AT THE HAUNTED MILL.
Once more the little squad of scouts resumed their forward movement.
Matty remained at their head, as before. This game was growing more
delightful to him every minute, and some of the others were feeling the
same way.
Of course it was easy work for those who came after, and the second
bunch, headed by Mark Cummings, would have, as Red expressed it, a
"snap."
The real work of following the trail was falling upon Elmer and his
companion, the tall, angular fellow known among his mates as Lil Artha.
In carrying out the purpose of the game they were to do all the reading
of the signs, and leave a plain track for those who came after. But the
two detachments of scouts were expected to pick up as much knowledge
concerning the methods used as they could.
Besides this, they must read the messages left occasionally by their
pathfinder.
For quite some time the boys scurried along. More than once they had to
quicken their pace to what Matty called a "dog-trot." This happened
especially when the "signs" were very plain.
"Why all this haste?" asked Landy, who seemed to be puffing a little,
because of his being rather a stout boy, and not very well up in
athletics.
"Because we want to gain on Elmer when we have the chance," replied the
leader.
"But look here, Matty," said Landy, "do you mean to tell me Elmer is
getting along about as fast as we've been doing, when he has a blind
trail to follow, and we have a plain one?"
"Looks like it, don't it?" exclaimed Red.
"But how under the sun does he do it?" pursued the doubting greenhorn.
"Well," Matty went on, "Elmer lived in Canada, away up where our
blizzards come from. He used to ride a wild broncho, throw a rope, hunt
antelope and wolves, and was once in at the death of a big grizzly bear
that had been playing hob with their cattle."
"Yes, I've heard all that," admitted Landy.
"So you see he learned a lot about following a trail that would never be
seen by any fellows like us scouts. He knows a dozen signs that tell him
the facts. And when greenhorns like Ty, Nat, and Toby try to fool him,
why, he just eats the trail up."
Matty, as he finished speaking, came to a sudden pause.
"We might as well take a breathing spell," he remarked, "because we're
getting pretty close to the meeting place anyhow. Besides, here's a
chance for me to show you how Elmer manages."
The others crowded around, eager to see for themselves what object
lesson Matty expected to lay before them.
"Now I want you to notice right here," he said, pointing to the ground,
"that the footprints of the two boys ahead suddenly stop. Here are the
plain marks left purposely by Elmer and Lil Artha. Do you notice how
they run alongside this fallen tree?"
"That's a fact," declared George, as all of them walked slowly along.
"The two foxes in the lead thought to puzzle the hounds by jumping on
this long log, and running its entire length," said Matty, with a grin,
"but they had their trouble for nothing. Why, it was such an old trick
that Elmer guessed it at a glance. He must have gained quite a lot on
'em here."
George and Landy exchanged glances.
"Well, there's a heap more in this game than I ever thought of,"
admitted the latter.
"Don't see how he does it," remarked George, with a doubting shake of
his head.
"Oh, the more you study up on this thing," said Red, "the better you'll
like it. No end of clever stunts that can be engineered. But see here,
Matty, didn't you say we must be getting near the place where we
expected to round up both foxes and hounds?"
"Yes, I'm looking to hear the bugle any minute right now," replied the
leader.
"Where was it fixed for?" asked Landy.
"Oh, I thought you knew," Matty replied, as they once more took up the
broad trail, at the point beyond the end of the fallen tree.
"I heard some talk about an old mill, but didn't pay much attention to
it," remarked Landy, carelessly.
"Then you've got to turn over a new leaf, old fellow, if you expect to
ever succeed as a good scout," Red broke in with.
"How's that?" demanded Landy.
"Because," replied the red-headed lad, himself always wide-awake and on
the alert, "a scout to succeed must forever keep his wits about him and
observe things. In fact, Elmer says he should take as a motto, besides
the words 'Be Prepared' the old sign you see at railroad crossings."
"Stop! look! listen!" exclaimed Matty, Larry, and Chatz in chorus.
"I suppose I _am_ somewhat sleepy," grumbled Landy, "but perhaps some
day I'll surprise you wide-awake Slim Jims by doing something real
smart. But tell me more about this mill."
"You sure must have heard of Munsey's mill?" remarked Matty.
"Oh, I believe it does sound kind of familiar, but then I must have
forgotten all I ever heard about it," Landy confessed.
Red and Matty exchanged glances, and shook their heads mournfully. It
seemed a pretty tough proposition to ever expect to make a good and
profitable scout out of such poor material.
"Well," said the patrol leader, "there is a long story connected with
the old ramshackle mill. No use of my going into all the details. It's
been abandoned a good many years now. People have tried to live there
three times since old Munsey was found dead there, but they had to give
it up."
"Yes, suh," Chatz broke in, his eyes shining brightly, for this was a
subject that appealed very strongly to him, "they just couldn't hold
out. Got cold feet after going through the experience and had to quit."
"But why?" demanded Landy.
"Because they declared the old mill was haunted!" replied Matty.
"Yes, suh, it was haunted," echoed Chatz.
The Southern boy had always confessed to a streak of superstition in his
make-up. He admitted that he must have imbibed it from association with
the ignorant little negro lads with whom he had been accustomed to play
down on the plantation.
He had even admitted once to carrying in his pocket, as a charm, the
left hind foot of a rabbit, which animal had been killed by himself in a
graveyard when the moon was full.
The boys plagued Chatz so much that he had by degrees shown signs of
considering most of his former beliefs as folly.
Still, the mere mention of a haunted house set his nerves to quivering.
Chatz might be a timid fellow when up against anything bordering upon
the ghostly, but on all other occasions he had proven himself brave,
almost to the point of rashness.
It was "Doubting George" who burst out into a harsh laugh.
"A haunted house!" he exclaimed. "Ghosts! Strange knockings! Thrilling
whispers! Ice-cold hands! Oh, my, what a lark! I've always wanted to get
up against a thing like that. Don't believe in 'em the least bit. You
could talk to me till you was gray-headed, and I'd just laugh. There
never was such things as ghosts, never!"
Chatz looked at him rather queerly.
"Oh, well, perhaps you're right, George," he said, holding himself in
check, "but I've read of some people who had pretty rough experiences."
"Rats! They fooled themselves every time," declared the boy who would
not believe. "Bet you it was the wind whistling through a knot hole, or
a parcel of rats squeaking and fighting between the walls. Ghosts! It
makes me laugh."
"Same here," declared Red.
"Listen!" exclaimed Larry just then, making them all start. Through the
timber ahead of them came the sweet clear notes of a bugle.
"Told you so, fellows," declared Matty, smiling; "that's Elmer. He's
learning to use the bugle nearly as well as Mark himself."
"Then we're at the end of our trail following, are we?" asked Landy, not
without a sigh of relief, for it had not been as easy work in his case
as with his less stout comrades.
"Well, pretty near," Matty replied. "We've got to keep it up till we
come in sight of the mill."
"But why?" asked George, who seemed to want to know every little thing,
so that his natural tendency to object might have a chance to show
itself.
"Oh, well, there might be one more opening for a message, and our main
business is to translate these, you know."
"Do we stay long at the old mill?" asked Chatz.
Red gave him a quick, suspicious look.
"Aw, I reckon I know what's on our comrade's mind," he remarked, with a
wink.
"As what?" demanded Landy.
"Chatz thinks he'd like to prowl around some, and see if that ghost has
left any signs. 'Tain't often he's had a chance to meet up with a real
haunted house, eh, Chatz?" and Red gave the Southern boy a sly dig in
the ribs.
"Never had that pleasure in all my life, fellows, I assure you," replied
the Southern boy, with ill-concealed delight in his manner.
"But say, no respectable ghost was ever known to walk except at
midnight, and we don't intend camping out at the old mill, do we, just
because of this silly talk?" asked George.
"Oh, the rest of us don't, but Chatz might take a notion to stay over,"
laughed Red. "When a fellow is set on investigating things he don't
understand, and which were never meant for us to understand, there's
just no telling how far he will carry the game."
Chatz gave him a lofty look.
"Thank you for the compliment, suh," he said.
They continued to follow the "spoor" of the two hounds, left so plainly
for their guidance.
It was not long before another stick that held a bark "message" was
discovered. And Landy felt immensely elated to think that by some chance
he had been the first to see the "sign."
"I'll surprise you fellows yet, just mark me," he chuckled, while Matty
was trying to read the queer little characters Elmer had marked upon the
brown inner side of the fresh bark torn from a convenient tree close by.
"Wish you would, old top," remarked Red, with his customary enthusiasm.
"You'll get to like all these things more and more, the farther you go,"
said Larry.
"I feel that way already," was Landy's quick reply; "only I'm that
clumsy and slow-witted I just don't see how I'm ever going to keep up
with the procession."
"Elmer says it's only keeping everlastingly at it that makes a good
scout," remarked Chatz.
Evidently, from the way these boys continually quoted "Elmer," the
assistant scout master must be a very popular fellow in Hickory Ridge,
and those who have made a study of boy nature can understand what rare
elements the said Elmer must have in his composition to make so many
friends and so few enemies.
"Come around and see what I've made out of this message," said Matty
just then.
It proved to be the concluding communication, and in plain picture
language informed those for whom it was left that the two foxes had
stopped here, made a dense smoke to attract their missing comrade, and
when joined by him, the three had gone on together to the rendezvous at
the old mill.
"Fine," cried Landy, when he heard what a remarkable story those rude
drawings told.
"Very good--if true," admitted George.
"Well, come along and we'll prove it," laughed Matty; "for unless I miss
my guess the mill is close by."
"Sure," declared Red. "I can hear the noise of water tumbling down some
rocks, or over a mill dam."
Five minutes later and Chatz called out:
"There you are, suh!"
The mill could be seen through the trees, and all of the boys felt the
greatest eagerness to hurry along and reach this spot.
It happened that none of this bunch had ever set eyes on Munsey's mill,
or the pond just above it. There were plenty of places nearer Hickory
Ridge for fishing purposes. And besides, the dear familiar old "swimming
hole" was more convenient than this place, nearly seven miles away.
"I see Elmer and Lil Artha," observed Larry.
"Yes, and there's another fellow just beyond. I reckon it must be Ty
Collins," said Chatz.
Elmer waited for them to come up. He and his companions were standing on
the edge of the dam which had long ago been built in order to hold up
the water and form the big lonely looking pond beyond.
"Ugh, what a spooky looking place this is!" exclaimed Larry, as soon as
they drew up where they could look out on the big pond, its surface in
places partly covered with lily plants, and the long trailing branches
of weeping willows dipping down to the water.
"It sure is, suh!" remarked Chatz, plainly interested, and not a little
excited.
"Here we are, Elmer," called out Matty; "and I guess the second bunch
will be along soon. I see Ty and Toby, but where's Nat Scott?"
Elmer gave him a serious look.
"That's just what we're wondering," he said. "They all reached the old
mill, you see, but Nat seems to have disappeared in a mighty queer way!"