’t come up to your knees. There’s a sort of little
knoll or island out there, and the brush has been built up and woven
into the branches of an old fallen tree that may have grown on that
knoll before the water was so high. It’s a fine chance all right. But
come on, we must dig that raft out.”
They went forward again, and suddenly, with a splash and a sound of
throbbing wings, a small duck rose amid the rushes and went flying away
over the bosom of the lake.
“Hang it all!” exclaimed Roy in vexation. “Just look at that! If we’d
brought our guns, we might have knocked her down. That’s a young duck,
or it would have flown before we got anywhere near. Young ones always
hide if they can, until they get thoroughly used to the idea that their
wings will serve them better. We’ll get some shooting here in the
morning, mark what I say.”
The raft was found where Hooker expected to find it. It was a small
affair and would support only one of the boys, but would be sufficient
for their use in picking up such ducks as they might shoot. With the
raft there was a long pole and a piece of board that had been roughly
hewn into the shape of a paddle.
When the raft was floated Roy got on it and poled it around into the
little cove near the blind, where he succeeded in concealing it quite
effectively amid the grass and reeds. Then he waded ashore in his
water-tight boots without sinking nearly as much as he had thought he
would.
“That’s done,” he said. “Now we’ll get back to the camp and chop our
firewood while we can see to do it. There are no signs to indicate that
anyone has shot from the blind this fall, and therefore the ducks ought
to come up to it without fear.”
Soon the strokes of an axe were ringing through the gloomy woods as Sage
worked at the trunk of a dry fallen tree. Hooker carried the wood into
the camp and piled it beside the old stone fireplace. Sunset’s faint
afterglow faded from the sky, and with gathering darkness the atmosphere
took on a sharp, nipping chill, which, however, was little felt by the
active boys. Sage continued chopping, while Hooker found time between
armfuls to build a fire. Through the open door of the camp Fred saw the
welcoming glow of the flames, and it gave him a feeling of buoyancy, of
keen relish, of intense satisfaction in life and the pleasures thereof.
It was good to be there with his chum in those dark and silent autumn
woods, making ready to spend the night together in that old camp before
the duck hunt that was to come in the crispness of gray dawn.
Hooker’s figure was silhouetted in the open doorway.
“I say, old man,” he called, as he came out, “there has been somebody in
this camp lately.”
“That so? I thought you said you were sure no one had used the shooting
blind.”
“I am; I’ll bet on it. I looked to see, and I could tell that no one had
been there. They would have left tracks and marks and probably empty
shells. Whoever it was that stopped in the camp, they did not try any
shooting from the blind. And say, I’ll bet somebody was in that camp
last night. I thought I caught a smell of tobacco smoke when we first
opened the door, but it was so dusky inside that I didn’t notice
anything else. There’s fresh-cut boughs in the bunk, and the ashes in
the fireplace were hardly cold. I found crumbs on the floor, too, and
part of a newspaper not quite two weeks old.”
“Then I reckon you’re right,” agreed Sage, “though I don’t quite see why
anyone should stop in the old camp this time of year, unless he came
here to shoot ducks. We’d have been in a scrape if we’d found someone
here ahead of us to-night.”
They bore the last of the wood inside and threw it down on a heaping
pile beside the now merrily blazing fire, which illumined the entire
interior of the camp. Hooker had thoughtfully brought a can of water
from a nearby spring, and, thus prepared, they were ready to settle down
to the supper of sandwiches and doughnuts put up for them by their
mothers.
Roy closed and fastened the door with the inside hasp.
“You can see,” he said, with a gesture toward the old bunk at one side
of the room, “those boughs on top are fresh cut.”
“That’s right,” nodded Sage, after examining them. “Hacked off with a
jackknife, I should say, and not two days old. Well, somebody was kind
enough to help make us comfortable, for, with our blankets and a fire
going, we ought to find that bunk all right to-night. I’m really much
obliged to the unknown person or persons. I presume there may have been
more than one.”
“Here’s that part of a newspaper,” said Roy, taking it from the small
rough table that had been nailed against the wall opposite the bunk.
“The date on it is enough to show that someone has been here lately.”
Fred took the paper and glanced at it carelessly. In a moment, however,
a queer expression flashed across his face, his eyes opened wide, his
lips puckered, and he gave a long, low whistle.
“What is it?” questioned the boy.
“By Jove!” muttered Sage wonderingly. And then, after a moment of
silence, he repeated with greater emphasis: “By Jove!”
“What is it?” exclaimed Hooker.
“This paper,” answered Fred, staring at some headlines in bold-faced
type. “It’s either a part of the same one or a duplicate of an issue I
saw in the possession of Billy Piper last Saturday night.”