AND IS CAUGHT.
It was, as he afterward told Jack, a good man-sized sneeze, and made
noise enough to waken the seven sleepers. Instantly the voices stopped.
Poor Bob was in a quandary as to what to do. He knew that it would be
useless to beat a retreat as they would be sure to hear him and be upon
him before he could much more than get started. So he lay perfectly
still hoping that they would attribute the sound to some animal. But, in
his heart, he knew that the hope was futile. These men knew perfectly
well the sound made by any animal in the Maine woods and would know that
the sneeze came from a human throat.
“By gar! Dat some man close here,” he heard one of them say.
“Oui, I tink you right,” the other replied. “We better find heem queek.”
Bob hoped that they had no light but this hope was almost immediately
dashed to the ground as the light from an electric torch began to play
through the thick woods. He was lying behind a thick clump of bushes and
he tried to worm himself into the midst of them hoping they would
conceal him.
The two men were now making no pretense of keeping quiet but were
crashing this way and that through the underbrush and the boy knew that
unless the unexpected happened it was only a question of a few minutes
before they would find him. He was debating whether it would not be
better to get up and show himself and had decided on making the move
when he felt his foot grasped by a powerful pair of hands and he was
yanked violently out of his hiding place.
“Me got heem,” his captor called as he grabbed him by the shoulder and
jerked him to his feet.
The other man was only a few feet away and in another moment had joined
them.
By the light of the torch Bob saw that he had been correct in his
thought regarding the identity of one of the men. The other was much
smaller and, to the best of his knowledge he had never seen him before.
“What you do here, huh?” the big man demanded still retaining his hold
on Bob’s collar.
“I seem to be just standing here,” Bob replied pleasantly.
“Oui. You stand here now, but what for you stand here?”
“You ought to know that,” Bob grinned “You seem to have been responsible
for it. I was lying down until you came along.”
“I tink you follow us. Try hear what we say, oui? You know what we do to
spies here, huh?”
“I’m a pretty good guesser,” Bob replied with an ease which he was far
from feeling. “But what makes you think I’m a spy?”
“You tink we one fool?” the man cried angrily. Then turning to his
companion, he said,
“We tak’ heem wid us. Come.”
Still keeping a firm hold on Bob’s collar he pushed the boy in front of
him and ordered him to march. Knowing that it was useless to resist at
present Bob did as he was commanded. He could tell by the sound that the
smaller man was following close on the steps of his captor. The going
was very rough as the underbrush was thick. Bob’s mind was working
rapidly. He knew that if he did not escape it was almost certain to go
hard with him and he was by no means sure that his life was not in
danger. They had proceeded but a short distance, though it seemed to Bob
that they had been walking a long time, when he bumped into a log which
was lying across their path and some eighteen inches from the ground. As
he climbed over it a plan flashed into his mind. It was a chance and he
determined to risk it. He stepped over the log and his captor followed
still keeping a firm grasp on his collar. As soon as the man was clear
of the log he stopped and said to his companion,
“Look out dat log.”
Bob waited a moment until the man ordered him to go ahead. Then with a
sudden jerk he wrenched himself free and turned so as to face his
captor. The Frenchman, taken by surprise, stepped back at first and
then, with a cry of fury, reached for the boy. And at that instant Bob
struck. It was too dark for him to see more than the outline of the
man’s head but, trusting to luck, he put all the strength of his
vigorous young body behind the blow. And it landed just where he had
hoped that it would, squarely on the point of the chin. With a grunt the
man fell backwards, staggered for a moment, and then crashed over the
fallen log carrying the smaller man down with him.
Bob waited but an instant to learn the result of his blow. He heard the
men go down and then turned and made his way as rapidly as he dared
through the forest. He had gone perhaps a hundred feet when he tripped
on a root and plunged headlong on his face. Fortunately, however, the
ground was not hard and he was not hurt. As he scrambled to his feet he
heard a great crashing in the underbrush behind him.
“Guess I didn’t knock him out after all,” he thought as he started off
again.
His heart sank as he realized that, with the aid of the flashlight, they
would be able to make faster time than he dared attempt so rough was the
going. Indeed he had not gone more than a couple of hundred feet farther
before he knew that they were but a very short distance behind him and
he realized that it was a matter of but a few minutes before they would
be upon him.
Should he submit to capture a second time or should he make a fight for
it? He thought of climbing a tree but dismissed the thought as he knew
that such a move would at best only delay his capture.
“You better stop queek or we keel you,” Big Pierre panted now only a few
feet behind him.
“I won’t give up till I have to,” he thought as he scrambled up on to a
large rock which he had ran into.
Having gained the top of the rock at the expense of a severe bruise on
his right shin he started to go down the other side when suddenly his
feet flew from beneath him and he felt himself falling. Down, down he
went until, just as the thought flashed through his mind that it was
taking him an awful while to reach the bottom, he struck water.
The fall was all of thirty feet and he was carried far beneath the
surface. Fortunately he struck feet first and so was not at all hurt. He
felt very thankful that he had struck the lake instead of the hard
ground and that the water was deep.
As soon as he could he began to swim for the surface and in another
moment his head emerged. Shaking the water from his eyes he saw a beam
of light fall on the water only a few feet away. Doubtless the men had
heard the splash as he struck the water and had thus been warned in time
to avoid following him into the lake. Drawing in a long breath. Bob sank
again beneath the surface and swam out into the lake. He kept beneath
the water as long as he could hold his breath and then cautiously
allowed his head to emerge. Almost at once a beam of light struck full
in his eyes and the vicious bark of a revolver, followed by a slight
splash only a few inches from his head, caused him to dive once more.
“That was a little too close for comfort,” he thought as he started to
swim.
When he was forced to come up this time he turned on his back and
floated with only his nose and eyes out of water.
“I’ll give ’em as small a target as possible,” he thought.
He was now so far out from the shore that he had little fear of being
hit, even should they be able to locate him with the flash, and he very
much doubted their ability to do this. By carefully bending his head he
could see the slim pencil of light playing over the water, but not once
did it reach him.
Feeling now fairly safe he began to swim slowly in a direction at right
angles to the way he had pursued under water and which he judged was
toward the camp. He was careful to make no noise which might reach the
ears of his enemies on the shore. Glancing back from time to time he
could still see the beam of light as they tried to locate him. But soon
it vanished and keeping perfectly still he heard them crashing through
the underbrush as they made their way back from the lake.
“Guess they’ve given it up as a bad job,” he chuckled as he started to
swim more rapidly now.
He swam for what seemed a long time hoping that he was keeping to the
right direction as he had nothing to guide him. Finally just as he was
beginning to feel tired his feet touched bottom and in another minute he
was sitting on a rock close by the shore.
“It can’t be very long before it begins to get light now,” he thought.
He had decided that it would be best to wait there until it was light
enough to see before trying to find his way back to the camp. He had
lost all sense of direction and knew that the chances were that he would
take the wrong way should he start in the darkness. And there was always
the chance that he might blunder into the hands of his recent captors.
Fortunately it was a warm night and although he was not very comfortable
sitting there in his wet clothes, still he minded it but little.
“It’s a good deal better than being in their power,” he told himself.
His watch had stopped, the water having worked itself in under the case,
and he had no means of knowing the time. He sat with his back propped
against a tree and despite the uncomfortable position it was not long
before he fell asleep.
He did not know how long he slept but it could not have been very long
for when he awoke with a sudden start dawn was just breaking in the
East.
“Well a little nap was better than none,” he mused as he rose and
stretched himself.
He waited a few minutes longer until the light had increased enough to
enable him to see his way and then started off along the shore of the
lake. He could only guess how far it was back to the camp but he knew
that if he followed the shore far enough he was bound to reach his
destination sooner or later. But he was in fact much nearer than he
thought for inside of twenty minutes he saw the cabin, which he had left
a few hours before, looming up through the trees.
“I wonder if Jack has missed me,” he thought as he took the door key
from his pocket and silently pushed it into the key hole.
He stood and listened a moment as he stepped inside the room and could
hear the deep regular breathing of his brother from the little bed-room.
“Bet he hasn’t opened his peepers,” he chuckled as he quickly slipped
out of his wet clothes and jumped into bed.
He was asleep almost instantly and the next he knew Jack was shaking him
vigorously by the shoulder.
“Make it snappy there,” he cried. “The breakfast horn blew some time ago
and if you don’t hurry up you’ll get left on the eats.”
Bob was out of bed in an instant and began to pull on his clothes.
“For goodness sake, Bob, what’s the matter with your duds? They look as
though you had slept between wet sheets in them,” Jack declared as he
gazed in amazement.
“They do look kinder out of press, that’s a fact,” Bob agreed with a
broad grin.
“I’ll say they do. What’s the answer? They didn’t look that way last
night.”
“Wait till after breakfast and I’ll tell you all about it. It’s rather a
long story,” and Bob, now fully dressed led the way to the dining-room
followed by a very much bewildered Jack.
The latter noticed that Bob looked up quickly with an anxious look on
his face each time the door opened. He bolted his breakfast as rapidly
as he could. They had been at the table not more than ten minutes when
he whispered:
“For goodness sake. Bob, are you going to eat all day?”
“Just because you have been eating as though you thought your life
depended on how much you could stow away per minute you mustn’t think
I’ve been doing the same,” Bob smiled. “But I’ll be through pretty
soon.”
Jack waited with what patience he could muster until Bob announced that
he had finished.
“Now spring it and for goodness sake make it snappy,” Jack ordered as
soon as they were back in the cabin.
So Bob told the story of his adventure interrupted many times by
exclamations of surprise from his brother.
“You know what p-i-g spells,” the latter declared as soon as he had
finished. “’Pears like you want to have all the fun yourself. Why didn’t
you let me go with you?”
“Well you see, when I started out I didn’t have an idea that I’d be gone
more than a few minutes, and I didn’t want to pull you out of bed on a
wild goose chase. Of course if I had known what was going to happen I
would have taken you along.”
“I suppose so,” Jack grunted. “But are you sure that it was the fellow
who tried to buy the wheels?”
“Certainly I am. I got several good looks at him.”
“Well, what’s the next move?”
“That’s the question before the house. Last night’s expedition was sure
a very unfortunate affair for us. You see, if those men are the ones
we’re after they will know now that we are spying on them and it will
make our work much more difficult.”
“I guess you’re right about that,” Jack agreed soberly. “Think we’d
better call up the captain?”
“Not yet. You see we haven’t really got anything to report. We don’t
even know for sure that they are the men we’re after but I have a pretty
good sized hunch that they are in the game all right. But we can’t
report hunches very well and I reckon we’ll have to wait till we have
something a little more definite. But one thing is certain and that is
that we’ve got to look out for that fellow Pierre. He’s sure bad
medicine whether he’s mixed up in this business or not. It’s apt to go
hard with us if he ever gets hold of us away from civilization.”
“I guess you’re right there but I don’t think much of this wait stuff.
We might wait around here for a week of Sundays without finding out
anything.” Bob smiled at his brother’s enthusiasm.
“I didn’t mean that we should remain inactive. All I wish to impress on
you was the futility of going off half cocked. Now I have a plan which
has been growing in my mind. Look here a minute.” Bob took a large map
from his pocket as he spoke.
“Now,” he continued as he spread the map out on the table, “you see
here’s where the border runs between the United States and Canada. Now
it strikes me that our best bet is to try to find out the place where
they bring the stuff across. Of course it is possible that it is brought
right through this camp, but I doubt it. You remember the captain said
that they had watched here for a long time and he didn’t think that they
brought it through here. It would be too risky.”
“But just how are we going to go about it?”
“Well my idea is this. You know the boundary line is marked by stones at
intervals of about a half a mile so we ought to be able to keep on it
pretty closely. Now we’ll tell the boss here that we’re going on a hike
and get him to let us have some grub. Then we’ll follow along the border
and if we find a place that looks suspicious we’ll camp near it and see
if anything turns up. Oh, I know it’s taking a pretty long shot,” he
added quickly as he saw a look of doubt on his brother’s face, “but it’s
the best bet I can think of.”
“And it’s good enough for me,” Jack said quickly. “I was only thinking
about that big Frenchman.”
“Well of course there’s a risk to it but it won’t be the first time
we’ve taken them and I fancy we’ll be able to steer clear from him.”
“Sure we can. When do we start?”
“I suppose right away is as good a time as any other. You get the rolls
made up and I’ll go see the boss about some provisions.”
As he spoke Bob was moving toward the door and was about to open it when
a loud knock sounded on it. As he swung it open he gave a slight start
of surprise for big Pierre Harbaugh was standing just outside.
“Good morning,” Bob said after a moment’s pause.
“Mornin’.”
It was evident that the man was putting forth an effort to speak
pleasantly. This was very surprising to Bob and at once put him on his
guard.
“Will you come in?” he invited stepping back into the room.
The big Frenchman followed him.
“Now what can we do for you?”
A broad grin lighted up the evil features of the man as he replied.
“I come ask pardon for las’ night. I tink you spy, oui. Now I know you
no spy. I geet mad las’ night. No mad now. You forgeeve, oui?”
“Sure thing. That’s all right,” Bob replied easily. “I get mad sometimes
myself,” he added with a smile.
“Dat ver’ bon. I got go to Skowhegan and lak’ be friend with boys.”
“When do you start?” Bob asked.
“Ver’ queek.”
“Well it’s all right so far as I’m concerned,” Bob assured him and after
a little more talk Pierre took his departure again protesting his
friendship.
“Pretty thin, hey?” Jack said as soon as their caller was out of sight.
“Not even a good veneer,” Bob laughed. “He altogether overdid it. But I
have a hunch that he thinks he put it over on us.”
“Oh, he swallowed it hook, line and sinker. There’s not a bit of doubt
about it,” Jack assured him. “But what do you suppose was his idea?”
“It confirms my suspicion that he’s one of the liquor runners. Of course
his object was to throw us off his trail.”
“And the plot thickens, hey?”
“It’s thick enough all right. And now I guess we’d better wait a bit and
watch Mr. Pierre.”
For about a half an hour they watched from the window and at the end of
that time were rewarded by seeing the Frenchman come out from the office
and start rapidly off on the trail toward Jackman.
“He’s going somewhere all right,” Jack declared.
“Somewhere is right,” Bob laughed. “Only the word is rather indefinite.”
“Well we won’t be apt to find out anything more by sitting here.”
“Right, son. I’ll go get the grub and we’ll be off.”
Bob had no trouble in getting what he wanted from the owner of the camp
who showed no surprise at the request. Such hiking trips were common at
the camp and he was always prepared to outfit parties. The boys had
brought with them their cooking utensils and their preparations were
quickly made.
“Reckon we’d better take the cells with us,” Bob declared as he
proceeded to remove the cell from his wheel.
“Good thing you thought of it,” Jack said as he followed suit.
They had kept the wheels in the cabin refusing the offer of the
proprietor to keep them in an out shed.
“There, I guess we’re all ready now,” Bob declared after he had added
the cell to the contents of his pack.
A number of the guests of the camp, who were walking about the clearing
as they started off, wished them good luck, but none asked them where
they were going.