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UNDER CANVAS OR THE HUNT FOR THE CARTARET GHOST




THE HICKORY RIDGE BOY SCOUTS

A SERIES OF BOOKS FOR BOYS

By Capt. Alan Douglas, Scout-master


The Campfires of the Wolf Patrol

      Their first camping experience affords the scouts
      splendid opportunities to use their recently acquired
      knowledge in a practical way. Elmer Chenowith, a lad
      from the northwest woods, astonishes everyone by his
      familiarity with camp life. A clean, wholesome story
      every boy should read.


Woodcraft; or, How a Patrol Leader Made Good

      This tale presents many stirring situations in which
      the boys are called upon to exercise ingenuity and
      unselfishness. A story filled with healthful
      excitement.


Pathfinder; or, The Missing Tenderfoot

      Some mysteries are cleared up in a most unexpected
      way, greatly to the credit of our young friends. A
      variety of incidents follow fast, one after the other.


Fast Nine; or, a Challenge from Fairfield

      They show the same team-work here as when in camp. The
      description of the final game with the team of a rival
      town, and the outcome thereof, form a stirring
      narrative. One of the best baseball stories of recent
      years.


Great Hike; or, The Pride of The Khaki Troop

      After weeks of preparation the scouts start out on
      their greatest undertaking. Their march takes them far
      from home, and the good-natured rivalry of the
      different patrols furnishes many interesting and
      amusing situations.


Endurance Test; or, How Clear Grit Won the Day

      Few stories "get" us more than illustrations of pluck
      in the face of apparent failure. Our heroes show the
      stuff they are made of and surprise their most ardent
      admirers. One of the best stories Captain Douglas has
      written.


Under Canvas; or, The Hunt for the Cartaret Ghost

      It was hard to disbelieve the evidence of their eyes
      but the boys by the exercise of common-sense solved a
      mystery which had long puzzled older heads.


Storm-bound; or, a Vacation Among the Snow Drifts

      The boys start out on the wrong track, but their scout
      training comes to the rescue and their experience
      proves beneficial to all concerned.

    Boy Scout Nature Lore to be Found in The Hickory Ridge Boy
    Scout Series, all illustrated:--

      Wild Animals of the United States--Tracking--Trees and
      Wild Flowers of the United States--Reptiles of the
      United States--Fishes of the United States--Insects of
      the United States and Birds of the United States.

    _Cloth Binding_      _Cover Illustrations in Four Colors_
             _40c. Per Volume_

    THE NEW YORK BOOK COMPANY
    201 EAST 12th STREET      NEW YORK

[Illustration: THE SCOUTS BUSIED THEMSELVES MAKING PREPARATIONS FOR THE
CAMP MEAL]




THE HICKORY RIDGE BOY SCOUTS


UNDER CANVAS

OR

THE HUNT FOR THE CARTARET GHOST


BY CAPTAIN ALAN DOUGLAS

SCOUT MASTER


[Illustration: N Y B Co.]

    THE NEW YORK BOOK COMPANY
    NEW YORK




    COPYRIGHT, 1915, BY
    THE NEW YORK BOOK COMPANY




CONTENTS


    CHAPTER                                      PAGE
       I  OUT FOR SHELL-BARKS                      13
      II  WHAT HAPPENED ON THE ROAD                25
     III  NEAR THE HAUNT OF "SPOOKS"               34
      IV  "TO THE VICTORS BELONG THE SPOILS"       45
       V  WHAT A SCOUT LEARNS                      55
      VI  LOOKING AROUND                           66
     VII  HARVEST TIME                             77
    VIII  HOW ELMER'S PLAN WORKED                  88
      IX  THE CAMPING-OUT EXPEDITION               99
       X  IN FOR A GLORIOUS TIME                  109
      XI  SACKING THE FOREST STORE-HOUSE          120
     XII  THE MIDNIGHT VIGIL                      130
    XIII  A STRANGE FIGURE IN WHITE               141
     XIV  TOLD AROUND THE CAMP FIRE               152
      XV  THE BOOGIE OF THE TOWER                 163
     XVI  HOMEWARD BOUND--CONCLUSION              174




UNDER CANVAS




CHAPTER I

OUT FOR SHELL-BARKS


"TOBY, we must be half-way there now; don't you think so?"

"Guess you're right about that, Mr. Scout Master; as near as I can
calculate."

"Glad to hear you say so, Toby, because, excuse me for saying it, but
until I hear something that sounds like business I'm all up in the air.
I've known you to fool your trusting scout comrades before this."

"There you go, George Robbins, suspicious as ever. No wonder they call
you Doubting George. You never will believe anything till you see it
with your own eyes, and then you often wonder whether you're awake or
dreaming. Now, I told Elmer here, our Assistant Scout Master, about my
plan, and he took my word for it."

"That's all right, Toby, but unfortunately I was born different; I'm not
so trusting, and things are mighty deceptive in this world, sometimes."

A fourth boy of the party in the big wagon broke into the conversation
at this point, by laughing hoarsely, and going on to remark, with a
decided lisp:

"I bet you were, George; and I can thee you looking up at the doctor and
thaying the very first thing: 'The moon _ain't_ made of green cheeth;
and I won't b'lieve it till you prove the thame to me, tho there!'"

"Hold on, Ted Burgoyne, don't fall all over yourself about my
shortcomings; I'm not the only pebble on the beach when it comes to
that; there are others. But to return to the subject. Toby, here are
three of us burning up with curiosity to know where you're piloting this
shell-bark hickory nut-gathering expedition. You let it out to Elmer in
the start, but the rest of us don't know a thing about it. You promised
to open up when we'd got far enough along the road so there wouldn't be
any turning back. And there was something said about half-way; so now's
your chance."

"I can see you all looking my way," remarked the fifth boy in khaki,
with a peculiar little drawl, quite musical, to his voice, that stamped
him of Southern birth; "and to hurry things up I move to make the
request unanimous."

"There, you heard what Chatz Maxfield said, Toby; take the cover off,
and tell us where this wonderful bonanza lies. You promised that we'd
get every sack we're carrying along filled to the brim with dandy
chestnuts, hickories, and black walnuts. Why all this mystery? It looks
mighty suspicious to me--excuse me for saying it."

These five lads, sturdy looking chaps all of them, belonged to the
Hickory Ridge Troop of Boy Scouts, Elmer, Ted, Toby and Chatz to the
Wolf Patrol, and George to the Beaver. The troop was in a flourishing
condition, since both patrols had their full quota of eight members, and
a third one, called the Eagle, was almost complete.

Elmer Chenowith had long been leader of the Wolf Patrol, and being a
full fledged first-class scout he had quite some time back secured from
Scout Headquarters his certificate enabling him to act as Assistant
Scout Master in the absence of the young man, Mr. Roderic Garrabrant,
who usually fulfilled the duties of that important office.

These bright, wideawake lads, with others of their chums, had seen
considerable in the way of excitement during the preceding summer. Some
of their adventures and victories have already been placed before the
readers of this Series of scout books in preceding volumes, so that an
extended introduction to Elmer and his four comrades is hardly necessary
here. What has been said has only been for the benefit of such readers
as are making their acquaintance for the first time.

It was on a Saturday morning in Fall that they were driving over the
road some four miles away from the home town. A sharp frost on the
preceding night was just the thing to make nutting a success, for it
helped open the burrs on the chestnut trees, as well as caused the
hickory nuts and black walnuts to drop.

Just before Thanksgiving holidays boys may be expected to develop a
feverish longing for an outing of some sort. It had struck these scouts
in full force when Toby Jones confided to them that he knew a place
where almost unlimited amounts of splendid nuts were to be gathered with
very little trouble, only he declined to reveal his secret until they
were well on the road.

The consequence was that he had three boys guessing for the balance of
the week; and plaguing the life out of him in the endeavor to coax him
to tell. But Toby was nothing if not stubborn, and he only shut those
jaws of his tighter, and waved the tempters away with the remark that
some people called him a clam because he knew how to keep his lips
closed.

Toby was himself driving the big strong horse between the shafts of the
wagon. The conveyance belonged to his father, and it sometimes took all
of Toby's strength to hold the frisky animal in.

Toby's middle name was Ellsworth, given to him because his grandfather
had in the Civil War been connected with a regiment of Zouaves under the
famous colonel whose death at Alexandria, Virginia, occurred just about
the time hostilities opened between the North and the South.

Toby was a strange boy in many ways. He cherished a burning desire to
become a celebrated aeronaut, and by means of some wonderful invention
that would turn the world upside-down make the name of Jones famous. As
yet, however, Toby had only succeeded in patching up several
supposed-to-be flying machines, which had managed to give him a few
rough tumbles, though luckily not any broken bones. His chums never
knew what he would spring on them next, for he was constantly grappling
with puzzling questions connected with the science of aviation, and
deploring the fact that there was always something magnificent just
ahead of him that seemed to be eluding his eager clutch like a
will-o'-the-wisp in the swamp.

Ted Burgoyne had the misfortune to possess a hare-lip, which made him
lisp. He was not so sturdy in build as some of his mates, but as smart
as they make them, and with a decided leaning for the profession of a
doctor. Indeed, such was the extent of his knowledge of surgery and
medicine that he often went by the name of "Doctor Ted." And having had
occasion to perform certain necessary operations along the line of
setting broken limbs, and bandaging severed arteries, his work had been
commended by several professional M.D.'s as marvelous.

When Doubting George made that last plea of his the driver turned his
head and looked at his companions. He saw an eager glow in the eyes of
the trio who had been kept in the dark up to that moment with regard to
their mysterious destination.

"Well, we've got along so far that it ain't likely anybody'll want to
turn back, and show the white feather," he observed, with a quick glance
directly at Chatz Maxfield; "so here goes. We're headed right now for
the old Cartaret place!"

"Whew! Cartaret's Folly they call it, because the man who built the same
sank a fortune there making it beautiful, and then the owls and rats
took charge, which was all of twenty years ago, I reckon!" George went
on to say, first whistling to mark the surprise he felt over the
disclosure.

"And there's a lot of talk going around to this day about ghosts being
seen in the windows and around the grounds of that deserted place; but
most people would say that's only old women's stories. All the same
those people who don't believe in spooks and goblins and all such things
couldn't be hired for any amount of money to camp out in that big house
for just one dark night."

It was Chatz who made this assertion. All of his chums knew that Chatz
had a deep-rooted vein of superstition in his system, which it seemed
impossible for him to get rid of. He believed in spirits coming back to
haunt graveyards, and empty houses where perhaps some violence had once
occurred. Elmer and other scouts had laughed at him many times, and
Chatz even took himself to task because of his weakness, which he had
probably imbibed through association as a small child with 
pickaninnies down on the plantation in South Carolina. Sometimes he
boldly declared he was done with such childish beliefs; but when an
occasion chanced to come along bearing on the subject it was strange how
Chatz again found himself standing up for his old-time faith in
hobgoblins, and the efficacy of the left hind-foot of a rabbit shot in a
graveyard in the dark of the moon, to ward off evil influences, and
repel the power of spooks to do bodily harm.

It was well known that many people shunned the vicinity of the old
Cartaret place, some eight miles away from Hickory Ridge, because queer
stories passed current concerning white figures seen stalking about the
weed-grown grounds, and looking out of the open windows of the ruined
house. That was why Toby had been wise enough to keep his secret until
they were so far on the road that there was little likelihood of any boy
venturing to propose that they abandon the nutting expedition and return
home.

"Well, I knew some of you fellows would be saying that," he now
remarked; "so I asked Elmer about it, and he advised me to bottle up
till we'd gone half-way to the place. So now, I hope nobody wants to go
back?"

"Oh! you needn't look at me that way, Toby," Chatz hastened to exclaim;
"p'raps I may be silly enough to believe in ghosts, but nobody ever
called me a coward; and where the rest of you go, suh, Chatz Maxfield
can be counted on to follow."

"Me too!" chirped Ted.

"P'raps now you may remember that once before we ran foul of a haunted
place up at that old mill," remarked George, "and it turned out to be
only a bunch of game-fish poachers at work there. I never did take much
stock in ghosts."

"You never take much stock in anything, suh, I notice, till you've
pulled the same to pieces, and examined it all ovah," the Southern scout
told him, quickly.

"Then it theems that you know about the thupply of nuts up at the old
Cartaret place, do you, Toby?" asked Ted.

"I asked a man who was sent up there only a couple of weeks back by the
lawyers that have the estate in charge, to look it over and see if it
was worth while to try and repair the ruined house. And say, he told me
he never saw trees loaded with such a crop of dandy nuts as there were
in that woods back of the house. You never heard of any fellows going up
there to gather hickories, did you? I guess nobody ever goes inside half
a mile of the place if they c'n help it. And Elmer, he fell in with my
scheme right away. Besides, you see, I'm taking something with me that I
hope to get a chance to try out on this trip," and Toby pointed back to
a mysterious bundle lying in the bed of the wagon, on the many
gunny-sacks that had been brought along in order to hold the anticipated
harvest of nuts for winter use.

"Well, well, well!" George exclaimed, in his skeptical way, "now chances
are that's some other foolish invention of yours, Toby--a new kind of
flying machine that'll drop you ker-plunk in a frog pond, or crack your
head on a log when you try it out."

"Nothing'd ever be accomplished in this world if everybody had your
doubting nature, George," the driver of the wagon told him; "I happen to
be built on a different model, and p'raps you may live long enough to
hear the name of Jones go thundering along the pathway of fame on
everybody's lips."

"Mebbe I will," George told him, "because they say it's getting mighty
near as common as Smith. But I'd better not say that when my cousin
Landy Smith is around. I only hope this don't turn out a hoax, that's
all. It's going to be an all day trip, and I'd hate to be sold, and come
back with one measly bag of poor little nuts to be divided among five."

"Well, now that you know the dreadful dark secret, and nobody says turn
back home," Toby announced, with a broad grin, "I'm goin' to invite the
whole bunch to stop off at this wayside grocery at the crossroads here,
and have some sarsaparilla with me. It's my treat this time."

As the road had been more or less dusty, and their throats were
accordingly somewhat parched in consequence, there was no dissenting
voice heard to this generous proposition.

"Plenty of time to gather all the nuts we want, and then make an early
start for home," Elmer told them, as Toby pulled near a series of posts
where the horse could be securely hitched.

"And the best of it is that we've thought to fetch some stuff along so
we can build a fire and have a cooked dinner," George went on to say,
with a pleased smile; for while he might be given to doubting many
things, he never had occasion to question his appetite as every one
knew--that was always in positive evidence.

All of them jumped from the wagon, which had two seats, so that three
boys could sit behind, and one with the driver. While Toby was doing
the needful with his hitching halter made of rope, the others stretched
their legs, and waited, because it would be hardly proper for them to
troop into the road grocery ahead of the scout who had invited them to
join him in a refreshing drink.

A hulking boy was leaning against the fence near by, and observing the
five scouts in a leering sort of way.

"Huh! that's Angus McDowd, one of that Fairfield bunch we beat at
baseball last summer," muttered Toby, as he happened to glance over, and
noticed the other observing them with a sneer on his face.

"Never liked him for a thent!" Ted was heard to say in a low cautious
tone; for the other boy was a strapping big chap, and if provoked might
give them more or less trouble, in a desire to fight them one after the
other, as he had the reputation of being something of a bruiser.

"My stars! but he was mad that day we won the game, though, let me tell
you, suh!" observed Chatz; "and he did his level best to get in a scrap
with some of our fellows. Felix Wagner and Tom Ballinger had to lead him
away, you remember. He doesn't like the boys of Hickory Ridge any too
well, believe me, fellows."

They all went inside the little dusty-looking building, where some
enterprising man had started a wayside grocery, and general store, at
which you could purchase nearly anything from a paper of needles to a
coffin, or an automobile tire, and gasoline.

Fortunately the man happened to have some stray bottles of soft drinks
like sarsaparilla and root beer that must have been left over from his
summer trade; and presently each of the scouts was washing the dust down
his throat.

Altogether they may have spent about ten minutes in the store; and then
after Toby had settled the account, they again passed out to the wagon.

The loitering Fairfield boy had disappeared, as Elmer noted when he
looked over toward the fence where Angus McDowd had been standing on
their arrival.

"Now, what ails you for a silly thing, Nancy?" said Toby, as the mare
laid back her ears, and pranced at their approach. "Been getting too
much oats lately, I reckon, with too little exercise. Well, you won't be
feeling so fresh and frisky by the time we get back home to-night. That
load of nuts is going to make you puff, let me tell you. Pile in,
fellows, while I unfasten the hitching rope. Whoa! there, don't you dare
try to bite me, you horse with the nasty temper! Why, this is a new
trick for you to show. Grab the lines, won't you, Elmer? The blame nag's
that anxious to show off she'd leave me in the lurch! Let up, there,
can't you?"

It was only by making a hasty jump that agile Toby managed to gain his
seat, to take the taut lines from Elmer's hands. Immediately the mare
commenced to rear up in a most remarkable manner. Then, taking the bit
between her teeth, she started along the road, fortunately in the right
direction, at a whirlwind pace, amidst a cloud of dust, and with the
three scouts who had been sitting on the second seat tumbling around in
a heap in the bed of the wagon, all of them having been thrown backward.

Even as the grocery keeper came running out of the door to see what was
the matter, and while they were still within hearing distance of the
place, Elmer felt sure he saw a head rise into view above the pig-pen
situated on one side of the road, and could recognize the grinning face
of that Fairfield loafer, Angus McDowd.

There was no time to say anything. The mare was undoubtedly running
away, and the wagon flinging from side to side in the road, as Toby
stood half erect, pulling with might and main on the lines in the
endeavor to hold the frantic animal in.

It began to look like croaking George might have been right when he said
he doubted whether the nutting expedition would be much of a success.




CHAPTER II

WHAT HAPPENED ON THE ROAD


"HOLD her in, Toby!" George was heard to shout, as he floundered around
in the midst of the gunny sacks, with the other two scouts straddling
him half the time.

"Whoop! we ain't in thuch a hurry ath all that, Toby. Get a grip on the
linth, Elmer, and help him pull. Oh! what a quack I got then on my head.
I bet you I'll have a lump ath big ath a gooth egg! Quit clawing me,
George; I can't help it if I do climb all over you. Look at the way the
wagon thwings, would you?"

Elmer did not need to be told that it was his duty to assist Toby
control the runaway animal. No matter what the cause of the beast's
strange fright might turn out to be, their first business was to drag so
heavily on the lines that Nancy would have to moderate her wild pace.

Accordingly both of the boys pulled and sawed and jerked until the mare
was made to come to a full stop. This occurred fully a mile away from
the wayside grocery, which was long ago lost to sight behind several
bends in the road.

"Jump out and hold her, some of you other fellows!" gasped Toby, short
of breath after his violent exertions.

Chatz, George and Ted all hastened to obey. They had been tumbled around
in the bed of the big wagon at such a lively rate that they were only
too glad of the chance to gain their feet. Held by a stout boy on either
side the mare did not offer to run further, though still acting very
strangely.

Elmer had once spent some time up on an uncle's ranch in Northwest
Canada; and knew a heap about horses. He had sometimes seen animals act
this way, and had before then guessed what might be the matter.

"Hold her steady, everybody, and let me look around a little," was what
he called, as he jumped down, and began patting the sweaty back of the
trembling animal.

A minute later and they heard him give an angry exclamation.

"I thought as much," Elmer was saying, as he held up his hand; "look
what was fixed under her tail."

"Say, that seems like a bunch of those nasty little sand spurs that
sting and poison like all get-out!" exclaimed George, and it might have
been noticed that this time he showed no signs of his customary doubting
spirit.

"Just what they are," Elmer went on to say, indignation in his whole
manner.

"But how--when--where?" began Ted, when Chatz burst out with:

"He did it, Elmer, that skunk of a McDowd. Must have thought it'd be a
fine way to pay back what he believed he owed the Hickory Ridge boys.
The low-down coward, to hurt a hoss that way."

"But why, he might have made some of us get thrown out, and hurt right
bad in the bargain!" exclaimed George, angrily.

"Much he'd have cared for that," Toby panted; "and didn't I just think I
heard a silly laugh at the time Nancy started to rear up, and prance
like a crazy thing? That must a been Angus. And like as not he's doubled
up back there right now laughing over seeing how we got thrown around in
the wagon because of his sand spur trick. For five cents I'd turn
around, and go back to give him the licking he needs."

"Don't bother thinking about that," Elmer told him. "It was a mean
trick, and I've known men to get a halter out on the plains for playing
that same game. But we got out of the hole without any damage, only to
our feelings; so let's forget it."

The others were usually swayed more or less by what Elmer thought or
did. He was a natural leader, and it had become second nature for the
other scouts to look to him for advice, whenever an emergency arose.

"Guess the poor frightened thing'll stand now, fellows, without holding
her any more," Toby suggested; "so climb back on your seat; and be more
careful next time how you let go your hold. It's a wonder none of you
got dumped out when you tilted over backward."

Just as he said, the animal seemed to have partly recovered from her
mad fright occasioned by the pain the little sharp-pointed burrs
inflicted. Though still trembling, and acting in a skittish manner, she
gave signs of being docile enough to be driven.

The three scouts hastened to climb in at the back of the wagon, and
after securing the gunny sacks, as well as the large package belonging
to Toby, they once more found seats for themselves. George and Chatz,
however, it might be noticed, made sure to get a firm grip somewhere on
the side of the wagon; while Ted, being in the middle, threw an arm
around each of his chums, as though he depended on them to sustain him,
should another runaway occur.

They were soon going along at a fair clip, though Toby had to "lean"
pretty heavily on the lines in order to hold the big bay mare in, for he
did not think it advisable to let her have her head again. The next time
she made such a mad spurt as that they might not find it so easy to get
her to stop.

"What d'ye reckon possessed that coward to play such a mean trick on
us?" Toby wanted to know.

"Oh! he had it in him, that's all, and when the chance came around he
just couldn't help himself," Elmer told him, for the Assistant Scout
Master was somewhat of a philosophical boy, and able to figure out
things that might puzzle some of his tent mates.

"Next time I see that Angus he'll hear my opinion of a sneak who could
play a dirty trick like that!" continued the driver, vigorously.

"Thame here!" chirped Ted. "And if he giveth me any thath I'll pull hith
red noth for him, thee if I don't."

"All I can say is, keep your eye out for sledge hammer punches if ever
you go to pulling _his_ nose," warned George; "because he's a born
scrapper, and would as soon fight as eat."

"Let's forget about that little affair," suggested Elmer; "no use crying
over spilt milk, and what's done can't be undone. Toby, suppose you tell
us a little more about this nut grove up at the old Cartaret place;
because if I remember rightly you said you'd been asking everybody all
about the estate."

"Why, old Judge Cartaret, the rich man who built up the place, meaning
to live there with his young and handsome wife, went crazy, they say,
after he'd found her dead in her room. The mystery never was cleared up.
To this day some people say she was murdered by a man she once promised
to marry before the millionaire judge came along; another lot seem to
believe she committed suicide because the judge was so cruel, and
wouldn't let her leave the place; and one man told me he always had
believed ever since he was a boy that the judge struck her down in a fit
of passion. But of course those things don't cut any figure with us."

"On the contrary," interrupted Chatz, who had been listening to all
these horrors with wide-open eyes, and a look of intense interest on
his dark face, "they strike me as being decidedly interesting, suh. If I
had a chance I'd like to investigate this queer thing, and perhaps learn
what did happen in that big house ever so many years ago."

"But how about the nut treeth, Toby, did the judge plant the thame when
he wath trying to make a thut-in paradith for that pretty bride of
hith?"

"That's just what he did, boys, so they told me," Toby continued,
readily consenting to be squeezed for information; "he planted a whole
lot of chestnuts, walnuts and shell-bark hickories that have been
growing for several dozen years. They're busting big trees, and just
breaking down with the finest crop ever known, and with never a single
fellow brave enough up to this time to go there and gather the harvest.
Why, when I heard what that man had to say about it, I was fairly wild
to be off. And believe me, boys, we'll make the eyes of the other
fellows stick out of their heads like fun when they see what an enormous
supply of nuts we've gathered for next winter around the fire. Yum! yum!
I always did say that a plate of red-cheeked apples, a dish of fresh
popped corn, and a pocketful of nuts beats all creation on a stormy
night, winter times."

"Believe it when I see it!" muttered skeptical George, who undoubtedly
thought this wonderful harvest was too good to turn out to be true;
after they had arrived on the ground, very probably it would only be to
find that the trees had been stripped of their burden of nuts by some
hardy souls who did not place much credence in the stories of the ghost
said to haunt the place; something was always on the eve of turning up
to keep George from reaping success, it seemed.

"No use talking," observed the disgusted Toby, "George never will be
convinced till he begins to load up the wagon with bags running over
with nuts. And even then he'll expect some white-sheeted ghost to step
up, and demand that we throw every one of the same back again where we
found them. You couldn't convince him of a single thing till he's had a
chance to prove it over and over again."

"Learned that in school when I was doin' problems," George declared with
one of his most exasperating grins; "which was why I always passed with
such a high percentage in arithmetic and algebra. They said I'd make a
fine carpenter, because I'd always measure my boards again and again
before I cut 'em, and that way there never'd be any mistakes about my
sawing."

"And a great carpenter you'd make, George," chuckled Toby; "why, you'd
take everlasting and a day just to get your foundation started. The
folks would all die off waiting for you to finish your job. A
carpenter--whew! excuse me if you please from ever employing a mechanic
who spends all his time figgering out how things could be so and so."

"But we must be within a mile or two of the place by now, fellows,"
Elmer told them about that time, "so if you hold up a little we'll soon
know the worst or the best. I'm of the opinion myself that what Toby
says is going to turn out true; for nobody ever goes near the Cartaret
place these days. Lots of boys around home never even heard about it;
and others couldn't be coaxed or hired to explore around a place they
call haunted."

"Yes, I'm not the only silly believer in ghosts," Chatz told them,
looking pleased at what Elmer had just said, "for misery always likes
company, and you'll remember, suh, how the sly old fox that had fallen
into a well told the goat looking down that it was a lovely place to
drop in; and when Billy had taken him at his word he hopped on the
goat's back and jumped out. But if I have half a chance I expect to
prowl around more or less while we're up heah, and see if the stories
I've heard about this queer old rookery could ever have been true. Why,
they even say the judge had the house built so that it was like a big
prison, or some sort of asylum."

Chatz was full of his subject, and might have wandered on still further,
once he got fairly started, only for a sudden movement on the part of
Elmer. Sitting alongside the driver it was the easiest thing going for
that worthy to seize the reins and with a quick strain on the same bring
the mare to a full stop.

"Why, what under the sun!" began the astonished Toby, when Elmer clapped
his hand over his mouth and immediately said:

"Hush! be still! Look what's coming out of that side road ahead there!"
and at the same time he pointed with his disengaged hand.

All of the others hastened to do as he requested. There, in plain sight,
though their own vehicle was partly hidden by the foliage still clinging
to the bushes that jutted out at a bend of the road, was a two-horse
wagon, containing four boys, in whom they readily recognized some of the
toughest elements around the town of Hickory Ridge.

As the other wagon rattled into the main road, and went speedily on
without the occupants once looking toward them, Elmer and his chums
exchanged troubled glances.




CHAPTER III

NEAR THE HAUNT OF THE "SPOOKS"


"WE might as well hold up here a little bit, so as to let that crowd
pass on," suggested George. "I never did take any stock in Connie Mallon
anyway. He's got a pretty bad name down around our way. My father says
he'll land in the penitentiary before he's two years older, except he
reforms, and I'd never believe he'd change his ways."

"Oh! Elmer, I wonder now, could they know about those splendid nuts, and
mean to skin the trees ahead of us?" exclaimed Toby, as though nearly
overwhelmed by a staggering thought.

"You've some reason for saying that, Toby?" Elmer told him.

"Why, don't you know, it flashed over me just like a stroke of
lightning," was what Toby went on to say, excitedly, a troubled look on
his face. "You remember that when I was talking to you over the
telephone, Elmer, and telling you about wanting to get the boys to come
up here with me Saturday, I said several times somebody was rubbering,
and once even told 'em to get off the wire, which they did, only to come
on again."

"Yes, I do remember something like that," admitted the other scout.

"Well, our telephone is on a four-party line, and one of the other
three houses is Jackson's down the street. Phil Jackson is one of the
cronies of Connie Mallon, and he's sitting there in that wagon right
now."

"Then you think he must have heard all you were telling me that man said
about the immense crop of nuts up here at the Cartaret place, and has
put the others wise to it?" Elmer asked.

"I wouldn't put it past Phil a minute!" Toby declared, with an
expression of pain, "and now it looks like we mightn't get what we came
after, unless we fight for it."

"I knew it!" muttered George; "call me a doubter all you want, but let
me tell you things ain't always what they seem. There's a string tied to
nearly everything you think you're going to get so easy. Oh! I know what
I'm talking about, and for one I'm not surprised at anything happening."

"Don't throw up the sponge so easy, George," Elmer told him. "We may
have our troubles, but scouts are supposed to be wide-awake enough to
know how to overcome any kind of difficulties that happen along. As
Sheridan said at the battle of Cedar Creek, we'll have those camps back,
or the nuts in our case, or know the reason why."

"Lithen to that kind of talk, would you?" burst out Ted, brimming over
with confidence in their leader; "why, we haven't begun to get buthy
yet. That Connie may think he'th tholen a march on our crowd, but thay,
he'll have to cut hith eye-teeth before he can beat Elmer here laying
planths."

"It may turn out to be a false alarm, after all, boys," Elmer continued,
while Toby still restrained the impatient Nancy; "but even if we get
there to find that they're on the ground ahead of us, we'll hatch up a
scheme to turn the tables on that crowd, I give you my word for it."

"That's the ticket!" Chatz exclaimed, being inclined to display an
impetuous style of talk and action, as became his hot Southern blood;
"if they've sneaked this idea from Toby by listening over the wire
they've got no business up here. I'd call it rank piracy, and treat the
lot like I would buccaneers of the Spanish Main. Why, it'd serve 'em
right if that ghost they tell about jumped out at them, and sent the lot
scampering off like crazy things."

"That's just what I had in my mind, Chatz," said Elmer, chuckling; "and
perhaps we'll find some way to coax the spook to help us out."

"Elmer's got the dandy idea, all right," said George; "you leave him
alone, and he'll sure bring home the bacon. But how much longer do we
have to stay here? I wonder if anybody's getting cold feet about now?"

"Speak for yourself, George!" cried Toby; "I'm for going on three times
as much as I was before we saw that bunch cutting in ahead of us. When
Elmer gives me the word I'll start things moving."

"You might do that now," said the leader, "but take it slow, Toby. I
want to keep an eye on the track of their wheels. If they turn off at
any fork in the road, or into the woods, we want to know it."

"Thith theems to be getting mighty interethting," observed Ted; "and I
want to thay right now that I've got tho much confidence in Elmer and
the whole of our crowd that I'd call the chances five to one we'll go
home with a full cargo thith afternoon."

"Good boy, Ted; and I second that motion!" Chatz announced, heatedly.

The mare was allowed her head, but Toby kept a tight rein, so that they
did not begin to whirl along with half the speed the other wagon had
displayed as it came out of the side road on to the main thoroughfare.

Elmer kept his gaze firmly fixed ahead, where he could plainly see the
marks of that other vehicle in the dust of the road. Thus they continued
for a short time; then the leader put out his hand, and Toby again
pulled in.

"They've left the road, and entered the woods back there twenty feet or
so," the acting scout master told them.

"On the left, wasn't it, Elmer, that they turned out?" asked Chatz,
eagerly.

"Just what it was, which shows that you were using your eyes, as a scout
should always do," came the reply. "Back up, Toby, and we'll follow
suit."

"Do you think we're at the place already?" asked Toby.

"I certainly do, though I'm some surprised that they knew where to hit
that little grass covered wagon-road that led off among the trees,"
Elmer replied. "It was once used as a way through the forest to the rear
of the Cartaret place, so I was told when I asked a man about it who
used to work for the judge long ago. They must have been busy doing some
of the same kind of missionary work, because I don't believe any of them
has ever been up here before--to stop I mean."

"Well, what if we get in where the nut trees are growing to find that
lot skinning every tree, and ready to put up a rattling fight before
they'll let us have even a look-in; what are we goin' to do about it?"
Toby wanted to know.

"First of all we'll just hang around, and watch them work," Elmer
declared.

"That's all very fine, Elmer," interposed George, who was always the
first one with any objection; "but once they cover the ground with nuts,
we'd find it a hard proposition to chase the bunch away, and lay claim
to what they'd gathered."

"But they'd be really _our_ nuts," interrupted Toby, "because didn't the
bright idea flash right into this brain of mine; and ain't first
discoverers entitled to the land always? It's the rule of the world.
They hooked the idea from me by unfair means, and ain't entitled to any
consideration at our hands. If Elmer can manage to scare them away you
watch and see how quick I'll start to filling my bag with some of the
nuts they've knocked down."

"I only want the chance to do the thame," Ted insinuated.

"Ditto here, because, as we said, they're only a pack of wolves or
pirates, and have no rights honest people are bound to respect," Chatz
added as his quota to the discussion; "after we've filled all our bags,
if there happens to be some more nuts to be had why they're welcome to
the same. Gentlemen first, every time, we believe, down our way."

"Pull up, and let's listen, Toby," Elmer counseled; "I thought I heard a
shout or two just then; and perhaps they've started to work."

When the mare had been made to stand they could all readily hear the
sounds that welled up some little distance ahead. Loud laughter and
boyish shouts attested to the fact that a party of nut gatherers must be
busily engaged in the grove; for with other sounds could be heard the
plain swish of poles beating the branches of the trees in an effort to
rattle the nuts down.

"Just our luck!" muttered George, disconsolately.

"Well, what would you have?" demanded Toby, like a flash; "it ain't
every bunch that can have a lot of fellows knock down their nuts for
'em, is it? Think of all the hard work it's going to save us. Elmer, the
more I look at that grand little scheme of yours the better I like it.
Go it, Connie, Phil and your mates; keep the ball arollin' right along.
The more the merrier, say we. And now, Elmer, do we hide our rig
somewhere around, so they won't happen on the same if they come to skip
out of that grove in a big hurry?"

"That's the idea, Toby," Elmer told him; "turn out to the left here, and
we'll like as not run across a good hide-out for the wagon. When we've
got the nuts all sacked we can come back for the outfit, and head for
home."

A short time later they found the place they were looking for. It
offered concealment for the wagon and the mare; and Toby soon had the
latter securely hitched to a limb.

"Fetch the bags along with you, boys," remarked Elmer at this stage of
the proceedings, and picking up several himself as an example.

Toby saw that the others had cleaned out the entire assortment of sacks,
which fact caused him to grin with satisfaction. He calmly secured the
rather bulky package that lay in the bottom of the wagon, and trotted
after the rest of the scouts.

They made a sort of detour in approaching the spot where all that noise
announced a busy lot of boys covering the ground with shell-barks and
other varieties of choice nuts.

"Whee! looky over there, Chatz; ain't that the house you c'n see through
the trees? I never thought I'd ever have the nerve to come up here, and
break in on the enchanted ground given over to hobgoblins and spooks and
owls ever so many years."

When George said this in a low and rather shaky tone he clutched the arm
of the Southern boy, and pointed toward the left. Of course Chatz
eagerly followed the line of his extended finger; for he had been
wishing to catch the first glimpse of the haunted house for several
minutes back.

"Yes, that's it, all right, George," he replied, with a sighing breath,
as though something he had long yearned to see was now before him.

"Come on, you fellows back there," said Elmer, who did not like to have
them lagging so; and accordingly George and Chatz hurried their steps.

It was certainly anything but a cheerful place, for a fact. The trees
were very much overgrown, and the undergrowth had year after year
increased its hold until it would have been difficult to force one's way
through this, only for wandering cows having made paths which could be
followed.

"Elmer, I c'n see 'em workin' like beavers over there!" whispered Toby,
who had forged alongside the leader, still burdened with that package
which the others believed must contain some new fangled contraption of
his connected with the science of aviation.

The five scouts gathered in a group, being careful not to expose
themselves in a way to draw attention. They could see a boy in a
chestnut tree, and plainly hear the rattle of nuts from the opened
burrs, whenever he switched the branches with the long pole he was
carrying, secured somewhere in the woods near by.

"Did you ever hear it hail nuts like that in all your born days?" gasped
George as they stood there, sheltered by the bushes and watched
operations.

"Oh! listen to him talk from the other side of his mouth, fellows?" Toby
muttered. "George has seen a big light; he ain't a doubter any longer,
you notice. He hears the rattle of the nuts, and sees 'em falling like
hail. Talk to me about beavers and busy bees, that crowd would take the
cake for business. Look at that one climbing to the very top of the
hickory tree to get the best nuts that always grow up high. There he
starts in slashing, and it's like a regular bombardment on the ground.
If they get away with all that lot I'll die of a broken heart. There
never was, and there never will be again, such a bully chance to lay in
a big winter's supply of nuts in double-quick time. And I never did like
to take other people's leavings."

"Make up your mind to it we don't have to," Elmer assured him.

"Might as well make ourselves comfy while we're about it," suggested
George, as he dropped down, and sat tailor-fashion, with his legs
doubled under him.

"Yes, for we may have to stay here quite some time," admitted Elmer,
copying his example without hesitation.

"Ain't it nice to watch other people working for you?" observed Ted,
after a while.

"Only they don't know it," added George; "but, Elmer, suppose you give
the rest of us a hint what you mean to do. I see you've been cutting the
bark off that white birch tree, and got the same in your hand. It's used
for marking canoes, and picture frames as well. Some persons even write
on the brown back of the bark, but I don't think you mean to send them a
notice from spookland, telling them that if they don't clear out
instanter the bully old ghosts will grab them tight?"

"Not the kind of message you're thinking about," replied Elmer, smiling.
"In the first place I don't know what sort of hand writing ghosts would
be apt to use; and then again, I don't believe they'd pay much attention
to that sort of thing. Watch and see if you can guess now."

With that he rolled the large strip of bark so that it looked like a
great cornucopia. So had Elmer seen Indian guides fashion a horn when
wishing to call the aggressive moose on a dark night, away up in
Northern latitudes.

"Oh! now I see what you're meaning to do!" exclaimed George; "that looks
like a regular megaphone now, the kind they use when there's a boat race
on, or at college games. You're going to throw a scare into them by
whooping it up through a horn; is that right, Elmer?"

"You've hit it to a fraction, George, because that's exactly what I'm
meaning to do with this birch bark horn. And as some of the bunch have
started to slip down the trees even now, thinking they've got enough
nuts on the ground to keep them busy picking the same up, we'll watch
until they've gathered all they want, and then you'll see some fun--that
is, it'll be fun at this end, but a serious business for them. Lie low
when I give you the signal."

They hovered there for a full hour while the four boys were gathering
the nuts, and stowing them away in sacks that had been brought for the
purpose.

At last Elmer decided that matters had gone far enough. There were
evidences that one of the boys had been sent to fetch the horses and
wagon up, in order to load the numerous bags that had been filled. So
cautioning his chums to lie low so they might not give the game away,
Elmer raised the bark horn to his lips.




CHAPTER IV

"TO THE VICTORS BELONG THE SPOILS"


SO far as the other scouts knew, Elmer Chenowith had never seen such a
mystery as a real ghost in all his life; and he certainly had not heard
one groan, or give any kind of sound. Consequently his imagination was
called upon to conjure up a series of queer, blood curdling noises such
as an orthodox specter, fresh from the world of shades, might be
expected to utter when tremendously excited.

Josh and George afterwards confessed that if they had not known it was
the scout master who amused himself in this way, they too might have
shivered in their shoes. As for the Southern boy, he lay there amidst
the brush, and kept his eyes glued all the time on the face of Elmer, as
though he dared not depend on his knowledge of facts, but must back this
up with the positive evidence of his eyes.

Once Chatz even cautiously put out his hand, and gently felt of Elmer's
khaki sleeve; it was a mute confession that while never a doubter like
George, the boy from Dixie had to be convinced when it was a matter of
superstition.

But the main thing, of course, was what effect Elmer's groaning might
have upon the four boys who had stolen a march upon the scouts, and
reached the harvest of nuts in advance.

No sooner had the first sounds begun to rise than they looked up with
startled expressions on their faces. Of course, like nearly every other
person in town, the quartette must have heard strange stories connected
with the abandoned Cartaret place, for such things have a way of
traveling from one end of a county to another, being eagerly repeated
even by many who would scorn to admit their belief in such silly notions
as ghosts.

Before coming up here perhaps Connie and Phil, with the other two
fellows, may have talked things over seriously, and expressed many a
fervid hope that their piratical operations might not be interrupted by
any visit from a spectral guardian, such as was said to watch over the
place.

The first thing they did was to stare at each other, while their mouths
could be seen to open with astonishment.

Elmer changed his key, and gave them another sample of the weird sounds
capable of being coaxed from a birch bark horn. He certainly was making
a great success of his music, his comrades thought, as they lay there
and waited to be invited to have a share in the proceedings, according
to agreement.

Toby afterwards solemnly declared that he could see the caps of the four
frightened boys start to rise, as their hair stood on end; though an
element of doubt always surrounded this statement; for Toby was so
excited himself that possibly his imagination worked over-time.

With the change in tune the boys seemed to regain in some measure the
command of their faculties; at least they were able to rush close
together, as though seeing protection in mutual sympathy. It was a plain
case of "united we stand, divided we fall!" And clutching at one another
they continued to shiver and listen,--meanwhile looking all around, as
though more than half expecting to discover some terrible figure bearing
down on them.

Elmer would have been only too happy to have provided such a specter for
their accommodation; but unfortunately he had not come prepared to
launch such a thing. Ghosts were hardly in his line; and in lieu of a
specimen for exhibition purposes he was compelled to do the best he
could with the material on hand; which is always a cardinal principle
with scouts.

"Now!"

When Elmer hissed this single word his four chums knew that their time
had come to get into the game. The snake had been "scotched, not
killed," as Josh later on aptly described it. No matter how much
frightened Connie Mallon and his cronies might seem to be, if they stood
by their guns what would the advantage amount to? The affair must be
turned into a regular rout in order that the scouts might reap the full
benefit.

Accordingly all of them got busy immediately. George pounded on a hollow
log with a heavy stick, and managed to produce a series of throbbing
sounds that were likely to add to the consternation of the listeners;
Ted clapped two stones together; while Toby and Chatz rattled the brush
violently, and added a few choice groans of their own manufacture as
good measure.

It was enough, yes more than sufficient.

Human nature had reached its limit, so far as those alarmed fellows were
concerned. Undoubtedly they must have become convinced that their raid
on the preserves of the ghostly guardian of the haunted Cartaret place
had aroused the ire of the said defender, and that they were now in
deadly danger of being seized by bony hands.

Of course Connie and his followers were raw novices in matters connected
with haunts, and all such things, or they would have known that no self
respecting ghost was ever caught giving public exhibitions of his
oddities in broad daylight. The gloom of night, or the weird light of
the moon, has always had a monopoly of these thrilling diversions.

When Connie Mallon suddenly gave a tremendous spring forward, and
started on a full run, there was no holding the other three back. They
went plunging madly on in his wake, paying little attention to the
direction they took, so long as their flight promised to carry them away
from those dreadful manifestations.

Elmer did not stop his labors; in fact he even went to some pains to
increase the racket, under the impression that once you get a thing
started it is good policy to keep it moving.

He had distinctly warned the others, however, not to allow their
excitement to overlap their discretion; for should one of them so far
forget himself enough to give vent to a genuine boyish shout, perhaps
the panic-stricken quartette might become wise to the fact that they
were being made victims to a great hoax.

"Come on, let's chase after them a bit, fellows!" Elmer told them,
between his puffs through the birch bark megaphone; "but keep well back,
so that they can't get a look-in at us if they turn their heads. Noise
is what we want, and plenty of the right kind."

Acting on his suggestion the others trailed after their leader. They
swished in and out of the bushes, and accompanied their progress with
all manner of novel sounds, each of which was calculated to add just a
mite more to the alarm of the fugitives.

More than once they heard loud cries of pain coming from ahead, as one
of the runners collided with some tree which had not been noticed in his
terror; or else found himself tripped up by a wild grape-vine that lay
in wait for unwary feet. As Toby declared later on, all this was "just
pie" for the chasers; they feasted off it, and seemed to enjoy the run
immensely; which was more than the Mallon boy, with his three cronies,
could ever say.

At least Connie seemed to have kept his head about him in one important
particular, which pleased Elmer very much; he knew in which direction
lay their wagon, for which he had been in the act of sending one of his
companions at the very moment this awful clamor broke out which had
started them in full flight.

The neigh of a horse close at hand told Elmer what was happening, and he
immediately held his eager clan in. Far be it from them to wish to delay
the departure of the Mallon tribe, whose room was worth far more to the
scouts than their company.

"Wait, and listen!" said Elmer, in a whisper.

"You didn't get the whole of that straight, Elmer," Toby told him,
quickly, in a low, husky voice; "you ought to have said, 'Stop! Look!
Listen!' That's the way it always is at railroad crossings!"

"Hist! Be still!" cautioned the leader.

They could hear loud excited voices near by, accompanied by the stamping
of horses' hoofs, as though the excitement had communicated to the team
used by Connie Mallon and his three cronies in their rival nutting
expedition.

"Now, let's start up again, and add the finishing touches!" Elmer told
the others, when a dozen more seconds had dragged past, and they felt
they might safely assume that the fugitives must have untied the team,
as well as scrambled into the wagon.

Once again did that strange chorus break forth, with Elmer groaning
through his birch bark horn, and the others doing all in their power to
accompany him in regular orthodox ghostly style, in as far as their
limited education along these lines went.

Taken altogether the racket was certainly enough to scare almost any
one. Snorts and prancing on the part of the horses announced that they
were now sharing the general excitement. Then came cries urging haste,
and presently the plain unmistakable smack of a whip being brought down
with decided emphasis on the backs of the animals, several times
repeated.

With that there was the crunch of wheels, and away dashed the two-horse
wagon, making for the road which Connie knew must not be far away. Once
or twice the scouts had fugitive glimpses of the departing vehicle as it
flashed past small glades where the view happened to be unobstructed;
and it was certainly "killing," as George called it, to see those
fellows bouncing about in the bed of the wagon, holding on for dear
life, and with Connie plying the whip savagely, while the horses leaped
and tugged and strained to make fast time over the uneven floor of the
woods.

The echoes of the flight grew fainter in the distance, and presently as
they stood there the scouts could tell from the change in sounds that
those who were fleeing from the wrath of the ghosts must have reached
the harder road, for the hoof beats of the horses came with a pounding
stroke.

Gradually even this was dying away. Then the five boys turned and looked
at each other, with their faces wreathed in huge grins.

"Tell me, Elmer, is it safe to let off steam now?" demanded Toby,
eagerly.

"If you're careful not to be too noisy, go it!" came the reply.

With that Toby threw himself flat on his back, and began to kick his
heels up in the air, all the while laughing, and giving queer gurglings
that were meant to serve his pent-up emotions about as the escape valve
of a boiler does when the steam presses too heavily on the boiler, and
relief is necessary.

He was not alone in his hilarity, although the merriment of the others
partook of a different nature. Ted, Chatz and George went around shaking
hands, and assuring each other that never in all their lives had they
ever run across a more ridiculous diversion than this flight of the bold
nut-gatherers.

"Talk to me about Napoleon's retreat from Moscow," said George, who
prided himself on his knowledge of history, "why, it wasn't in the same
category as that wonderful escape of the Connie Mallon gang from the
raid of the Cartaret ghosts. And say, what thrilling stories they'll
have to tell about it all! Believe me, the whole Hickory Ridge will know
about it by night time. Oh! I'll never forget it! I haven't had so much
fun for a whole year as to-day. It was worth coming twenty miles just to
see them on the jump."

"Why," observed Ted, after he could regain his breath in part, "that
Phil Jackthon took the cake when it came to covering ground. Did you
thee him clear that log like a buck? I bet you he made a record jump
that time, and beat anything he ever marked up on the thlate at a
match."

"Well, they're gone, all right," said Chatz; "and from the way they
whipped their poor hosses I'd like to guess they'll keep on the wild
run till they get home. And there isn't much chance that we'll be
bothered again by that Mallon bunch to-day; how about that, Elmer?"

"You can set that down as certain," replied the one spoken to. "It would
take more spunk than any of that crowd happens to own for them to change
their minds, and come back here. And that's why I wanted you to be
careful not to give the secret away. We've got the field to ourselves
the rest of the day."

"Unless something comes along to give us a scare too," added Chatz,
meaningly; for truth to tell, the superstitious Southern boy was already
wondering whether all this playing ghost on their part might not bring
something down on their heads savoring of retribution.

"Then what's to hinder our getting busy, and changing all that pile of
fine nuts from their sacks to ours?" George wanted to know. "The spoils
of battle belong to the victors every time; and besides, they were
trying to beat us out of our share as first discoverers. For one I ain't
a bit ashamed to grab everything. Let that silly bunch wake up earlier
next time, if they mean to get away with the game."

What Elmer may have thought just then he did not say; but his ideas were
certainly not so pronounced as those of George, who was a pretty blunt
fellow, one of the "give-and-take" kind.

As they were all of one mind a start back was made; and Toby, not
wishing to be left in the lurch, had to bring his kicking exhibition to
an abrupt finish, and hasten after his four chums.

The glorious store of nuts that had already been gathered was
immediately turned from the sacks owned by Connie Mallon and his cronies
into the burlap bags the scouts had provided for the purpose. Then, far
from satisfied, the boys proceeded to take up the work where the late
nut-gatherers had left off. They climbed trees, and whipped the branches
with the long poles, delighting in the sound of splendid nuts rattling
down like hail. There is such a fascination about this sport that it is
difficult to know just when to stop it; and the ground was soon covered
to such an extent, that when the harvest had been gleaned several of the
enemy's bags were more than half filled with the surplus.

"I never saw half so many chestnuts, walnuts and shell-bark hickory nuts
gathered in heaps in all my life, as there are right here!" declared
George; "a big bag apiece all around, and with three partly filled sacks
belonging to that crowd left over."

"Which extra plunder," said Elmer, quietly, "I'm sure none of us would
think of wanting, as we've got twice as much as we can use already."

"Then you're going to leave them for the ghost, are you?" asked Chatz,
eagerly.

"We'll take them along," said Elmer, "and turn them over to Connie
Mallon as a consolation prize; he'll find them in his front yard
to-morrow morning, bright and early."




CHAPTER V

WHAT A SCOUT LEARNS


"HUH! so far as the nuts go, I haven't any objection," remarked George;
"but to my mind it's going to be like casting pearls before swine.
They'll never appreciate the real motive back of the thing; and chances
are they'll reckon we're throwing them a sop so they won't hold hard
feelings against us."

"Perhaps you're right, George," Elmer admitted; "but don't forget we're
every one of us true scouts, and that we've promised to hold out the
olive branch to those we call our enemies, whenever we find the chance.
There's such a thing as heaping coals of fire on another fellow's head,
doing a kindness to the one who hates you, and making him ashamed of
himself. Scouts learn that lesson early in their service, you remember.
If we didn't have all the nuts ourselves, perhaps I'd hesitate to put
this up to you, but it's no sacrifice to any of us."

"Elmer, I agree with you there," Ted spoke up. "Of courth none of us may
ever know jutht how they take it; but when a fellow hath done his duty
he needn't bother himthelf wondering whether it payth."

"Listen to Ted preach, will you?" jeered Toby, who truth to tell was not
much in favor of carrying those three half-filled hags of nuts all the
way to town, just to serve as a "consolation prize" to those fellows who
had conspired to cheat them out of their just dues.

"But he's right in what he says," maintained Chatz stoutly, for he had a
Southerner's code of honor, and was more chivalrous that any other
fellow in the whole troop of scouts. "Duty is duty, no matter how
disagreeable it seems. And when once you realize that it's up to you to
hold out a hand to the treacherous enemy who's flim-flammed you many a
time, why, you'll have no peace of mind till you've made the effort."

"But," Toby went on to say, sneeringly; "if you step up to Connie
Mallon, and say: 'Here's your bags come back, and we chucked the
leavings in the same, which the ghost is sending you by us to sort of
soft soap your injured feelings,' why, d'ye know what he's apt to do;
jump on you, and begin to use those big fists of his like pile drivers.
You'll have to excuse me from being the white-winged messenger of peace,
Elmer. I pass."

"There's no need of doing it that way, Toby," he was informed by the
scout master. "Some time to-night, as late as we can make it, we'll
carry these partly filled bags around to Connie's place, and drop them
over the fence. Hold on, here's another of the same sort; now, if we
only had that as full as the rest it would be just one all around, and
we could leave them in each yard, you see."

"Like old Santa Claus had been making his annual visit, only this time
he picked out Thanksgiving time instead of Christmas," remarked Toby, a
trifle bitterly; and yet strange to say he was the very first one to
start in gathering more nuts and thrusting his find into the fourth
Mallon bag; which told Elmer that much of his objection was mere surface
talk, and that his heart really beat as true to the principles of scout
membership as did any other present.

"Many hands make light work," and so plentiful were the several
varieties of nuts that it was not long before the fourth bag was half
filled. No doubt those boys felt better because of this act. The chances
were they would never get any credit for what they were doing, but as
Elmer told them, the consciousness of having done a decent act should
always be quite enough for any ordinary scout.

"And every one of us has a clear title to turning our badges right-side
up, after working so hard for our enemies," Chatz declared, as they
"knocked off."

"Well, how about that dinner, camp style?" demanded Toby, drawing out
the waistband of his khaki trousers to show what a quantity of room he
had for a supply of cooked food.

"It's long after noon, so we might as well get busy with dinner," Elmer
replied.

After stowing all the sacks away in the bushes, where they were not
likely to be discovered, should any outsider wander on the scene while
they were employed elsewhere, the scouts busied themselves in making
preparations for the camp meal which all of them had so long been
anxiously looking forward to.

First of all a fire was started in the most approved manner, some flat
stones being built up in two parallel ridges. Long ago these lads had
found that there was nothing so splendidly adapted for camp cooking as a
gridiron of some sort, made after the pattern of the shelf in the
kitchen oven at home, with grill bars. This could be easily placed on
stones, or even mounds of earth if the first were not available, and
there was no danger of anything upsetting; while the flames, or the heat
of the red coals had a chance to accomplish the work. So they never went
forth, when there was a possibility of cooking being done, without
carrying this contrivance along with them.

They had been thoughtful enough to also fetch along a coffee-pot, an
extra large frying-pan made of sheetiron, and the necessary tin
platters, cups, knives, forks and spoons.

Soon the delicious odor of dinner began to steal forth, causing Toby to
sniff the air with rapture, and loudly declare:

"Fried onions, coffee, ham, potatoes, and plenty of fresh bread and
butter; that's the bill of fare, is it? Gee! whiz! you couldn't beat it
if you tried all day. And every minute's going to seem like a whole hour
to me till I hear the welcome call to the feast."

"We're a lucky lot to be sitting around here like this, and a bully
dinner coming on, when we think of that bunch of soreheads hustling for
home, not even half a dozen nuts in their pockets, and even their gunny
sacks lost," Chatz remarked.

"Yes, provided somebody don't get too gay, and upset all that coffee
into the fire," grumbled George, who evidently would not feel sure of
his dinner until he had devoured it, because, as he was fond of
repeating, "there's many a slip 'tween the cup and the lip," and Toby
was so apt to be so clumsy in moving around.

As usually occurred, however, George's fears proved groundless, because
no accident happened to the splendid dinner, which they were soon
enjoying to their hearts' content. There was enough and to spare, so
that even Toby admitted he could find no more room, when Elmer pressed
him to have a third helping.

"If we had Ty Collins and Lil Arthur Stansbury along there never would
be even a crumb left over, no matter how much you cooked," said Toby, as
he heaved a sigh, and released another button so as to add to his
comfort; "I'm a pretty good hand, but when it comes to crowding the
mourners, and stowing the grub away, they take the prize."

For a while afterward the boys sat around the fire, and talked of the
recent happenings. There was plenty of time to get home before dusk,
which was really all that they wished to do, so none of them showed any
desire to hurry off.

Later on, however, when some one happened to mention the fact that if
there was nothing more to be done they might as well bring the wagon
up, load their cargo of well filled sacks, and be moving along toward
town, Toby suddenly remembered something.

"Well, I declare if I didn't nearly forget one of the most important
things of the whole excursion!" he exclaimed.

"What?" asked George, ready to object at once, if the thing did not meet
with his approval.

"Why, you know I told you I'd been fixing up another little stunt
connected with the wonderful science of aviation, and right here's where
I see a golden opportunity to try it out for the second time. It seemed
to work all right with me in a ten-foot drop, and next thing is to make
it thirty. If she does that, and I live to tell the tale, you're apt to
see the name of Jones right often in the papers pretty soon."

He had pounced on that mysterious package of his while speaking, and was
busily engaged in unwrapping the same, while the others crowded around,
curious to learn what it could be that the aspiring inventor had hit on
now. So many of Toby's startling devices had turned out to be the
rankest fizzles, that his comrades had come to be very skeptical with
regard to his ability to make good.

"Why, I declare if it ain't only an old umbrella after all!" exclaimed
George, with his accustomed sniff of disdain, as the contents of the
package became visible after the paper had been cast aside.

"You're away off there, George," affirmed Toby; "because every bit of
it's brand new. My own invention too; nothing just like it ever known
before."

"Huh! I believe you!" grumbled the skeptical George.

"It's what they call a parachute," Toby continued, glibly. "You know the
kind the hot air balloon men use at county fairs when they go up; well
this is an improvement along that line, and is intended to let an
aeronaut drop a mile and more, if anything happens to his machine when
he's up among the clouds."

"That sounds pretty well, Toby," remarked Elmer, though there was a
shade of doubt on his face, for up to then Toby had really never managed
to impress his chums with his greatness as an inventor; he was always
getting excited over things, but seemed to lack the ability to
successfully grasp the ideas that were floating around in his mind.

"You'll soon see that this time I have got a grand scheme in this safety
device," the inventor boasted; "you know there are an awful lot of
casualties among air-men these days. Some sort of thing goes wrong when
they're away up, and nearly every time it means they fall like a stone.
My wonderful parachute will make it _impossible_ for the aviator who
carries one along with him to be killed. Let his machine head for the
earth like a meteor, and as for him he'll drift down as softly as you
please."

"Go on and tell us how all this is meant to do the business," asked
Chatz, as Toby amused himself in opening and closing the folds of the
big stout umbrella, which certainly seemed to work smoothly enough.

"Why, you see it's fixed so that it will be attached to the back of the
man in the aeroplane all the time he's up; a sort of insurance plan,
because while he may not need it at all, if he does it's there handy.
When he finds his machine has gone back on him all he has to do is to
jump boldly out into space. The Jones patent parachute does all the
rest. It's as reliable as United States bonds, and will save lots of the
poor fellows who, but for my thinking up this scheme, might have lost
their lives this next year."

"Of course you've tried it out, Toby?" suggested Chatz.

"Never will work in the wide world," affirmed George; "because in nine
cases out of ten it'd get caught somehow in the planes or the machinery
of the aeroplane, and the poor chump who had pinned his faith to the
Jones Parachute would come down ker-plunk with his wrecked motor!"

"Shows how little you know about some things, George," Toby flashed
back; "if the directions are faithfully followed there never can be an
accident like you say. As to trying it out, I've had one little drop,
say of about ten feet, but that was too short, because the umbrella
didn't have a chance to get fully open; and when I struck the ground it
near rattled every tooth in my head out. But now I want to get up at
least thirty feet, and then drop with the thing already open."

"But see here," Elmer told him; "I should think you'd have found a way
to test the opening of the thing by throwing it over some precipice,
with a heavy rock tied in place of a man."

"Just what I did, Elmer!" cried the other, hastily. "I spent a whole
Saturday morning up at that big rock that overlooks Lake Jupiter, and
five different times I tossed the parachute, folded up, over the edge,
with a stone weighing more than a hundred and fifty pounds fastened to
the same."

"And how did it work?" asked Chatz.

"Like a charm," replied the happy inventor. "The umbrella opened as
quick as it began to drop, and after that it floated to the ground all
right. Course it hit a little hard, because you couldn't expect it to
sail along like a thistle-down, with all that weight attached; but the
shock wasn't enough to hurt--much, I guess. And while we sat here eating
I saw the very tree I'm meaning to climb. Look over there, and notice
that half dead one, with one big dead limb hanging out, and nothing else
on that same side. How high would you call that, Elmer?"

"Nearer forty feet than thirty, I should judge; and enough to kill you
if you fell straight," replied the scout master.

"Don't worry about me, now; I'm all fixed for it, and I've got on my
rubber-soled shoes in the bargain, so I'll be light on my feet. But I
would like some of you to give me a lift up that tree."

"It's got plenty of branches on this side, so that you won't have much
trouble climbing, once you get a start," Chatz told him, starting
forward to lend what assistance lay in his power.

"Better not try that risky game, Toby," objected George, possibly really
concerned about the safety of his comrade, but more than likely voicing
his natural liking for being on the side of the opposition, for some
boys are built that way, and never so happy as when throwing obstacles
in the way of success.

Toby, however, paid no attention to this grumbling on the part of
George. Ted and Chatz helped him into the tree, and then handed up the
wonderful parachute which, if it turned out to be one-half as successful
as its proud inventor claimed, was going to be a great boon for all
those who took their lives in their hands and went up among the clouds
in air machines.

Higher climbed Toby, managing somehow to lug his burden along with him,
although it certainly could not have been any light weight.

His objective point was a large decayed limb that stood out all alone on
one side of the trunk. As Elmer had calculated this was all the way from
thirty-five to forty feet from the ground, and that distance offered him
a good chance to experiment with his parachute.

"Be careful, Toby, and don't take too many risks!" Elmer called out to
him, making use of the birch bark megaphone, so as to impress his words
more positively on the other.

"Oh! look there what's running up ahead of Toby, would you?" cried
George. "As sure as you live it's a '<DW53>, with its striped tail, and
scared half to death because a critter with two legs has clumb his
private tree. He must have popped out of that hole you c'n see where
Toby is. And say, if the little fool hasn't gone and run out on that
very limb where Toby's planned to jump from."

"Keep back, everybody!" warned Elmer; "give Toby and the '<DW53> all the
room they need, because our chum is attaching the parachute to his body
right now!"




CHAPTER VI

LOOKING AROUND


"HERE goes, fellows; now watch me make the jump!"

Toby had adjusted the big parachute to his satisfaction, before he
called this out; and it seemed to have been attached to his back by
means of some device of his own. When open it resembled a large
umbrella, only the ribs were made much more solid than the usual ones.

"It's lucky the ground's pretty soft down here, Toby!" called George;
"because you're apt to get a swift knock when you land. Be sure and keep
that tongue of yours well inside your mouth, or you might bite it off."

"Seems to me you do your share of biting, George; you've always got some
ill-natured remark to make about everything I invent. Nothing venture,
nothing gained, is my motto. And now I'll walk a little further out on
this limb, so as to get a better chance to jump; and then watch me sail
like a thistle-down!"

"Careful, there, Toby!" shouted Elmer, as the scout up in the tree
started to move out further, looking very queer with that canopy over
his head, and his waving arms assisting him to keep his balance.

Hardly had the scout master given this warning than what he possibly
anticipated happened. There was an ominous crack, and the rotten limb
started to drop earthward. So did Toby, though the parachute caught the
air, and sustained his weight pretty fairly. How it would have been had
he been thousands of feet up, instead of a paltry thirty-five, was a
question that could not be answered.

The four boys saw the limb come crashing down, to break into fragments
when it landed. Strange to say the ring-tailed animal that had
accompanied the rotten limb in its sudden descent did not appear to have
suffered any material damage from the drop; because it was seen to run
away as soon as the termination of the unexpected aerial voyage had been
reached.

As for Toby, he was certainly falling, but buoyed up by that stout
material extended in the shape of a parachute, his descent was not
nearly so rapid as it must otherwise have been.

He struck the ground with a resounding thump, and then fell over in a
heap; though from the scrambling that ensued the others knew he could
not have been hurt very much.

"How'd she go, Toby?" demanded Chatz, hurrying forward to assist the
daring air navigator, if it turned out he needed any help.

"Kinder hard slap it gave me when I hit terra firma," replied the other,
whose lip was bleeding a little, showing that he must have bitten it;
"but all that's going to be remedied easy enough. What she needs is a
little more canvas; ain't a big enough sail yet to hold me up. But
whee! who'd ever expect that limb to snap off as sudden as that? See
what it means to be prepared, fellows? Scouts ain't the only ones that
ought to do that same; for if anybody ever needed to be ready, the air
pilot does. He never knows what's going to happen to him next."

"Well," the scout master remarked, "let's hope that's plenty for you
to-day, Toby. We've stood and watched you make a record drop, and you
came through in pretty decent shape; but enough's as good as a feast.
The next time things mightn't turn out as nice for you; and we don't
want to carry a scout with a broken leg home in our wagon to-day."

"But think of that little '<DW53> coming down with it all, and then
running away as if he didn't have a scratch to show for it?" George
observed.

"He got off sound and unhurt, did he?" asked Toby; "I'm real glad of
that, 'cause I wouldn't want him to be injured. I reckon that '<DW53> was
a mascot to me, and gave me good luck. But do we get ready to start home
so early in the afternoon, Elmer?"

Before any opinion could be advanced by the scout master, Chatz broke in
hastily:

"I'm going to ask you a great favor, suh," he told Elmer; "and which I
hope you can grant without interfering at all with any plans you have
formed."

"What's that, Chatz?" asked the other; although from the quick look he
cast in the quarter where lay the haunted house, it was easy to see
that he could give a pretty fair guess what it's nature would prove to
be.

"Why, suh, we may never get the chance again, and I've always wanted to
see what the inside of a haunted house looked like," Chatz went on to
say.

"Whee!" burst from the lips of Ted; while both George and Toby pricked
up their ears, and began to show considerable interest.

"You mean that while we're up here, and have half an hour or so on our
hands," Elmer suggested, "we might as well take a look-in over there,
and see if the rats and the owls are the only things living in the
Cartaret house."

"I'd like to very much, suh, believe me, I would," Chatz continued, with
one of his winning smiles that were very difficult to resist.

"What do the rest say about that?" and as Elmer made this remark he
turned to the other three scouts.

"I vote in the affirmative!" Toby immediately answered.

"Thame here," purred Ted.

"Oh! of course I'll join you in anything you hatch up, fellows," George
told them; "though I don't take any stock in all this nonsense about
ghosts and such. If you show me one, and I can pinch his arm, and feel
the bones in his hand, I might believe in the stuff; but you never can,
and that's a fact. Still, I'd like to see what the inside of this old
Cartaret house is like. I don't believe there's a single fellow in
Hickory Ridge that can boast he's been through it. Lead the way, then,
Elmer, or Chatz. We'll follow you."

That was always the way with George. He would oblige a comrade every
time, but his chronic way of fault-finding, or unbelief, often took away
much of the pleasure his accommodating nature might have afforded.

They had bundled the cooking utensils together, ready to be placed in
the wagon when it was brought up; Toby also fastened his wonderful
parachute in as small a compass as possible, and laid it down alongside
the other things.

"Wouldn't want to forget to take that along home for a king's ransom,"
he stoutly declared, looking defiantly at George, because of course that
individual was smiling in a fashion that smacked strongly of
incredulity.

After that the whole five of them headed toward the spot where they knew
the deserted house was to be found. Chatz was fairly quivering with
eagerness, and there was a glow in his dark eyes that told how much he
appreciated this chance to pry into the secret lodging place of a
reported ghost.

Everything was overgrown, and looked very wild. Elmer remarked that if
there really were such things as hobgoblins in this world, they
certainly could look long and far without finding a more congenial
neighborhood in which to reside; for the whole appearance of the place
seemed to smack of the supernatural. The breeze actually whined as it
passed through the bare branches of the untrimmed trees close to the
house; and loose shutters and windows added to the creaky sounds by
their rattling, every time a little gust happened to blow.

"Wow! this sure is spooky enough around here to suit me," Toby frankly
admitted, as they stood there, and looked about them.

The house itself had once been quite an extensive, and perhaps costly
affair, with two wings, and a spacious hall in the center. That was long
ago, for now it was in the throes of dissolution, a mere wreck of its
former self, and fit only for bats, owls, and rats. Doors hung on a
single hinge, and shutters had been torn off long ago by gales, leaving
the paneless windows gaping beyond. Moss streaked the rotten roof, and
parts of the porch had given way under accumulated snow piles in
previous winters.

As Toby said it certainly was gloomy enough, and one did not need to
have a very vivid imagination to picture the tragic scenes that were
said to have been enacted here many years ago, when the place was a
regular Eden, with flower beds and outbuildings on all sides.

"Gives you the creeps, all right," admitted George.

"Now, for my part," Elmer remarked just then, "I kind of like the
feeling it makes pass over you. And as few people have visited here for
the last ten years, I'm glad you asked us to look around with you,
Chatz. Let's go inside."

There was no trouble about finding a place of entrance, for there were
plenty of the same, some originally intended for this purpose, and
others the result of decay while the old mansion lay here year after
year the sport of winds and storms, winter and summer.

They wandered around from room to room, viewing the wreck of what had
once been a very fine house.

"Looks to me like there might be some truth in that story about the
Judge making this a regular prison for his young and pretty wife," Elmer
announced as his opinion, after they had been pretty well through the
lower story, and were climbing the shaky stairs to the upper floor.

"Why, yes, there were actually bars across the windows in that last
room!" declared Chatz; "it's just such a place as I've always had in my
mind whenever I got to thinking about haunted houses. You could imagine
anything might happen here. Right now, if it was midnight, we could
watch and see if there was any truth in all those stories about the
ghost of the Judge's young wife storming around here, going through all
that terrible scene again. I'd give something to be able to learn if she
does come back to visit the scenes where she was so unhappy."

"Here, you'll have uth all shaking like we had the ague, if you don't
stop that thort of talk," said Ted, apprehensively, and when he thought
no one was looking, rubbing the back of his hand across his eyes, as
though something connected with the sad story of the old-time tragedy
had brought unbidden tears there.

"Well, perhaps you may have just such a chance, Chatz," said Elmer,
suddenly, as though he had made his mind up.

"Tell me how," requested the Southern boy, trying to control the
eagerness that burned within his soul when he heard this said.

"You remember that we'd about made up our minds to spend the
Thanksgiving holidays in camp somewhere, just to have another little
outing before winter dropped down on us?" Elmer went on.

"Yes, that's right, we did," muttered Toby, who was almost as much
interested in the matter as Chatz.

"And where could we find a better place for spending those few days than
right here in the dense woods close to the Cartaret house? There's
everything to be had that the heart of a camper might wish; and if
you're a ghost hunter, why, here's a splendid field for your
activities."

"Elmer, will you do that much for me?" asked Chatz, earnestly.

"Much more, if the chance ever came along, and you know it, Chatz,"
replied the scout master, warmly. "So, what do you say, shall we
consider that settled, boys?"

All of them held up a hand, which meant that they voted in the
affirmative.

"But," interposed the Great Objector, "we mustn't forget that there
will be several other fellows of our troop along with us on that little
outing; and p'raps they mightn't just fancy camping so close to a mouldy
old ruin, where the owls and bats fly around nights, and lots of other
unpleasant things are apt to crop up."

"Oh! we know Lil Artha, Ty Collins, and Landy Smith well enough to be
able to speak for them, too," Elmer ventured; "and the chances are when
they hear what we're aiming to do they'll be as wild as Chatz here to
investigate."

"We've got a big job cut out for us, I'm thinking, boys," faltered
George.

"Rats! who's afraid? Gimme two cents' worth of peanuts, please!"
exclaimed Toby, who seemed to be in an unusually good humor, perhaps
because of that successful parachute drop, looked forward to with an
admixture of hope and fear for a considerable time.

They passed through every part of the house that seemed worth while,
even visiting the attic, where the rain had beaten in so many times,
that some of the woodwork seemed very mouldy. They frightened an army of
bats up there, and there was a lively ducking of heads, with numerous
attempts at knocking the flying creatures down with whatever the boys
could lay hands on.

Underneath lay the cellars, and determined to see it all the boys
trooped down the rotten stairs, saving George, who declared he had had
quite enough of the exploration, and that after all he didn't believe in
ghosts, and therefore an old ruin with a tragic story back of it failed
to impress him as worth much time.

When the others came out a little later, talking about what queer
dungeons lay underground, some of which possibly had been constructed by
the rich judge to serve as wine cellars, they found George sitting at
his ease, and watching the shadow on the stone face of an old and
unreliable sun dial.

"I guess long ago that pretty young wife used to sit right where you
are, George, and watch the shadow creep around to the hour mark," said
Elmer, who must have had a pretty good touch of the romantic in his
make-up, to speak in this way.

"Mebbe," George retorted, as though falling back on his old principles,
and not willing to believe anything unless shown.

"That finishes our visit to the Cartaret place, for this time, Chatz,"
Elmer continued, turning to the Southern boy; "I hope you think it paid
you for the trouble."

"A dozen times over, suh, I assuah you; and I'll not soon forget your
kindness that made this interesting visit possible. Yes, and that
promise to come up here again next week, when we're out for our little
vacation camping. I shall look forward to the same with the greatest
pleasure, believe me, suh."

"Then we might as well get the horse up, and load our cargo?" Elmer
suggested.

"Oh! did you see that?" shouted Toby, just then.

"What was it, and where did you see anything?" demanded George, always
suspecting that the others were playing practical jokes.

"Up at one of the windows there!" Toby went on, pointing, while his face
filled with excitement and a little touch of awe.

"What was it like?" asked Chatz, his interest aroused to fever heat.

"I only had a peek at it, because it disappeared, just like it might be
smoke," Toby went on to explain; "but it was a white face, and if there
ever was such a thing on this here earth as a ghost, I saw one then,
sure I did, fellows!"

Elmer had his eyes glued on the face of the scout when he was making
this astonishing assertion; and he knew that Toby, though a practical
joker at times, was not trying to deceive them now; he had seen
_something_ up there at that window, or believed he had, which amounted
to the same thing; and yet they had just explored every bit of that
portion of the ruins without meeting a single soul!




CHAPTER VII

HARVEST TIME


NO one said a single word for the better part of a minute, after Toby
had made this astonishing statement. They continued to exchange uneasy
looks, and then cast furtive glances up toward the particular window at
which Toby had been pointing his trembling finger.

It was however excitement, not fear, that made Toby shiver; for after
all he was the first to break the sombre silence, and then it was to
make a proposition.

"Let's go back up there, and take a turn around," he said, eagerly;
"mebbe we did miss some room, and after all there's somebody ahidin' in
the blooming haunted house. What d'ye say, fellows?"

"I'm on!" replied one of them before Toby had really finished speaking;
and of course it was Chatz who agreed so readily.

Elmer immediately made a move that announced his readiness to do what
the first discoverer of the ghost proposed; Ted and Toby followed suit;
and finally George, shrugging his shoulders as though he considered it
all folly, came tagging along at their heels grunting to himself.

In this fashion they entered the house, and immediately passed up to the
second floor, looking curiously about them again. Nothing was in sight,
not even a trespassing bat, for the little creatures had all been
alarmed when the boys made their first entry, and flown through various
openings into the outer air.

"Now be sure you pick out the right window, Toby," warned Chatz.

"I counted 'em from the outside," replied the other, with a
business-like air, "and it was exactly the seventh from the end; and
here she is. Everybody count and see for yourselves."

"That's all right," remarked George, triumphantly; "but suppose you show
us your old ghost, Toby."

"Never said it was one," protested the other, as he looked about in a
puzzled manner; "what I did remark, and I stand back of it still, was
that if ever there was such a thing as a spook in this world that must
have been one."

George sniffed contemptuously.

"Go on and poke him out, then; I want to be shown, if I ain't from
Missouri!" he told Toby, who turned his back on him.

"Well, there doesn't seem to be anything here, Toby, for a fact," said
Elmer, as he looked carefully around, up and down, on the floor, and
along the hall.

"It's disappeared, as sure as shooting, Elmer," admitted the pilot of
the ghost-hunting expedition; "but I give you my affidavy that I did see
a face, a white one at that, though it flipped out of sight before I
could grab a second look."

"Beats the Dutch what an _imagination_ some fellows have got," grumbled
George.

"I tell you I did see something, George!" repeated Toby, firmly.

"Sure, you might have done that," agreed the other, cheerfully; "but
it's my honest opinion that it might have been just a little flash of
sunlight on a window pane. I've known such a thing to startle me more'n
once. And when you shifted your head, why, you got out of focus, and the
thing disappeared as you say, like a wreath of smoke. Now, I'm one of
the kind that likes to look deep into things; and I never let a mystery
grip me. Make up your mind, Toby, that it was something like I'm telling
you, and let it go at that."

Toby did not answer. Truth to tell he did not know what to say, for
while he still firmly believed he had seen a human face at the window
there was nothing around by means of which he could prove it.

He went to the window and looked out.

"Anyhow," he remarked, disconsolately, "even if I was fooled by
something, it sure wasn't the sun, because it never strikes this side of
the house after noontime; and look at the heavy trees shading it, will
you? I give the thing up, and yet I'd like to take a look over this
floor."

"Suppose we start in and do it, then?" remarked Elmer, quietly.

Even George accompanied them, though he continued to look superior, and
allowed a skeptical expression to appear on his face. Possibly, in
spite of his avowed disbelief in ghosts, George did not really care to
be left alone in that house; his valor might all be on the surface.

Nothing was found, and Toby finally admitted that it seemed useless
wasting any more time prowling around.

"But I'll always believe I did see something," he avowed, as they
started out of the building again; "and if we come up here to camp
during the Thanksgiving holidays we ought to look into this business
closer. P'raps something might show up in the night time that'd be worth
seeing."

"Do you really think so, Toby?" exclaimed Chatz, with rapture, as though
even the mention of it gave him secret delight.

"Rats!" sneered the unconvinced George.

They had gone only a little way from the house when Elmer called a halt.

"Just wait for me a few minutes, boys," he said; "or, if you feel like
it, fetch the wagon around to load up our sacks of nuts."

With these words he turned and went straight back into the house. The
others exchanged looks, but did not say anything, though they must have
thought this queer on the part of the scout master. But then Elmer was a
privileged character, and often did things that mystified his chums,
explaining later on, to their complete satisfaction. Perhaps he may have
dropped something up there on that second floor, or else conceived a
sudden idea which caused him to return for another look around.

"Might as well get loaded up, as hang around here any longer?" suggested
Toby.

"I think the same," added George, "for there's no telling who'll be
seeing all sorts of queer things next. Must be in the air. Once that
sort of thing begins to get around, and it takes a solid mind to ward it
off. Never bothers _me_, though."

"I'll bring the horse up," suggested Toby, with a grin; for in spite of
finding himself the target for these shafts of ridicule on the part of
the scoffer, Toby dearly loved to hear George offering objections.

"Guess you'd better, because Nancy knows you more'n she does any of the
rest of us; and a hoss is a rantankerous creature," said Chatz.

"Particularly a mare," added Toby, as he hurried away; but they noticed
that he cast many side glances at the surrounding dense foliage as he
went in the direction of the spot where they had left Nancy and the
wagon when approaching the grove of nut trees, as though he did not
wholly fancy finding himself alone amidst such weird surroundings.

Once the wagon was brought up it did not take the scouts long to get all
the sacks of nuts loaded. When they saw what a splendid showing the
collection made it caused a fresh outbreak of congratulations all
around.

"There never was such a grand lot of nuts brought into town from the day
the first cabin was built away back!" declared George, who could not
see any reason to throw cold water on this positive fact, with the
evidence plainly before him.

"That's what comes of having an idea," remarked Toby, proudly; "if I
hadn't engineered this plan we might have spent a hard day in the woods,
and only brought home a single bag to show for it. Just look at that
wholesale lot, will you?"

"Yeth, and we're all ready to thay you did it with your little hatchet,
Toby; it taketh you to hatch up plans, thure it doeth," admitted Ted.

"Wonder what's keeping Elmer?" Chatz observed, as he turned to look
toward the house, glimpses of which they could catch through small
openings in the dense growth of trees; to immediately add: "there he
comes right now."

"Hope he found what he was looking for," George ventured, and nothing
further was said in regard to the matter.

Elmer quickly joined them. Chatz looked keenly at his face, and fancied
that he could detect something like a faint smile there; but even if the
scout master had made any sort of discovery on his last visit to the
haunted house, he did not seem ready to take his chums into his
confidence.

"Well, that looks like something, boys," he remarked, as he surveyed the
great load of filled bags that occupied nearly every bit of space in the
wagon bed.

"Oh! we believe in doing a wholesale business when we get started,"
laughed Toby; "the only thing that's bothering me is where Chatz, Ted
and George can find room to sit. Guess they'll have to fix it so as to
stretch out on top of our load."

"Ted can crowd in with the two of us on the front seat, if he wants,"
explained Elmer; "and if somebody gives me a hand we'll soon arrange a
place for the other seat back here on top of these four partly filled
sacks."

"Consolation prizes, you mean!" muttered George, who did not exactly
like the idea of their going to all the trouble of carrying the extra
sacks home just to drop them in the yards of the members of the Mallon
crowd; George was inclined to be proud, and it seemed to smack too much
of pulling "chestnuts out of the fire" for others.

"Well, after all, suh, they worked hard enough to knock those nuts down
to be entitled to a share," Chatz remarked, that fine Southern sense of
justice cropping up again, despite his dislike for Connie Mallon and all
those who trained in his camp.

"Not to speak of the bruises and black eyes some of them must have
picked up when they conducted that masterly retreat," Elmer added; "I'll
never forget that panic; for I don't believe I ever saw fellows more
frightened than they were."

"Well, do you blame them?" asked Ted; "if I got it in my head that bunch
of ghosth had it in for me on account of my breaking in on their haunt
I'd run like a whitehead too, and thatth right."

"I'd like to see Connie's face when he discovers that sack of nuts in
his yard to-morrow A. M.," George continued, actually pursing up his
lips in a smile, something he was seldom guilty of.

"Reckon he'll think it rained down in the night," chuckled Chatz.

"More'n likely he'll begin to believe he's only been dreaming that these
things happened, and that he did fetch the nuts home with him, after
all," Toby volunteered.

"But when the other counties are heard from, and they all compare notes,
won't they get on to the game then?" George asked.

"How about that, Elmer?" Toby inquired, turning to the scout master.

"I don't see how they can help but figure it out as it stands," came the
reply.

"That is, they'll guess we fetched back their bags for 'em, and not
wanting to turn the same over empty, just chucked a lot of nuts in to
make 'em stand up," and George as he said this looked as consequential
as though he had solved some great problem.

"All I'm afraid of," resumed Toby, "is they'll get the idea in their
dense heads that we're only doing this because of fear; that is, we're
offering a bribe, hoping they'll forgive us for frightening them, and
won't hold us to a reckoning. I don't like knuckling down that way. I
wish we thought to put a note in each sack telling them we only turned
these nuts over because we had more than we could use ourselves, and
thought they'd worked hard enough to earn some."

Elmer, however, shook his head.

"That wouldn't be worth while trying!" he declared. "I think it'd only
make them more bitter against us. The best way to do is just to leave
the bags in their yards, and say nothing. If they ever ask us why we did
it, let's say we thought it only fair they should have some of the
proceeds of the raid on the Cartaret grove, because they worked hard
enough for it. If they want to make trouble after that why we'll have to
accommodate them, that's all."

That settled the matter. When Elmer clinched an argument he seldom left
any ground for the others to stand on; and in this case all of the boys
seemed to be satisfied to let him do as he proposed, though several
privately disliked the idea of carrying that additional weight back
home, just to turn over to that turbulent, trouble-making crowd.

"There's nothing more to keep us here, seems like," suggested George;
"so what do you say to going home?"

"It's time," admitted Chatz, "and if Nancy is able to draw such a heavy
load, we ought to get there before dark, which comes along about five,
these November days."

"It's mostly down-grade," Toby went on to say, as he climbed to his
seat, and took up the lines; "besides, I told you the animal needed a
good haul to take some of that extra spirit out of her. All aboard,
fellows; those who can't get a board find a rail. Homeward bound, and
with the greatest load of bouncing big nuts ever harvested along Hickory
Ridge."

They were a merry lot as they found places on the wagon.

"Hope Nancy behaves herself going home," George remarked, as he tried to
fix himself firmly in his seat; "if she took a notion to cut up all of a
sudden where d'ye think we'd land back here, with the wagon so full?"

"Plenty of room on the road, George; and believe me you wouldn't have to
question where you'd dropped, because it'd be a convincing argument,"
Elmer told him.

So they started, and all of them turned to take a last look in the
direction of the haunted house, as they caught a glimpse of it through
the trees.

"Good-bye old ghost!" cried Toby, waving the hand that did not hold the
reins; "we'll come again and interview you, mebbe. Take care of
yourself, and don't play any mad pranks while we're away."

As they rode off, making their way among the trees, and heading for the
vicinity of the road, Chatz turned to Ted, who was sitting in the middle
again, having decided to cast his fortunes with the comrades of the rear
seat, and remarked in what he meant to be a low tone:

"I'd give something to know, suh, whether Elmer _did_ find out about
that _thing_ when he went back into the old house again!" but Ted only
shook his head in reply, as though the subject was too deep for him, or
else he believed Elmer would take them all into his confidence when he
saw fit to do so.




CHAPTER VIII

HOW ELMER'S PLAN WORKED


"HOW had we better arrange about the nuts, Elmer?" asked Toby, when they
were drawing close to the border of the town, with the twilight
gathering around them.

"I've been thinking about that, Toby," replied the other; "and the best
way all around would be for you to keep the whole lot in your barn. Some
day we'll get together and divide up, because, as they stand now some
bags have only walnuts, others hickories, while a couple have got most
of the chestnuts in them."

"Are the rest agreeable, and do they trust me as far as that?" demanded
Toby.

"Trust you with my pocketbook, Toby," George assured him.

"That's because there's never a red cent in the same, then," the driver
flashed back, as quick as anything; "but see here, Elmer, what about the
other four half-filled sacks?"

"I was coming to that," replied the scout master; "and unless somebody
objects to the programme, why, I'll drop around after supper, say before
nine o'clock, and between us, Toby, we'll lift all our own bags out, and
stow the same away in that room in your barn that's got a lock to it.
Then I'd like you to hitch up Nancy again, so we can go around and drop
these other bags in the yards of the four fellows. It's apt to be pretty
quiet along about that time, even if it's Saturday night; and not much
danger of anybody spying on us."

"Just as you say, Elmer; I'm with you," replied Toby, who was a very
accommodating fellow, and easily influenced; "I guess I'll feel
stronger, and more like tackling the job after I've had my supper."

There was no objection to that plan, since it had already been decided
to work things that way; and possibly George, as well as Ted, felt that
they were escaping some hard labor when they allowed these two comrades
to shoulder the burden.

At various corners the others jumped off the heavily loaded wagon, and
made for their homes. It happened that no boys were abroad just then to
ask where they had been, for supper time came early in most of the
Hickory Ridge homes during the fall and winter days; and so Toby was not
forced to explain that he and his four chums had been off nutting.

True to his word by half-past eight Elmer made his appearance at the
Jones domicile, and with Toby and a lighted lantern proceeded to the big
barn. Here they found that the wagon stood just where it had been left
when Toby unharnessed Nancy, and stripping off their coats the two lads
proceeded to complete their job.

It was no light one at that, lifting out those sacks filled with nuts,
and stowing the same away in the man's room near by; but both were
husky fellows, and by degrees managed to complete their task.

"There," said Toby, wiping his streaming brow, "that part's done, and
the rest won't be so hard, because the bags are only half filled; but I
kind of wish we had 'em planted O.K., and were on the way home again.
Whew! what would happen, d'ye think, Elmer, if Connie Mallon dropped in
on us when we were dumping a sack over the fence into his yard?"

"That'd be hard to say," replied Elmer; "but what's the use crossing
bridges before you come to them? Time enough to bother with that when it
happens. And if you knew Connie as well as I do, because he doesn't live
far away from my house, you'd never expect him to be home at nine
o'clock on a Saturday night. He's too fond of loafing down in the pool
room with his crowd; or being off on some lark, robbing some orchard of
late apples. Now, suppose you lead Nancy out, after you've got her
harness on, and we'll hitch up."

This was soon done, and afterwards Toby started to back the vehicle out
of the barn, while Elmer extinguished the lantern.

"I'll leave it here alongside the door, so we can find it again when we
come back," he told the driver; after doing which he mounted beside
Toby, and they started off on their queer errand.

Phil Jackson lived close by the Jones home, so they paid the first visit
there. Lights could be seen through the windows, but the boys found it
an easy thing to lift one of the half-filled sacks of nuts out of the
wagon, and silently slip it over the fence, leaving it there to be
discovered by Phil is the morning.

After that a second visit was made, and their end was accomplished quite
as easily as at the Jackson house. The third one proved a little harder,
for there were some people standing at the door as the boys drove past.

"Better make a turn around the block, Toby," suggested the scout master;
"they've been having visitors, and perhaps they'll be gone when we get
back again."

This proved to be the case, and having decided just where they wished to
leave the sack of nuts, the boys drew in the animal and quickly dropped
their burden over the picket fence.

"Things are booming," remarked Toby; "that makes three of the lot, and
only one left, which is Connie Mallon's bag."

He seemed to be a little nervous about approaching this place, for the
bully had a bad reputation as a fighter among the boys of the town; but
everything appeared to be quiet, and there was not a single light to be
seen in the small house where the Mallon family lived.

All the same Toby breathed freer when he felt the bag slip from his
grasp over the fence. Hardly had they managed this than there was an
explosion of savage barks and a bulldog came rushing toward the corner.

"Wow! ain't I glad that Towser's on the other side of the fence?" Toby
exclaimed, as he hastened to jump up on the wagon; while the dog
continued to bark fiercely, with his blunt nose pressed against the
palings surrounding the enclosure; "hurry, Elmer, and let's get away. I
don't think he can climb fences, but I won't take any chances with that
brute. He's spoiled one pair of trousers for me already."

Soon afterwards the two boys parted at the gate of the Jones place.

"I feel like we'd had a great time of it to-day, don't you, Elmer?" Toby
was saying; and then, not waiting for an answer, he continued: "and I
have to laugh every time I think of what a crazy scramble that Connie
and his bunch put up when you gave 'em the ghost walk with that birch
bark horn. Most people like to see the ghost walk on pay days, but this
one wasn't the same kind. Wouldn't I give a cooky, though, to see what
they look like to-night, and hear what they say about bein' chased by
that Cartaret spook!"

"Well, it's been a good enough day for us, Toby; and I think we ought to
have a great time if we go up in that region for our Thanksgiving
camping trip. Good night," and with that Elmer walked away, not a little
tired himself, for it had been a pretty strenuous day, all told.

In the morning he was up early, because he had an object in view, and
Elmer was not the one to sleep late at any time, even though it were
Sunday morning.

From a certain place up in the loft of the barn he knew he could see the
Mallon yard quite plainly; and taking a field glass he owned along with
him, he now proceeded to occupy this lookout.

As he had already had some breakfast he was nor bothered by gnawing
hunger as he continued to sit there, and watch the back door of the
Mallon cottage.

He saw Connie's mother come out several times, and judged she was
getting breakfast ready. Then the big hulking boy himself appeared,
bearing a bucket in his hand, and yawning at a great rate.

Elmer sat up and watched closely, for he anticipated that a fellow who
possessed as sharp eyes as Connie, could not help but see the bag that
lay in plain sight near the fence. The dog had already been chained to
his kennel by Mrs. Mallon, the watcher fancied, though he had not seen
her do this. Connie stopped to speak to the ugly looking beast, and from
the way Towser wagged his crooked stump of a tail it seemed as though he
must be somewhat fond of his master.

Then the big boy shuffled on toward the well, where he was evidently
expecting to draw a bucket of drinking water.

Suddenly Elmer, who was using the glasses now, saw him come to a
standstill, and look straight at the bag, as though he could hardly
believe his eyes.

Down went the water pail, and Connie hastily strode across the yard
until he reached the bag lying where Elmer and Toby had dropped it, snug
up against the fence palings.

He bent down, and opening the bag by cutting the stout cord that had
been wound around the flap above the store of nuts, stared hard at the
latter. Elmer saw that he was greatly staggered, for he started to
scratch his head after the manner of one who did not know what to
believe. Just as Chatz had suggested, perhaps he began to think the
prize must have rained down in the night, for he examined the sack, and
evidently recognized it as one of those he had taken with him on the
preceding day when starting out on that nutting expedition with the idea
of getting ahead of the scouts.

Then again it might be that he began to believe all that affair of the
panic and flight must have been a bad dream, and that after all he and
his cronies had brought back some spoils when they returned. Again Elmer
saw him put his hand up to his face and feel of his cheek.

"He's got a cut there to show where he banged against a tree," the scout
told himself, "and that's plain proof there was a panic. There, he's
examining the bag again, as if he thought it would speak and explain the
mystery. This is surely worth watching. Hello! there comes Phil Jackson,
and that Benners fellow on the run. Looks like they had found their bags
at home, and are coming to see what Connie has to say about it. And now
there'll be a high old time, I expect."

There was, after the two newcomers had discovered that one of the bags
half filled with nuts stood in the Mallon yard, just as they had found
at their homes.

Elmer sat there for fully fifteen minutes, watching them talk and make
gestures. He imagined that they had quickly figured it all out, and must
know to whom they were indebted for a winter's stock of nuts. What they
might choose to do about it was another question, however. Elmer hoped
for the best, yet was prepared to meet the worst, whatever might come.

"Anyway, Connie's concluded not to refuse the nuts just because they
came to him through the scouts he hates so bitterly," Elmer concluded,
as he saw the Mallon boy shoulder the sack and carry it to the house,
after saying good-bye to the other two, who hastened away, possibly to
learn if the fourth and last member of the expedition had likewise been
favored by a visit from the fairies during the night.

School held for the next three days, and then came glorious Thanksgiving
with its turkey, and pumpkin pies, and all the splendid things that go
to make up the annual feast. All this while there had not been the least
hint from Connie or his three allies that they knew who put those nuts
there. It almost seemed as though they purposely avoided meeting Elmer
and his chums. Even at school they kept away from the others, and Toby
declared that it was mighty queer, because he had fully expected to have
a tongue lashing from the big bully, even if nothing more serious came
to pass.

Elmer was satisfied with the way things had turned out. As a scout he
could feel that he had done the right thing, and deep down in his heart
he hoped it might in some fashion show Connie Mallon there was such a
thing as returning evil with good.

Nothing might come of it just then, but Elmer hoped the seed would find
lodging, and perhaps later on germinate.

When they got to talking it over, as they made preparations for leaving
home bright and early on the morning after Thanksgiving, George of
course professed to doubt whether it had made even a dent in the callous
surface of Connie's mind.

"Take my word for it, fellows!" he declared, pompously, "you'd have to
swing a sledge hammer and give more'n a little tap at that, to make any
impression there, he's so extra tough. Chances are he just don't want to
stir us up for fear we'll tell the whole story, and all his pals would
have the laugh on him for running away from a ghost!"

Toby himself seemed more than half inclined to believe something along
these same lines; but Chatz knew Elmer must be looking beyond this
explanation, and still entertained hopes that the olive branch extended
might not be wholly wasted.

They had all their arrangements made that night, and expected to start
with the rising of the sun on Friday morning. This would give them two
nights in camp, even if they did have to come back on Sunday afternoon
in order to be ready for school on Monday.

"And it looks like we might have fine weather along with us, too," Elmer
told the others, as they said goodnight at his door; "there's a tang
like frost in the air even now, and you can see your breath easily. That
means we'll enjoy a camp fire more than ever, because it never feels
half as good on a hot summer night. Look for you bright and early, Toby,
with the wagon and the tent and all the stuff. I'll be ready with my
bundles, and that piece of ham."

All preparations having been made they parted with mutual good wishes
for a fair dawn, and Elmer, standing there in the doorway, found himself
a little disappointed because there had been no response to the
invitation extended to Connie Mallon to bridge over the chasm, at the
time they left those nuts in his yard.

Elmer was astir long before daybreak on the following morning, because
he meant to get himself a light breakfast, so as to be ready for the
wagon when it came along about sunrise. Having satisfied his hunger, and
seen that all his various bundles were ready he stepped out of the back
door to listen, in expectation of hearing the sound of wheels.

Then he had a little surprise, for hanging there on a nail beside the
door was a brace of freshly killed rabbits; and Elmer knew to a
certainty nothing the kind dangled there on the preceding evening.

He took them down, and laid them on the kitchen table, while a whimsical
smile crept over his boyish face, and a glow of satisfaction could be
seen in his eyes as he rubbed his hand along the sleek side of the
larger bunny.

For Elmer chanced to know that Connie Mallon had spent Thanksgiving day
off in the woods and meadows hunting; and the very fact that he had thus
shared the results of his tramp with the boy he had fought against so
long gave Elmer a queer feeling of triumph deep down in his heart.

Then the wagon came along, with all the other boys aboard, and the bed
of the vehicle pretty well filled with their camping outfit; so Elmer
got in his seat, wondering what Doubting George would have to say when
he learned how a good action may set even the worst boy in town to
thinking, and changing his ways.




CHAPTER IX

THE CAMPING OUT EXPEDITION


THIS time there was a load for Nancy to pull, since besides the five
scouts who had made the nutting trip three additional fellows were
along.

First of all there was a lanky boy who long ago in a spirit of derision
had been dubbed "Lil Artha" by his Comrades; and although he stood fully
a head taller than any of his intimate chums, he still answered
cheerfully to this silly name. Arthur Stansbury was a good scout, and
well liked, though at critical times he showed a disposition to get what
boys call "rattled," and on more than one occasion this weakness had
resulted in his getting those long legs of his twisted in a knot,
resulting in trouble all around.

Landy Smith was a cousin of George Robbins. Philander was rather fat,
belonged to the Wolf Patrol, and had been known to walk in his sleep, so
that often the others, whenever any mysterious thing happened in camp at
nighttime, accused Landy of doing it while under the influence of this
strange wandering spirit, that made him get up while asleep, to play
tricks, and disturb his mates.

The third boy was Tyrus Collins. His specialty as a scout, if he had
any, was his recognized ability as a cook; and Ty's weakness might be
said to be a fondness for wearing a sweater of a pronounced fiery hue.
Once a garment of this type had gotten Ty into a lot of trouble with a
furious bull, when he was caught in a pasture, and forced to take refuge
in a lone tree. He had only escaped in the end by sacrificing his red
sweater, which the bull stopped to rend while the fleeing boy managed to
gain a friendly fence.

But Ty could not always be expected to remember this danger, and at
present he boasted of another garment of a sanguinary hue, which he wore
when he believed there were no bulls around.

Here, then, were eight lively fellows seated "every-which-way" in that
commodious wagon, and enlivening the time as they journeyed toward camp
with much jabbering, and not a little loud singing of popular songs.

They appeared to be completely happy. Ty was wearing his "grand sweater"
right then, and treated the warnings solemnly uttered by some of his
mates with abject scorn. Nancy certainly did have a pretty heavy load to
transport, and after the first mile or so along the frosty road there
were no further manifestations of gaiety on her part, only dull care,
for she labored heavily.

But then these boys were merciful, and they generally jumped off, to
walk up any steep hills, so as to relieve the beast of burden. Scouts
early learn to think of the woes of dumb animals, and show a disposition
to lighten their work all that is possible. If being a scout did not
teach a boy a single thing more than that it would still have
accomplished much; and posterity would have great cause to be grateful
to General Baden-Powell as the originator of the organization that has
long ere now circled the globe, and made converts in every clime.

The boys were of course all dressed in the familiar khaki uniforms
associated with scouts everywhere; and they carried with them a couple
of tents, as well as other necessary things connected with camping out.
There were no firearms visible, though possibly a gun or two might turn
up later on, when the contents of that heavily laden wagon had been
fully disclosed. Several of the boys were fond of hunting under
favorable conditions; and besides, as there was always some danger to be
encountered from wild beasts or snakes, Elmer thought it advisable to be
prepared for an emergency.

He sat on the front seat with Toby and George; Chatz, Ty and Landy had
managed to pre-empt the second one by virtue of early arrival; while Ted
and Lil Artha, the "long and the short of it," made themselves fairly
comfortable on the soft tents, and claimed to have the best of the
bargain.

The tall scout dangled his long legs over the tail-board, and was
frequently called upon to "quit dragging," whenever the pace of the
animal between the shafts slowed down from any cause.

"How about going all the way in with the rig this time, Elmer; could we
make the riffle, do you think?" Toby was asking, after they had gone
three-fourths of the distance to the Cartaret place, and there was a
brief lull in the general chaffing.

The others listened in order to catch the reply of the scout master, for
of course they were one and all interested in what was being said.

"I don't see any particular reason why we shouldn't," Elmer answered;
"we found it possible to take the wagon all the way to the nut grove
when we wanted to load our sacks; and by watching out smartly I reckon
we'll find a way to push through the woods there."

"I only mention it," continued Toby, as though he thought some
explanation were necessary, "because we've got a raft of stuff along
this time, and if we had to tote the same on our backs to and from the
wagon, it'd mean a lot of hard work, all of which could be saved."

"And I think it a good idea too," chimed in George; "though of course
I'm always willing to shoulder my share of the hard work when it's got
to be done."

There was more or less chuckling and nudging among the other scouts when
this broad statement was made, because George had a reputation a little
bit along the line of a "shirk," when it came to hard labor, though
always ready to do his duty manfully when a meal had to be disposed of.

"Well, we ought to get there in about twenty minutes more, if only Nancy
doesn't drop dead with heart disease," Toby went on to say.

"Not much danger of that, Toby," ventured Ted, from the rear of the
wagon; "I alwayth did thay that Nanthy wath the toughest thing that
ever wore the iron on her hoofth. And I expect to thee her doing duty
yearth after I come back with my diploma from college. And they tell me
thereth only one hoth older than Nancy in the county, which ith owned by
that Connie Mallon's dad, the mathon."

Somehow the very mention of that name which had been associated with
considerable of tumult in the past history of the scouts' organization
seemed to remind Toby and George of the remarkable events connected with
their late nutting expedition. Elmer, therefore, was not in the least
surprised to hear George immediately voice the feeling of detestation he
entertained toward Connie Mallon.

"I hope that gang enjoyed the treat we fetched home for 'em the other
day; and which I believe you and Toby here distributed like a pair of
Thanksgiving Santa Claus," he remarked, with a vein of satire in his
voice that was almost as natural to Doubting George as breathing was;
"but I never did take any stock in the game, though I agreed to assist
out, to please you, Elmer. And to my mind it was a flat failure in the
bargain. We might as well have handed all that lot of good nuts to some
poor family, or turned the same into the pig-pen for the porkers."

"Oh! I don't know," Toby said, with his favorite drawl. "Elmer here
seems to be of the opinion that it's done _some_ good. Anyhow, none of
us has had any trouble with that Mallon crowd since then. They seem to
slide away every time they see us coming down the street, or across the
campus at school."

"Good reason," piped up George, "because they're afraid that if they say
a word we'll start the ball arolling, and everybody in town'll hear how
they ran like Sam Hill, leaving their nuts behind, and thinking a ghost
was chasing after 'em. Huh! don't you give that tough crowd credit for
thinking anything decent, because it ain't in 'em."

"Listen," said Elmer, quietly, "and perhaps you'll find it best to
change your tune, Old Question Mark. I had a little surprise this same
morning when I came out of the house, just as dawn was breaking.
Something dangling there alongside the back door caught my eye, and what
do you think it was?"

"Oh! give it up, Elmer," said George, with a shrug of his shoulders;
while the others leaned forward eagerly, intent on hearing the answer;
"couldn't guess in a year of Sundays, so open up and tell us."

"A brace of the fattest and biggest rabbits I ever saw, and fresh killed
at that," replied the scout master, impressively.

"Oh! you don't mean to say it?" ejaculated Toby; "and, Elmer, as sure as
anything I saw Connie Mallon coming home late last evening with four of
the same hanging over his shoulder, and looking as proud as a turkey
cock. He just grinned as he walked past, and even nodded his head, but I
was too surprised to answer him, or ask where he struck such great luck.
But then everybody knows Connie is the best rabbit hunter around
Hickory Ridge, and has got a boss hound in the bargain. So you think he
left that brace hanging at your back door, do you?"

"I'm as sure of it as if I saw him sneaking in late at night, and
fastening the pair there," said Elmer, positively; "and he divided
evenly with me, you see, if he had just four. Now, George, what do you
say to that? Was it a silly thing in our taking those four bags of nuts,
and leaving them where we did? Don't you think Connie Mallon was set
_thinking_, and that unable to express himself in any other way he
carried out this fine thing to show me he understood the motive back of
what we did?"

George died hard.

"Well, I wouldn't just like to say that much, Elmer," he admitted;
"because I don't believe that tough case could understand a decent
motive; but he evidently wanted to let you know he'd keep still, if you
fellows only wouldn't blab on him and his crowd."

"I don't agree with you, George," the other told him, sharply. "I think
you've got to rub your eyes some yourself, and get the scales off. It's
my opinion that in his own crude way Connie meant to tell me he was
holding out the olive branch. I've got a hunch he's in a humor to be
approached, and met more than half-way; and when we get back after this
camping trip I'm going to have a chin with him the first chance I get to
see him alone."

"Huh! wish you luck then, that's all," grunted George; "but I give you
my opinion for what it's worth, and the chances are ten to one you'll
rub up against a stone wall."

"Well, there'll be no harm done, anyway," continued Elmer, nor did he
insist on carrying the argument any further, for he knew how persistent
George could be, and that although possessed of many sterling qualities,
being broad-minded was not a cardinal virtue of the doubting scout.

A short time later and those who had been up in this region recently
began to call the attention of their companions to certain features of
the landscape, and comment on the same.

"I'd give a heap," said Chatz, "to own a picture of that other rig
coming whooping out of the woods somewhere around here, and turning down
the road in the direction of town. Well, suh, I reckon the fellow who
held the whip was using the same on the backs of those hosses like fun,
and the lot of them shouting to him to make the team go faster, because
they believed the ghost would overtake them."

"It sure must have been a glorious sight," called out the long-legged
Lil Artha, from the rear of the vehicle; "and just like you, Chatz, I'd
give a heap to see a photograph of the same. Do we turn in here, Toby?"

"Yes, and you fellows hang on now, tooth and nail," replied the driver,
"or there's a chance of you getting pitched out, because the old wagon
joggles dreadfully most of the time over roots and stones. Steady, back
there, everybody!"

What Toby said turned out to be the truth. He tried to pick the easiest
trail possible, but in spite of this it proved to be so rough that
presently Elmer called a halt.

"I'm going to walk the balance of the way, fellows," he declared, as he
made a jump and landed on the ground.

"Me too!" echoed Landy Smith, following suit.

In another minute Toby was the only one left aboard, and he too might
have gladly sought the ground only that it was necessary for some one to
do the driving.

Old Nancy appreciated this lightening of her load by striving harder
than ever to draw it; while George and Ted and Chatz continued to call
attention to various features of the landscape.

"There's where we hid our wagon that other time," the last named
declared, pointing to a thick cover of brush, into which the track of
wheels led; "and Toby, you notice, is turning out, because this time we
don't want to head direct for the nut grove, but the dense woods
alongside. We saw a fine spring as we came by, and I reckon, suh, that
our efficient scout master has it all fixed in his mind's eye to pitch
our tents close to that."

"Saves a heap of water lugging, and that counts," admitted Lil Artha.

"That oughtn't to bother you much, Lil Artha," said George; "when you're
built to cover half a mile at every step. All you'd have to do would be
to take one look-in, fill your pail, and then turning around, come right
back again."

"Our camp, then, will be pretty close to the old house, won't it?"
ventured Chatz; and there was an eagerness in his voice that betrayed
how much he had been thinking of his luck at being in the vicinity of a
building said to be haunted, for two full nights.

"That's what it will," Toby called out over his shoulder, for he was
following the pilot of the expedition, Elmer, who strode on all by
himself away in the van; "and you'll have a chance to scrape up an
acquaintance with that old hobgoblin, Chatz. You're welcome to all the
fun; I haven't lost any ghost that I know about, and you don't ketch me
hanging about in there half the night, waiting for something white and
clammy to stalk around. Ugh! I should say not. Oh! what was that?"

Nancy, up to then behaving very well, because quite tired after the long
pull, began to prance at a lively rate; and every one of the four scouts
craned their necks and stared in one particular direction; it was in
that quarter George had just said the haunted house lay; and what had
come to their ears was the strangest sort of a cry they had ever heard,
a mingling of pain and rage it seemed.




CHAPTER X

IN FOR A GLORIOUS TIME


"A WILDCAT!" exclaimed Ty Collins, excitedly.

"Mebbe only an old owl," Lil Artha ventured; "because I remember you
fellows told us there were some whoopers up here; and when an old house
has got bats in its belfry it's likely to have owls too."

"The house is over that way, ain't it?" questioned Landy Smith, showing
a mild interest in the matter; but his indifference was more than made
up for by the excitement on the part of the Southern scout, whose dark
eyes fairly danced with eagerness.

"I should say it was," he told Landy, "and if you think that's only an
owl, or even a wildcat, suh, I reckon you've got another guess coming to
you."

"Listen to that, would you?" broke from Ty; "our chum from Dixie here
believes in ghosts, and he even thinks that was one warning us away from
the haunted house. It'd take a dozen of the same to scare _me_ off. I
may light out before an enraged bull, but you don't find me sneaking
away when there's a white thing waving up and down in the road. Had a
lesson once, when I found it out to be just a rag hangin' from a branch,
and since then nothing spooky ever faizes Ty Collins."

Chatz looked keenly at the speaker, and nodded his head. Although he
made no remark, his manner was that of a prophet, and Elmer, noticing
it, could imagine him saying: "Just wait, and we'll see what sort of
nerve you've got, Ty Collins. Things seem different at high noon from
what they do when it's midnight. And if I have my way you'll get a
chance to see a real ghost, for once in your life; because I just
believe in the things, make all the fun you want to."

Whatever the strange thrilling cry may have been, at least it was not
repeated. Nancy was quieted by Toby, and the other scouts stood there,
listening earnestly, for fully five minutes, but nothing developed worth
noticing.

Finally Elmer called out to them:

"Here, get a move on, Toby, and come along. We've got lots to do before
we can cook our first dinner; and I don't know how you fellows feel, but
I'm as hungry as a wolf. Make a sharp turn here, Toby, because we want
to push straight into the woods, and reach that spring."

Of all the scouts, George was really the only one who, as they walked
on, turned his head and glanced back several times toward the region
from which that strange sound had come.

Chatz noticed it, and smiled grimly, as though making up his mind that
perhaps he might find a convert in his belief in George, especially if
anything remarkable did come to pass, as he felt almost sure would be
the case.

Presently they came to the running water, and by following this up a
short distance found the spring.

"Hurrah! here we rest! Alabama for mine!" cried Lil Artha, as he turned
and surveyed his surroundings, with the eye of one who had camped on
numerous previous occasions, and might be expected to know something
about such things.

Then ensued a bustle, as the scouts began to unload the contents of the
wagon, stake out the mare, and start to get things arranged.

Every fellow had his share of the work apportioned to him, so that there
was little real confusion, or getting in each other's way; and it was
wonderful how things seemed to almost grow like magic.

Two khaki- waterproofed tents soon stood there, facing toward the
south, and with the spring only twenty feet away. Inside these the
scouts began immediately to arrange their blankets, though the beds
would not be made up until after the coming of night.

Another pair attended to the very important duty of making the cooking
range, on top of which they would spread the metal top that was to serve
as a gridiron, to hold such utensils as were necessary for cooking
purposes.

When this had been constructed to their satisfaction a fire was quickly
kindled, for the air was still rather sharp, even for a November day,
and all of them felt they would be much better for a warm lunch.

Amidst more or less good-natured chaffing the meal was prepared. There
was no lack of assistant cooks to help Ty, who had taken upon himself
the duties of _chef_ for the occasion, since long ago he had proved his
capacity in that line; everybody seemed only too willing to help, such
is the potent effect of genuine hunger.

Even George was bustling around, trying to hurry things along, picking
out all the best wood in order to make a hotter fire, and occasionally
peeping in under the covers of the two kettles to learn if the contents
might not be sufficiently cooked.

It was about an hour after noon when dinner was ready, and all of them
admitted the result was well worth waiting for. That frosty November air
had given them an enormous appetite, and everything tasted better than
it could possibly do at home; so for a certain length of time little was
said, since they were too busy in disposing of the meal to talk.

When the edge had been taken from their appetites they fell into a
disjointed conversation, and almost every subject under the sun was
discussed from the standpoint of scouts.

Afterwards they lounged around for a while, being really too full to
think of doing anything strenuous. As this was not supposed to be a
regular camping trip of the whole troop, Elmer had not laid out any
particular programme looking to their practicing the various "stunts"
which scouts are interested in. Under ordinary conditions there would
have been all manner of events underway, such as wigwagging classes,
tracking advocates, new wrinkles in nature-study unfolded; photography
of wild animals and birds in their native haunts undertaken, and many
other educational features that make the camping out experience of Boy
Scouts so vastly superior to those of other lads who simply go to the
woods to loaf away the time, swim, and fish, and eat.

Of course each fellow was at liberty to employ himself as best he
thought would give him the most pleasure, only there was no authority
brought to bear, and no one felt constrained to do anything that he did
not particularly care for.

"Where's Chatz gone?" asked Lil Artha, after they had been knocking
around in this fashion for nearly an hour after eating, and several of
them showed signs of wanting to be on the move.

"Oh! I saw him slip away a while back," remarked Toby, "and chances are
he's prowling in and out of that old shebang over beyond the trees, the
haunted house that Judge Cartaret built fifty years or so ago. Chatz is
clear daft on the subject of spirits, you know. And from what I've seen
of him, it wouldn't surprise me a little bit if the fellow before we
left here, tried to get us to make some sort of a ghost trap, to grab
that wonderful spook in."

"If he ever did that," Elmer remarked, "it would show that deep down in
his heart Chatz didn't believe in any such notion; because if there was
such a thing as a real ghost no trap we could manufacture would ever
hold it. If Chatz proposed that to us he'd be as much as saying he
believed the ghost to be a man, playing a game for some reason or
other."

"But," interposed Ty Collins, "what sort of a game would make anybody
prance around here night after night, with a sheet wrapped around him,
and p'raps luminous paint on his face, like I remember a ghost once did.
But in that case there was a good reason, for he wanted to give a bad
name to the property so he could buy it in for a song. That wouldn't be
the case here with the Cartaret place, you know."

"Well, it's foolish trying to guess a thing when we haven't even seen
the ghost," George interrupted the others to say; "and I've got to be
shown such a thing before I'll take the least stock in it; though I must
say that as a rule Chatz is a long-headed chap, and not easy fooled."

When Elmer heard George say this he fancied that it would only take one
mysterious ghostly manifestation to make the doubter an ardent believer
in supernatural things. Scoffer that George was, once he saw with his
own eyes, he went to the other extreme, and became firmly convinced. It
was just like the swing of the pendulum with him every time.

"Oh! let's forget all that stuff about white-sheeted things that walk in
the middle of the night!" exclaimed Landy Smith, "and pick up a more
cheerful subject. Now just yesterday I chanced to be reading an account
that told how three scouts in this very state made a study of hunting
for the hives of wild honey bees up in the hollow limbs of trees in the
woods. Elmer, do you think we could run across a hive filled with
delicious honeycombs around here?"

"Whee! you make my mouth water just to hear you talk about it," Lil
Artha arose to say, "and if so be any of you make the try for a hive
just count me in, will you?"

"You bet we will," Landy hastened to assure him, "and right now consider
yourself appointed commissioner-in-chief, whose principal duty will be
to climb the honey tree, after we locate the same, and cause the
warm-footed little innocents to vacate, so that we can gather in a store
of the nectar. Wow! I'm going right away to see if I can't find the
tree. Who'll be my backer? Don't all speak at once!"

Lil Artha and Ted proved to be the most eager for the adventure. Upon
making inquiries it was found that Landy had read all about how to
locate a bee tree, if by good luck any such happened to be in the
neighborhood, and was ready to show his chums how the thing ought to be
done.

His talk concerning the subject proved to be so interesting that when a
start was made he had gained another convert, being Ty Collins.

"I rather think I'd like to see how that thing's done, myself," this
worthy admitted, "so with your permission, Landy, I'll tag along, and if
you need any help in carrying the stock of honeycomb home count on me.
Right now I feel like I could tackle a few big wedges myself, and enjoy
the same."

"All right, come along with us, Ty," Landy told him, cheerfully; "but
I'd feel a whole lot easier in my mind if you'd take off that red
sweater, and wear something else."

"What for?" demanded Ty, who could be pretty stubborn when he chose.
"This is going to be a bee hunt, not a bull fight, that I know of. Why
should you object to me going warmly clad, I'd like to know?"

"Oh! well," replied Landy with a grin that told he had only been drawing
the other on for a purpose; "there might be an old king bee that had a
detestation for red, just the same as a bull does, and he'd make it so
warm for us we'd have to get out of the woods in a hurry."

"Rats!" the other shot back at him, "bees don't bother about what they
see; I've been told by an old bee man that it's _sounds_ they get mad
at. And then there ain't such a thing as a king bee anyhow--queens,
drones and workers make up a colony. Oh! I ain't quite such a ninny as
some people think. So I guess this beautiful red sweater goes along."

"All right, if you're willing to take such a terrible risk it's nothing
to the rest of us, is it, fellows?" Landy told him, with a chuckle; and
then went on to add: "Now, we'll carry a little sugar water along to use
if we happen to run across any bees flying around, which at this late
day ain't likely. Best we can do is to watch every tree-top and try to
hear the buzzing of a swarm of young bees. They come out every fine day
as long as the weather lets 'em, around noontime, and try their wings.
An old bee hunter can get on to the little hum far off and locate the
hive that way. Let's see if we've got ears worth anything."

"The best of luck go with you!" called out Elmer, who was busy with
something or other; "and if you need any help come back after the rest
of the bunch. I see you're carrying our camp ax, Lil Artha; be careful
and don't lose it, because we need that same thing right along."

"Don't worry about that, Elmer," the elongated scout shouted back. "I
wouldn't let that get away from me for all the honey in seven counties.
But in case we do find a tree that looks good to us I'm ready to swing
the ax for all I'm worth," and so saying he strode away after the other
three.

That left just Elmer, Toby and George in camp.

"I'd be tickled half to death if they _did_ find a tree, and got a lot
of honey," Toby remarked, grinning in anticipation, and licking his lips
at the same time; "and I can just see that Lil Artha whooping things
when the tree drops, and he rushes headlong in among the branches to
scoop up some of the sweet stuff that bursts out of the crack, with a
million bees swarming around his ears. If I was you, Elmer, I'd get some
witch hazel ready to put on stings, for they'll need it right bad."

"Time enough for that when they report a find!" declared Elmer, who
evidently did not have a great deal of confidence in the ability of
Landy Smith to locate a hive, especially at that time of year, when the
little insects were apt to be lying more or less dormant.

An hour passed by. Then Elmer began to wonder what could be detaining
Chatz so long, for he several times looked in the direction where he
knew the old deserted Cartaret house must lie, as though half expecting
to see the Southern boy come on the full run, with some wonderful story
of sights he had seen, or imagined he had, which was the same thing.

When Chatz did appear he was walking slowly, and his face had an
expression of subdued disappointment resting on it. Apparently, then,
all his prowling in and out of the building could not have met with any
particular reward. In other words the Cartaret ghost was not very
accommodating, and respectfully declined to make its appearance at such
an unheard of hour as three in the afternoon; when every one knew that
all respectable spirits only manifest themselves around the midnight
hour.

"You didn't run across anything new, did you, Chatz?" Elmer asked him,
as he came into camp, took a drink of cool water, and threw himself on
the ground to rest.

"Not a single thing, suh; but then I didn't really expect to in broad
daylight. Wait till to-night, and I reckon there may be something
doing," and then Chatz allowed his brow to show three wrinkles that
told of perplexity, for he had heard Elmer chuckle; and all at once it
struck him that on the former occasion the scout master had gone back
into the house after he and the other comrades had left; and once more
the Southern boy who had the vein of superstition in his make-up asked
himself what Elmer could have seen on that occasion to make him look so
knowing, and have that queer smile cross his face whenever the ghost was
mentioned.

But Elmer did not offer to explain, and so Chatz had to content himself
with the thought that perhaps on the coming night the veil of secrecy
might be lifted from the mystery.




CHAPTER XI

SACKING THE FOREST STORE-HOUSE


TOBY had insisted upon stowing that wonderful aeroplane appendix which
he called an "aviator's life-saver parachute," in the bottom of the
wagon when starting out on this camping trip. He was working at it while
helping to keep camp the first afternoon after their arrival.

"All I hope is," he went on to say, when Elmer chanced to come around
close to where he straddled a log, and did some heavy sewing with the
toughest waxed string he could use, "that I find a chance to try out
this thing again while we're in this region. If no other place shows up
I might climb to the top of the tower on the old house, and jump off
there. How high would you guess, off-hand, that might be, Elmer?"

"Oh! perhaps thirty-five or forty feet," replied the other, carelessly,
and hardly noting what Toby was saying, because just then he had caught
a peculiar sound that came from some little distance away.

"Do you hear that, Elmer?" called out George.

"Yes, and I was trying to make out what it was when you spoke," replied
the scout master. "I reckon it must be some one busy with an ax, for the
blows are repeated as regular as clock-work."

"And our chums took the camp ax away with them?" suggested Toby, looking
up, an eager glow commencing to show in his eyes.

"Yes, and they went off in that direction, too," added George.

With that the four camp keepers smiled at each other.

"Can it be possible they've found a bee-tree, after all?" asked George,
who, despite his yearning for a honeycomb, could not overcome his
skeptical disposition, and believe that such a delightful consummation
of the bee hunt had come about.

"Listen to that whanging, will you?" cried Toby; "nobody but Lil Artha
could use an ax like that. As sure as you live they must have struck
something. Tell me about the babes in the woods, will you; some people
wade in good luck every time they start out!"

"Another fellow has taken hold, because the sound changes," George
observed, sagaciously; "and p'raps Ty Collins is swinging the ax now. He
can hew close to the line; fact is, I never saw a scout who could chop
as evenly as Ty. Wow! did you hear that crash, fellows? A tree went down
that time, whether there's any honey in the same or not. I'll only
believe it when I see, smell and taste the nectar."

A short time afterwards they heard some one coming on the run. Then a
figure broke out of the brush, waving excitedly.

"Hi! get your buckets, and come along to help gather the harvest!" Lil
Artha was shouting as he approached, half out of breath.

"Then you sure enough did find a bee-tree, and it isn't any joke?"
demanded the incredulous George.

"Take a look at me, and then say if I show up like a joke!" demanded the
long-legged scout, indignantly.

Everybody laughed as he twisted his face up, and tried to look serious.
It was an utter impossibility with that lump ornamenting the end of his
nose, others gradually swelling his cheeks, while various suspicious
signs behind his ears marked the places where the angry little bees had
left their stings.

"No hurry, Lil Artha," said Elmer; "let me rub your face with this witch
hazel, and put a little ointment on to relieve the pain and reduce the
swelling. You're puffing out under the eyes right now, and if something
isn't done you'll have to be led around for a while."

While Elmer was doctoring the battered comrade George kept plying him
with questions, as though he had great difficulty in believing the
glorious truth.

"I hope it isn't only an old hornet's nest you've struck," he went on to
say, doubtfully; "but then there wouldn't be any at this time of year, I
guess. Sure you saw real honey, did you, Lil Artha?"

"And smelled it too!" cried the afflicted scout. "Why, the old tree
burst open when it fell, and you just ought to see what gallons of the
stuff fills the hollow trunk away up near the top. My! but the bees are
mad, and swarming around there by the million! I ran in among 'em,
thinking to snatch a comb, and get away with it, but they swooped down
on me, and I had to cut for it like fun. Elmer, however, can we get some
of that honey without being stung to death? Oh! if only I had one of
Daddy Green's bee head-nets that he loans to people when he's showing
them the inside of a hive in his apiary, wouldn't it be the boss; and
rubber gloves to go with the same."

"Perhaps I might rig up a net somehow," Elmer mused; "I've got a piece
of mosquito netting in my bag that I use for a minnow seine, and that
ought to make several head-nets. Let's see if we can find any gloves
that'll help keep our hands out of danger."

After a hunt through all the traps the boys managed to secure enough
coverings to answer the purpose after a clumsy fashion. Meanwhile George
and Toby had hastily gathered what utensils they had with them capable
of holding some of the honey. Everybody was wildly excited, for they had
never really passed through an experience of this sort. Bee trees they
had heard of many times, but that one should actually be discovered when
they were camping out, and yearning for something of a sweet nature,
seemed almost too good to be true.

"All ready here, Lil Artha!" exclaimed George; "and now lead us to your
wonderful wild honey hive. I just want to see it with my own eyes,
that's all."

Lil Artha looked severely at him, that is, as well as he could with
those half-shut eyes of his, and then remarked sarcastically:

"Well, if you ain't the limit, George; I sure hope you _do_ see the
plain evidence, yes, and _feel_ some of 'em too, like I did. They say
the poison of bee stings is used in medicine, and it's mighty good for
some things. P'raps a dose of the same'd cure you of your questioning
everything there is. But come on, everybody."

Elmer did not know whether they were exactly wise in abandoning the
camp, even for a brief time; but he felt that it would be hard to keep
any one there; so he concluded to take the slight risk.

Lil Artha was a pretty good scout. He had noted directions as he went
forth on the expedition, so that in returning to the camp he had made
what might be called in more senses than one a "bee-line"; and now the
trail was so plainly marked that even a fellow with one eye, or
half-closed ones, could follow it back to where the other three scouts
awaited their coming, hiding behind the brush so as not to attract too
much attention from the buzzing horde of insects.

The netting was fashioned into head protectors, the ends being tucked
well down in their coats. Then donning heavy gloves the two boys
selected for the work, George and Ty Collins, started boldly into that
whirling mass of excited bees.

They shortly came out bearing pans full of splendid honey, and
doubtless a considerable number of stings in spite of all the
precautions taken against this evil.

"Next time look for a little fresher stock," Elmer told them; "for while
this is all right, and like amber in color, you'll find that it's last
year's gathering. Split the tree further up, and get the latest stuff!"

So Ty took the ax back with him; while George worked a sort of smoke
smudge Elmer had prepared, in order to help stupefy the bees. It did the
business in great shape, too, as every bee keeper uses this means for
keeping the little insects from paying too much attention to him when he
is working with their hive. They seem to fancy that their home is in
deadly danger of being consumed, and every working bee immediately
burdens itself down with all the honey it can carry, and for the time
being renders itself helpless to use its sting.

Every scout managed to accumulate one or more lumps, however, for the
air was heavily charged with the bewildered insects, now homeless on a
fall afternoon; and although the boys did a great deal of dodging they
could not avoid contact all the time. But then the sight of that
splendid honey made them forget their present troubles. They snatched up
the bottle of witch hazel, or applied the ammonia solution recklessly,
to immediately start in again working like heroes.

Elmer started back to camp bearing their one bucket actually full of the
most delicious honey he had ever tasted; and soon afterwards Lil Artha
followed with two kettles also heavily laden with the same.

When Chatz came along with several heavy honeycombs secured with an
arrangement consisting of cords, and stout twigs from some hickory tree,
the three looked at each other in dire dismay.

"We can't live on honey alone, you know," Lil Artha up and said; "and it
looks like we've already got every cooking vessel loaded down, with not
half the store of sweet stuff cleaned out. What in the wide world can we
do with it all? I guess this is a case of too much of a good thing."

"I know!" declared Chatz, suddenly; "in prowling around that haunted
house I saw several old stone jars in what was once used as a pantry.
Let's go over and lug the same to camp, Lil Artha. They can be washed
out clean, and will hold all that honey, I assure you, suh. And we can
carry most of the same back home with us to show other scouts what we've
been doing up here in the woods."

So the pair hastened away, and after a while came back with the stone
crocks or jars, each of which would hold several gallons. Elmer
pronounced them the finest possible thing for holding their rich find,
and proceeded to cleanse them thoroughly at the spring, after which the
various cooking receptacles were emptied, and both Chatz and Lil Artha
started eagerly back to the fountainhead for a fresh supply.

They certainly cleaned out the best part of that tree hive during the
next hour, and had four jars full of splendid honey, some of it as clear
as crystal. It was the greatest "harvest home" the Hickory Ridge Boy
Scouts had ever experienced; and they seemed never to get quite enough
of the sweet stuff, for every one kept tasting as new supplies were
disclosed by splitting the tree further.

Finally, however, it came to an end, and the distracted bees were let
alone with the sad wreck of their once fine hive. Perhaps, if they
survived the chill of the coming night, some of them would start in
fresh, and carry away enough of the discolored honey, refused by the
discriminating scouts, to start a new hive, and keep the swarm alive
during the winter.

Nobody seemed furiously hungry as the afternoon waned and the shades of
night began to gather around the camp. This was hardly to be wondered
at, however, since they had tasted so much honey for hours that it took
away their customary zest for ordinary food. Elmer told them it was a
bad thing, and every fellow promised that from that time on he would
take his sweet stuff in moderation.

Of course they cooked some dinner; and after once getting a taste of the
fried onions and potatoes it seemed that to some degree their fickle
appetites did return, so that the food vanished in the end.

"I'm thinking about all that darker honey we left there," Lil Artha was
saying, as they sat around the crackling fire long after night had
fallen, and supper had been disposed of an hour or more.

"My starth!" ejaculated Ted, "I hope now you don't want to lay in any
more of the thweet thtuff, do you, Lil Artha? Why, we'll be thticky all
over with it. Don't be a hog. Leave thome to the poor little beeth; and
it didn't look real nice, you know."

"Oh! I wasn't regretting that we couldn't make a clean sweep," explained
the tall scout, whose face was once more gradually resuming its normal
appearance; "but if what I've read is true, up in some places where they
have black bears, they always set a watch when they've cut down a bee
tree. You see, the smell of the honey is in the air, and if there's a
bruin inside of five miles he'll be visiting that broken tree hive
before morning, when the watcher can send a bullet into him."

"But you don't think there are bears around here, do you?" asked George,
always to be found on the side of the opposition.

"Well, hardly," replied Lil Artha, "though some of us wish it might be
so, because we've got a gun along, and they say bear steak isn't half
bad when you're in camp, even if it does taste like dry tough beef when
you're at home, and sitting down with a white table cloth before you.
I'd like to try some, that's what; but this expedition wasn't started
for a bear hunt, you know."

"No, that's so," Ty Collins remarked; "more likely a ghost hunt," and he
gave Chatz a sly look out of the corner of his eye as he said this.

"That was meant for me, suh," Chatz said, with dignity; "you think you
can laugh at me because I'm weak enough to believe there may be such a
thing as a ghost. But if you-all are so sure nothing of the kind ever
could happen, what's to hinder me from having the entire camp along
to-night when I go over there and hide, to watch what happens at exactly
midnight?"

Elmer laughed softly.

"Do you mean that as a dare, Chatz?" he asked.

"Take it as you please, suh; and we'll soon see who believes in ghosts
or not; because the one who backs down first is likely after all to be
afraid of meeting up with visitors from the spirit land."

"Who's going along with Chatz and myself?" asked Elmer, turning to the
circling scouts; who began to look serious, and cast quick glances
toward each other.

"Oh! I'll keep you company, Elmer!" said George, first of all; for
somehow he fancied everybody was staring hard at him, and not for worlds
would he allow them to think he was _afraid_.

"Count me in!" added Ty Collins, with a laugh, that bordered on the
reckless.

"I'll go along, too," observed Ted.

Landy Smith hastened to nod his head in the affirmative when Elmer
looked at him; Lil Artha spoke up and said he was bound to be one of the
number; and finally Toby completed the list by signifying that he was
ready to sacrifice himself also.




CHAPTER XII

THE MIDNIGHT VIGIL


"I'M glad to learn we don't have any 'fraidcats in this camp, and that
I'm likely enough to have plenty of company in keeping watch to-night in
the haunted house," Chatz remarked cheerfully, after the last scout had
been heard from.

"I've waited to see if it was going to be made unanimous," Elmer told
them at this juncture; "and now that you've all toed the mark so
handsomely, why of course I'll have to exercise my judgment in picking
out, say a couple of fellows, who will stay to look after the camp here
while the rest of us are otherwise employed."

"Lassoing ghosts, for instance!" Lil Artha murmured.

Elmer looked around the circle of faces again. All of them knew that he
was selecting the pair of scouts who would be left behind, and while
doubtless a number of the boys were secretly hoping deep down in their
hearts that they might be one of the lucky number, they tried their best
to appear indifferent.

"Ted, you're one!" said the leader, presently; "and I think I'll appoint
Landy to keep you company." The latter commenced to splutter a little,
when Elmer raised his hand, and continued: "Now, don't get the notion
in your heads that because I've selected you for playing the role of
martyr it was because I thought you'd prove weak-kneed, or in any way
show up poorly. I've no reason to think anything of the sort; only there
had to be two chosen, and I've taken you for reasons of my own. Landy
was complaining a short time ago of feeling squeamish, after gorging
himself with all that honey; and in case he gets sick who could attend
so well to him as our Doctor Ted?"

That was explanation enough, and every one had to rest satisfied.
Perhaps, if the truth were told, neither of the two scouts had any
regrets coming; and secretly they were envied by some of the less
fortunate ones, who would gladly have guarded the camp stores, if given
the opportunity.

"One thing good," Chatz informed them, "we're going to have a moon
poking up in a little while. You know it's past the full stage, but from
ten o'clock up to daylight it'll hold the fort up above."

"Fine!" exclaimed George, with a half laugh; "I always do like to have
bright moonlight whenever I go after ghosts. You can see the white
things so much better, and watch 'em flit around as soft as silk. I'm
glad you've ordered up a moon to help out, Chatz; it'll sure make things
more interesting."

"I think myself it will, suh," the Southern boy said, placidly in his
turn; "and if any of us feel like we'd want to make a bee-line from the
house to this camp here, why, the running is better when you have
moonlight, you know."

"Huh! that was meant for me, I guess, Chatz," sneered George; "but
you'll have to take it out in waiting if you expect to see me chasing
along, and hollering for help, because some old owl with a white front
shows up, or the bats begin to fly in and out of that tower. I'm not
built very much that way."

"I hope not, suh!" was all Chatz said in reply; but George was seen to
color up, and look a trifle confused, as though possibly he might not be
feeling quite as bold inwardly as his words would imply.

"When ought we start over?" asked Lil Artha, just as carelessly, to all
appearances, as though it might be a friendly visit to some neighboring
camp, instead of a thrilling experience in a haunted house.

"In about half an hour or so after the moon rises," Elmer informed him;
"that ought to be time enough, don't you think, Chatz?"

"Plenty, suh," came the reply, "because, if there is any truth at all in
these stories they tell about such places, the fun doesn't ever begin
till midnight."

"Fun!" muttered Toby, rubbing his chin reflectively; "well, it does beat
all creation what some people call fun. Now, so far as I'm concerned,
while I'm going along with you, and can't be made to back out, it's all
a silly nuisance. I'd rather be climbing up into that same old tower,
and getting ready for a drop with my reliable parachute."

"No use of that in the night-time, Toby," remonstrated Ty; "mebbe
to-morrow we'll get a blanket brigade to stand below while you make your
first jump, so's to let you down easy if the old thing breaks."

"No danger of that, Ty; because I've gone all over it again and again,
and right now she could sustain a weight of half a ton, I reckon. But
it's good of you to be interested enough in my invention to lend a
helping hand. Think what it'll mean to all the tribe of aeronauts when
every flier is equipped with a Jones Life-saving Parachute, that is
guaranteed to float him softly to the ground even if he has a breakdown
accident a mile up in the clouds."

Toby after that fell into a musing spell. Perhaps in imagination he
peopled the air fairly filled with flitting aeroplanes, and every single
aviator supplied with the remarkable device that was going to make the
name of Jones the most famous in all the wide land.

The other scouts chatted, and exchanged all sorts of lively remarks.
They even indulged in several songs that sounded very strange when heard
among those whispering pines of the grove, and knowing as they did what
manner of house stood close by, with a halo of mystery surrounding it.

Just as Chatz had predicted the moon arose close on ten o'clock. It was
no longer as round as a shield, but had an end lopped off; still the
flood of mellow light that came from the lantern in the sky was very
acceptable to the scouts, and served to render their intended mission
less objectionable.

Finally Elmer arose, and there was a start on the part of those who had
been selected to accompany the leader and Chatz on their singular
errand.

"I hope you'll let me carry the gun, Elmer?" Lil Artha remarked,
coaxingly.

"Why should you?" replied the other, instantly; "if it is a real ghost a
bullet wouldn't hurt a bit; and if it should turn out to be some one
playing a mad prank I don't think you'd feel easy in your mind if you
were tempted to shoot him."

"But it might be some tramp or hard case, and we'd want to subdue him;
how about that, Elmer?" questioned Toby.

"Well, we can carry clubs if we like," said Elmer; "and I mean to have a
piece of stout rope, so we can tie him up if we overpower him. Six
scouts can put up a pretty hefty sort of fight, it strikes me, if things
get to that point. No, leave the gun for the defenders of the camp and
the grub."

When presently the six boys stalked forth on their singular errand they
did not seem to be in very merry spirits. True, Elmer was smiling as
though he could give half a guess as to what they were about to run up
against; and there was Chatz, a satisfied grin on his dark countenance;
but the remainder of the investigating party could hardly have looked
more solemn and melancholy if they had been about to attend the funeral
of a dear departed friend.

"Good luck!" called out Ted, after them; while Landy waved his hand
mockingly, and grinned happily as he remarked:

"We'll expect to see you fetch back at least one full-fledged ghost,
boys; and take care he don't bite you. They're apt to do something along
that order, I'm told, by people who've interviewed some of the species.
But you c'n tame 'em so they'll even eat out of your hand."

"Just you wait, that's all," was the sum total of what the departing
scouts deigned to reply, as they vanished amidst the mixture of silvery
moonbeams and darkening shadows.

Soon they glimpsed the house through the dense vegetation. It stood out
boldly in the moonlight, grim and silent. There was not the half
expected gleam of any inside illumination, only the dilapidated windows,
the walls covered in many places by a rank growth of Virginia Creeper
vine, the broken chimneys rearing themselves up above the ridge, and
that square tower overtopping it all.

As they approached the walls of the house it might have been noticed
that those of the scouts who had been lingering a little back of the
rest somehow seemed to think they ought to close the gap, for they
hurried their footsteps, and were soon in a cluster, with no laggards.

"I've thought to fetch my little handy electric torch along, Elmer,"
said Lil Artha about this time.

"It may come in useful," was the reply Elmer made; "but with all that
moonlight going to waste I hardly think we'll need it. Still, you never
can tell, and it's a mighty clever affair. You were wise to think of
fetching it, Lil Artha."

"Are we going to separate, Elmer; and if we do, will you let me place
the rest of the boys, suh?" Chatz asked before they reached the yawning
doorway of the deserted building.

"How about that, fellows?" the leader asked them; "do you think we had
better split up into several small parties or stand together?"

Toby, Lil Artha, Ty Collins and George heard this announcement with a
new sense of consternation. In imagination they could easily picture how
dreary and unpleasant it was going to be if each one had to take a post
isolated from the rest, there to stand and listen, and perhaps _shiver_
as the time crept on, until he must become so nervous that he could give
a yell.

"For my part, Elmer," Lil Artha said, hastily, "I think we had ought to
stick in a bunch. One couldn't do much against a--er--ghost, you see;
while the lot of us might be able to down anything going."

"That's what I think too, Elmer," piped up George, "though of course, if
you say so, I'm willing to do anything to carry on the game."

"United we stand, divided we fall!" spouted Ty Collins, who, while a big
blustering good-hearted fellow himself, did not exactly like the
thought of being alone in that weather-beaten and half wrecked house, as
the hour drew on toward midnight.

"I think we ought to stick together, Elmer," Toby declared, which
confession appeared to tickle Chatz, judging from the low snicker he
gave utterance to; for, just as he had suspected, while none of these
fellows would admit that they placed the least faith in things bordering
on the supernatural, still they did not fancy finding themselves left
alone in a house that had been given a bad name.

Elmer had been talking matters over with Chatz, so that they were agreed
as to where the watchers should take up their positions. All talking
except in whispers was frowned down upon from that time forward; and
there is always something exciting about a situation when everybody is
speaking in low tones.

They entered the house, and led by Chatz passed up the rickety stairs.
This was evidence enough that their vigil was about to be undertaken in
the upper story. George seemed to think that if he could manifest a
disposition to joke a little it would be pretty good evidence that he at
least was not afraid; and while as a rule he left this weakness to Toby
and Lil Artha he could not resist the temptation to lean over and
whisper to Ty, so that Chatz also might hear, something to the effect
that it was just as well they were mounting those shaky stairs because
people who believed in silly ghosts must be weak in the upper story.

No one laughed, so George did not attempt any more witticisms. Truth to
tell, he was not feeling as perfectly indifferent as he tried to make
out; and when one of the others slipped a little, George it was who
exclaimed hastily:

"Oh! what in thunder was that?"

When the six scouts had gained the second floor they passed along the
wide hall to the place that had been chosen for the vigil. While in the
gloom themselves it was easily possible for them to look along the
moonlit hall, diversified with shadows, and see any moving thing that
might attempt to pass that way. At the same time by turning their heads
they could see out of the nearest window, and have a fair view of the
open space between the wall of the house and the dense bushes close by.
Beyond arose the thickly interlaced trees, a wild scramble along the
line of the survival of the fittest.

Elmer stationed them all as he thought would be best. They were told
that they could sit down cross-legged, Turkish fashion, if they chose;
but under no circumstances was any one to allow himself to be
overpowered by sleep. If a scout had reason to believe the one next to
him were nodding suspiciously he must whisper words of warning in his
ear; and should that fail to effect a radical cure he was empowered to
try other tactics, if by chance he possessed a pin.

Having been fully awake at the time of their arrival, something like
half an hour went by with all the scouts apparently on the watch. Then
George had to be admonished by Lil Artha several times, until finally a
low gasp, and muttering, as well as quick rubbing of his thigh on the
part of George announced that the radical means had been employed in
order to keep him awake.

There is nothing more reliable as a sleep preventative than the jab of a
pin; it seems to send an electric shock through the whole system, and
eyes that were just about to close fly wide-open again.

Twenty minutes later another low gurgling cry arose; this time it came
from the elongated scout, and George was heard to whisper savagely:

"Tit for tat, Lil Artha; you gave me a stab, and now we're even."

"'Sh! I thought I heard something moving down there in the bushes!" the
scout master told them, cautiously.

Of course every one was immediately quivering with intense anxiety and
eagerness. It was very close on the mystic hour of midnight, too, which
added to the interest of the matter. Could it be that they were about to
witness some strange manifestation such as Chatz professed to believe
was possible? No wonder that the boys wriggled erect, stiff in their
joints after sitting there tailor-fashion so long, and pressing toward
the open window stared down toward the bushes to which Elmer had
referred when he spoke.

So bright was the moon, now fairly high in the sky, that even small
objects could readily be distinguished. There was nothing in sight that
they could notice where the rank grass grew, and the trees and bushes
were absent; but looking further they could actually see something white
moving along through the brush.

No one said a single word, but there might have been heard several quick
gasps; and a hand that fell on the sleeve of Elmer's khaki coat trembled
fiercely. If ever some of those boys were willing to confess to the
truth they would admit that their hearts began to beat furiously about
that time, as with staring eyes they watched that mysterious white
object pushing through the matted bushes that grew just beyond the open
space near the walls of the haunted house.




CHAPTER XIII

A STRANGE FIGURE IN WHITE


"OH!"

After all it was George, boasting George, who gasped this one word in
Elmer's ear; and the scout master knew then whose trembling hand had
clutched his sleeve.

But if several of the others refrained from giving vent to their
agitated feelings about that time, it was only because they had lost
their breath completely.

All of them were staring as hard as they could at the strange white
object that kept creeping, creeping along through the brush. Not the
slightest sound did it appear to make, and that added to the weirdness
of it all. They must just then have had flash into their brains all they
had ever read or heard about the wonderful manner in which ghosts and
hobgoblins are able to advance or retreat, without betraying their
presence by even the least rustling.

Then all at once there broke out the sharp, furious barking of a dog.
Every scout reeled back as though struck a blow. At the same moment they
saw the white object whirl around, and rush away through the brush; and
now they could plainly detect the rapid patter of canine feet.

"It was only a stray farmer's dog after all!" exclaimed Lil Artha, with
a sigh of absolute relief.

"Yes," added Toby, "and when he barked up at us he was scared at the
sound he made himself, so that he lit out as though he had a tin pan
tied to his tail. But I own up I was shivering to beat the band, for I
sure thought it must be that Cartaret _thing_ they say hangs out here.
Whew!"

George, as usual, having recovered from his own fright wanted to make it
appear that he considered any one foolish who would actually allow
himself to be alarmed by such a silly thing as a white object.

"Anybody might have known it was only a white cur," he affirmed; "why,
if you looked right sharp you could see the shine of his eyes out there
in the shadows."

"Did you look sharp, George; and if so why didn't you put us wise?"
demanded Toby. "But I bet you were just as badly rattled as the rest of
us, only you won't own up to it."

"What, me? Huh, guess again, Toby, and don't measure everybody by your
own standard, please," George told him; meanwhile congratulating himself
over the fact that he had been standing in the shadow, so that none of
his mates could possibly have seen how pale he must have been.

"That dog couldn't belong around here, Elmer!" suggested Chatz.

"No, it was most likely some farmer's dog that had been running rabbits
through the forest, and chanced to wander over this way. But even he
considered it a queer place, and was glad to shake the dust of it off
his paws after he gave that one volley of barks. No danger of him coming
back."

"He scented us up here, don't you think?" continued Chatz.

"As like as not; but don't say anything more now, please. It must be
close on twelve o'clock!"

They knew what Elmer meant when he said that. If the ghost walked at all
it must be around the middle of the night. So they would have to take up
their weary vigil again, and await developments. Even whispering must
cease, and their attention be wholly given to watching, inside and out
of the house.

The seconds crept into minutes, though to some of the scouts these
latter had never moved with such leaden wings, and they could almost
believe hours were passing in review instead.

Had it been summer-time when they made this pilgrimage to the woods near
the old Cartaret house they would have expected to hear the chirping of
crickets in the lush grass; the shrill call of the katydid answering his
mate, and prophesying an early frost; and perhaps other sounds as
well--the croak of the bull-frog, the loud cry of the whippoorwill, or
the hooting of owls perched on some dead tree.

At the tail end of November, with most of the dead leaves strewn on the
ground, and the trees standing there bare of foliage, these familiar
sounds were hushed; and only a somber silence lay upon the land, which
was ten times more apt to produce nervousness on the part of the
listening boys than any combination of well known night cries.

Now and then some one would sigh, or move slightly; but beyond that they
maintained the utmost silence; which showed how well drilled they were
as scouts, and obedient to orders.

Their senses were under such a tremendous strain that it actually seemed
to Toby and perhaps Lil Artha, that they would have given a great deal
for the privilege of shouting at the top of their voices a few times;
but they did not attempt such a foolish remedy.

Lil Artha did make a slight movement after a long time, and as the
others fastened their anxious eyes upon him they saw that he had gently
taken out the little nickel dollar watch he carried. Bending forward so
that a ray of moonlight might fall on the face of the time-piece, Lil
Artha consulted it to learn if his suspicions were correct.

When he glanced around and saw that he was the center of observation, he
just nodded his head up and down several times. In that fashion he
informed the others that it was fully midnight; which was what they were
so anxious to know.

So far there had been no sign of a walking specter. George was getting
over his fears. He even commenced to shrug his shoulders every time he
saw one of the others looking his way. That was George's mute protest
against all this foolishness; of course he had known that it would end
this way right from the start, and had only agreed to come along to
please Elmer, as well as show them that ghosts had no terrors for any
sensible scout.

"'Sh!"

A thrill passed over every fellow as Elmer gave vent to this warning
hiss. They looked at him instinctively in order to learn the reason for
it, and found that the scout master did not seem to be staring out of
the open window as before. On the contrary he was intently focussing his
gaze down the wide hall toward the group of shadows that clustered at
the further end.

And as their eyes also roved in this direction once again did that cold
hand seem to grip every heart. Something white was moving there, beyond
the shadow of a doubt! They watched it advance, and then retreat
methodically, systematically, as though it might be a part of a
well-oiled machine.

Toby rubbed his eyes very hard, as though under the impression that they
were playing him false; while George shoved up closer to the next in
line, which happened to be Chatz, who bent over to stare into his face,
as though eager to learn the condition of George's bold heart.

What could it be? Certainly no dog had anything to do with this new
source of alarm, for it was tall, after the fashion of a man, and seemed
to be dressed in white from head to foot.

Though they listened with all their might none of them could catch the
sound of footfalls. If the mysterious object were a human being he must
be barefooted to be able to move along without making a sound; while if
it were a spirit, as doubtless most of them were ready to admit by now,
of course there was not anything remarkable about the silent tread,
because all spirits are able to project themselves through space without
even a shivering sound--so those who deem themselves competent to judge
tell us.

Elmer was perhaps also mystified more or less. Though he might know more
about the secrets of the old house than any of his companions, still
this particular manifestation was something he would like to have
explained.

There was no use asking any of the other boys, because they were
naturally much more shaken up than he could be, and hardly able to give
any information. The only way to do was to go to headquarters for his
knowledge of facts; in other words creep along the hall, keeping in the
shadows, until he found himself close enough to learn the true nature of
the "ghost."

That was what Elmer finally started to do. George managed to sense his
going, and the gasp he gave voiced his apprehension, as well as his
admiration for the bravery of his fellow scout.

"Stay here!" whispered the leader, in the lowest possible tone, which
could not have penetrated more than two feet away, but was enough to
warn the others that he did not wish them to follow when he crept away.

He went on hands and knees, picking out his shelter carefully as he
advanced.

Five other fellows crouched there and continued to watch, first that
puzzling white figure that noiselessly kept up its ceaseless parade back
and forth, and then the creeping scout, slowly and carefully covering
the space that separated him from the object under observation.

They did not know what to expect in the way of a shock; anything seemed
liable to happen just then. George in particular was wondering if his
scoffing remarks, so lately uttered, could have been overheard; and
whether they would likely attract particular attention in his quarter.
He also remembered what Chatz had said, while they were still near the
tents, to the effect that it was always much easier running in the
moonlight than when the pall of darkness lay upon things; not that
George was contemplating a wild retreat, of course not, so long as the
others stood their ground; but then it did no harm to be prepared like a
true and careful scout, so that he would know just how he must leap
through that open window if there arose a sudden necessity.

Meanwhile, there was Elmer hunching his way along the hall toward the
moving object in white that had so mystified them. He would raise
himself, and push along a foot or so, and then resume his squatting
position; but all the while steady progress was being made, and without
any noise, however slight.

When he had managed to make out what the nature of the white thing was,
Elmer planned to return again to his chums, and if it proved to be
simply a human being like themselves, he had a scheme in his mind
looking to first cutting off all retreat, and then making a capture,
after which perhaps they could learn what all this mummery meant.

Of course Elmer was always conscious of the fact that it would be an
unwise act for him to pass out of the line of shadow, and allow the
moonlight to fall upon him while making this advance. Fortunately there
was sufficient shadow to admit of his passage without taking these
chances.

He had already passed over a quarter of the distance separating him from
the mystery at the time he started, and everything seemed to be going as
well as any one could wish. If he could only keep the good work up a
little while longer Elmer believed he would be in a position to judge
things for what they were, and not what the fears of the boys had made
them appear.

By straining his eyes to the utmost he fancied that he could even now
make out what seemed to be the tall figure of a man, who was dressed all
in white. His bearing was erect, and he carried himself with the
stiffness of a soldier on parade. Yes, this comparison was made even
stronger by the fact that he seemed to have something very much like a
gun, though it may have been merely a stick, gripped tight, and held as
a sentry might his weapon, while pacing back and forth before the tent
where his commanding general lay sleeping.

Elmer also stopped to rub his eyes, not that he was doubting what he
saw, but the continued strain weakened them, and even brought signs of
tears, that made accurate seeing next to impossible.

Well, half a dozen or so more hunches ought to carry him along far
enough to enable him to make positive; and he believed he could
accomplish it without betraying his presence to the unknown walker, be
he human or a ghost.

By this time the scout had drawn so close that he thought it good policy
to remain perfectly quiet while the mysterious white object advanced
toward him, making all his progress when the other had turned, and was
moving away.

The half-dozen contemplated movements had now been reduced to three, and
he saw no reason to believe that his presence was known. This spoke well
for his work as a scout; it also promised such a thing as success.

Elmer had one thing in his favor, and this was an entire freedom from
any belief in things supernatural. While he never boasted, like George,
and some of the other scouts liked to do, at the same time he believed
that everything claimed as belonging to the realm of spirits could be
explained, if only one went about it the right way.

On this account, then, he had not allowed himself to give even the least
thought to such a thing as meeting a ghost. That white figure, to him,
must be a man, no matter what motive influenced him to act in this
strange way; and before he was done with the affair the scout master
hoped to be able to probe the enigma, and find a reasonable answer that
would fit the case.

Another turn along on his hands and haunches took him just that much
nearer the object of his solicitude. That left only two more to be
negotiated before he would have reached the mark he had mentally chosen
as the limit of his investigation. After that he must return to inform
his friends of his discoveries, so that together they might lay plans
looking to the capture of the white mystery.

But boys as well as men often lay splendid plans without taking into
account the element of chance that always abounds. Elmer might be doing
all he figured on, and yet meet with a cruel disappointment.

He had just drawn back to make the next to last forward hunch, and was
in a position where any other movement was an utter impossibility when
there sounded a loud and unmistakable sneeze! A draught of air had
caught George without warning, and brought this catastrophe about before
he could think to try and head it off by rubbing the sides of his nose
vigorously, or through any other known agency.

As the sneeze rang out Elmer, knowing what the result must be, attempted
to gain his feet, meaning to spring boldly forward; but his awkward
position placed a handicap on quick action, so that he wasted several
precious seconds trying. When he did finally manage to gain an upright
position it was to find that the white figure had vanished as utterly as
though the floor had opened and swallowed it up; nor had the scout heard
the slightest sound of a footfall.




CHAPTER XIV

TOLD AROUND THE CAMP FIRE


OF course Elmer was disappointed when his carefully laid plans all went
by the board, owing to that unfortunate sneeze, just at the worst
possible time.

As a matter of duty he ran forward to where that strange figure in white
had been marching to and fro, but just as he fully expected there was
not a single sign of the late presence.

So Elmer walked back to where his anxious chums were crouching, craning
their necks in the endeavor to ascertain what was going on. He found
them ready to ply him with questions; and Toby's first act was to free
himself from suspicion.

"George did it, Elmer!" he hastened to say; "with his silly little
sneeze. It sure gave us all a shock, and when I thought to look again
that bally ghost was gone."

"But how could I help it?" complained the guilty culprit. "I never had
the least idea it was coming, when all at once it gripped me hard. If
you'd offered me half a million dollars right then not to sneeze, I
couldn't have earned thirty cents. It took me just as quick as that,"
and he snapped his fingers to illustrate how impotent he had been in the
grasp of a necessity.

"I've been there myself, George," said Elmer, kindly, because he knew
how badly the other scout must feel on account of having upset all their
plans; "and just as you say, sometimes a sneeze comes so fast you can't
keep it back if your life depended on it. Of course it was unfortunate,
because in another minute I'd have been close enough to have done all I
wanted."

"But my stars! Elmer," exclaimed Lil Artha, in dismay, "you didn't
expect to jump that spooky thing all alone, I hope?"

Elmer laughed, which act proved to the distressed George that his
offense could not set so heavily on the mind of the scout master after
all.

"Certainly not, Lil Artha," Elmer told the long-legged scout; "I
expected to drop back, and get the rest of you before anything was done.
But accidents will happen even in the best regulated scout troops, and
that was something nobody could help. Better luck next time."

"Then, suh, you don't mean to give up this ghost hunt?" asked Chatz,
with a ring of exultation in his voice.

"Not if we have another chance to hook up with the mystery," replied
Elmer.

"But tell us, weren't you close enough up to see whether it was a real
ghost or not?" demanded George, arousing to his old self again.

Chatz could be heard giving a little indignant snort. He was evidently
unable to understand how any one could doubt after seeing what they had.
Chatz, with all his leaning toward a belief in spirits, had never
before come so close to an object that had all the earmarks of a ghost;
and he was correspondingly elated.

"I guess I was all of that," Elmer replied, quietly.

"And what do you think about it, Elmer?" continued George, persistently.

"We want to know!" added Toby, determined to get his word in somehow.

"There's a whole lot to tell," said Elmer, "and this isn't just the
place to begin the story. So let's get back to the camp, where we can
sit around the fire for another half hour, while I enlighten you on some
things I happen to know."

What he said gave the others a new thrill. For the first time some of
the scouts became aware that their leader had all along been in
possession of certain facts in connection with the strange appearance of
this reputed ghost. One or two there were, notably Chatz Maxfield, who
had suspected something of the kind, owing to the queer way Elmer had
often smiled while the others were disputing fiercely concerning the
possible identity of the specter.

"That sounds good to me, Elmer," announced Lil Artha, without a second's
hesitation, "and for one I'm ready to skip out of this place. It's raw
and spooky enough here to give us all pneumonia. Let's get alongside a
cheery old camp fire; and then you to spin the yarn. It wouldn't
surprise me so much if I heard that you'd known the pedigree of our
ghost all along, and was just holding back to see what fun you could
shake out of the situation."

"No, you're wrong there, Lil Artha!" declared the scout master,
earnestly; "that isn't so. I began to have my suspicions, but up to now
had found nothing to confirm them enough to warrant me telling what I
knew, or thought. But the time has come, because this thing has gone far
enough. Lend me your little flash-light torch, Lil Artha. The rest of
you wait here for me again, please."

As Elmer hurried away they noticed that he was making along the hall
directly toward the spot where they had recently seen the weird white
object that moved forward and back, again and again, with the regularity
of clockwork.

"He's gone to see if he can find any footprints in the dust on the
floor?" suggested Ty Collins.

At that Chatz gave another grunt, as though to his superior mind it was
a very foolish remark; because ghosts never left any tracks behind them.
But as he seemed to be in the minority, and knew it was hardly wise to
invite another verbal attack, Chatz chose to seal his lips and remain
dumb. His triumph would come later on, when they were seated around the
glowing fire, and Elmer chose to explain his views of the matter,
gleaned at close range.

A short time passed thus. The scouts were keyed up to top-notch pitch,
and the seconds dragged fearfully while they awaited the coming of their
leader. They could see him moving about, by means of the little glow
cast by the hand electric torch he had borrowed from Lil Artha; who
felt that his fetching such a useful article along had vindicated his
wisdom. Scouts should look ahead, and prepare themselves for all sorts
of possible needs. That was what they were learning to do day after day,
as they strove to earn new honors, and reach a higher plane in the great
organization.

Finally when the waiting scouts were beginning to sigh, and wish Elmer
would get through with his searching around, they heard him give the
well-known signal that was meant to call them to his side.

"All ready to go back to camp now, fellows," was all Elmer said as they
hastened to join him; for it was necessary to pass by that way in
heading for the stairs.

Whether or not he had been successful in finding any traces of the
mysterious _thing_ they had been gaping at so long, Elmer did not bother
telling them just then. That would keep until he was ready to explain
fully.

The camp, as we happen to know, was not far removed from the haunted
house that had gained such a bad name among the farmers of that section
for many years, on account of the sad story connected with its past; and
in a short time they filed in before the two guardians of the stores,
much to the satisfaction of Landy and Ted.

Of course the pair who had been left behind were eager to know what had
happened to their more fortunate comrades who had gone on the
ghost-hunting expedition; and they started to bombard Toby and Lil Artha
with a series of questions that made the victims throw up their hands.

"Yes, we did see something, and that's right," admitted the latter
scout.

"A tall white figure, too," broke in Chatz, who wanted to make sure that
nothing was omitted in the telling that ought to be narrated; "and it
kept moving up and down again and again like an uneasy spirit. If you
asked me I'd say it was the ghost of old Judge Cartaret, come back to
visit the scene of his crime!"

"Oh! gosh!" was all the staggered Landy could say, but it expressed the
state of his feelings exactly.

"Don't believe too much of what Chatz says till you hear what Elmer's
got to tell us all," warned Toby. "You see, he went and crept up close
to that _aw_ful figure, and then George here, just like he wanted to try
things out, and see if it really was a ghost, had to give a whopper of a
sneeze; and when we looked again the thing had disappeared like smoke.
But Elmer knows something, and he promised to tell us the real stuff
when we got sitting around our bully fire here. So pull up, fellows, and
let him know we're all ready to listen."

"Take my word for it," Lil Artha told them, "I'm wild to hear what Elmer
knows."

"What he _believes_, say, Lil Artha," corrected the scout master,
pleasantly; "for I haven't been able to prove it to my satisfaction
yet, though I hope to do that before we leave up here."

"That's all right, Elmer," said Toby, quickly; "your word's as good as
your bond, and when you _think_ a thing it's pretty sure to be it!"

This remarkable confidence which his chums had in him always spurred
Elmer on to doing his level best. He felt that he could not afford to
lose a shred of such sublime faith; and no doubt on many occasions this
had enabled him to gain his end when otherwise he might have considered
the case hopeless, and abandoned all design of succeeding.

Accordingly the whole eight of them found places around the fire, which
had of course been built up again until it was a cheery sight. Around
midnight at the extreme end of November the air is apt to be pretty
chilly during the small hours of the night, so that the boys could
hardly keep up too hot a blaze to satisfy their wants.

Naturally all of them had made sure that from where they sat they could
see the face of Elmer. As he was the center of attraction it was bound
to add more to their pleasure if they could watch him as he explained,
and told his story of achievement.

The scout master looked around at that circle of eager boyish faces, and
smiled. He was very fond of every one there; after his own fashion each
scout had his good points, and Elmer knew them all, for had he not seen
them tested many a time?

"First of all, fellows," he remarked, "I'm going back to the other time
we were up here, and Toby declared he saw a white face at one of the
windows, which news gave us all such a queer feeling, because we
couldn't tell whether it was so or not. You remember after we left the
house I went back again?"

"Yes, sure you did, Elmer; but you never said a word about finding
anything!" George remarked.

"But he looked it," muttered Chatz, with increasing uneasiness.

"I went up to that window again, and hunted around to see if there was
any sign of footprints there," Elmer continued. "You know that in all
the years the house has been lying there deserted the dust has collected
everywhere, though don't ask me where it could come from, because I
don't know. Sometimes rain would beat in through the broken windows, and
lay it, but the wind coming later on set it free again. Anyway, there
was tracking dust there on that floor, and I found what I was looking
for!"

Everybody was hanging on his words. Chatz gave a groan. He saw that a
death blow was being given to his cherished belief; for of course if
Elmer had found _tracks_, the one who had made them could never have
been a ghost.

No one else was sorry, apparently. Indeed, there was more or less actual
relief in the series of sighs that welled up, especially from George,
who had secretly been getting a little shaky with regard to his
disinclination to believe in the ability of spirits to return to the
scene of their earthly troubles for divers purposes.

"You mean there was a track there; is that it, Elmer?" asked Toby.

"I found several of them, though our tramping around had almost covered
the trail up," Elmer went on, steadily.

"But how could you tell them from the marks we left?" continued Toby.

At that Elmer laughed.

"Well, that was as easy as tumbling off a log, Toby," he replied. "I
guess even a tenderfoot could have told, because you see the strange
track showed that the other party was _barefooted_!"

"Oh!" gasped George and Lil Artha in a breath; while Chatz did not say a
single word, only sat there with his eyes fixed on the beaming face of
the scout master, and the light of a cruel disappointment in their
depths.

"I tried to follow the trail," continued Elmer, "but that dust happened
to be limited in its scope, so that it was more than I could master, and
I had to give it up. But of course the fact that a barefooted man had
been at that window where Toby said he saw a white face gave me lots to
think about, even if I did make up my mind not to say anything about my
find until I had more to tell."

When Elmer paused to get his breath Toby grinned as though greatly
pleased.

"See!" he ejaculated, thrusting his chin out aggressively, "some of you
other fellows thought I was seeing things that didn't exist, and you
knocked me right hard about gettin' a pair of specs, because I needed
the same. But seems like it was you ought to go and visit the oculist. I
_did_ see a face, and it was sure a white one in the bargain. But excuse
me, Elmer, for keepin' the floor so long; that's out of my system now,
and let's forget it. Please go on and tell us the rest, because I'm dead
sure there's a lot more back of this."

"Well," the other scout observed, "of course, when we got home I was
bound to go around and ask a lot of questions about the old Cartaret
place up here; and everything else I could hit on. What I learned didn't
add a great deal to my stock of knowledge until just by accident I
happened to read a little item in an old number of the Stackhouse _News_
that came to our house, and it set me to thinking out a theory. That
article was about a family named Oxley that live near Stackhouse I
should think. It seems that they have the misfortune to have a son who
is crazy, because of some accident to his head several years ago. He
wasn't violent, and like some people they couldn't bear the thought of
having him shut up in an asylum; so they hired a keeper, and he was
watched at home. But it seems that he must have slipped away, for a
report had gone out that he was missing, and the paper asked its readers
to communicate with the family if by chance they came upon a demented
man, dressed in the white uniform of a Spanish officer; for it seems he
had been in Cuba during the war, and imagined himself a soldier again."

Elmer paused to let what he had said sink into the minds of his chums;
and it could be easily seen from the way they exchanged knowing looks
that the full significance of the scout master's discovery had struck
them heavily.

"Elmer, you hit the right nail on the head when you guessed that!" cried
Toby.

"Dressed in white, too; that clinches the thing!" added Lil Artha.

"I'm afraid it does," sighed Chatz, in a disappointed tone, while George
only said:

"Mebbe it does; but you can't always sometimes tell!"




CHAPTER XV

THE BOOGIE OF THE TOWER


"LET Elmer go on, and tell us some more," suggested Toby.

"Yes, we can talk it all over after we know the whole thing," added Lil
Artha.

"Once I got that notion in my head," the scout master continued, "and I
began to investigate along those lines. When I heard from two farmers in
the market, who happened to live up this way, that for weeks they had
been missing things off their places, mostly something to eat, I began
to figure it out that the crazy man had to live, and would most likely
forage for his grub, about like Sherman's <DW15>s did in the Civil War,
subsisting on the enemy's country.

"One of the hayseeds told me he had even set a trap for the thief,
thinking it might be just an ordinary hobo; and when the alarm came one
night he had hurried out to the hen-house only to find a couple of
chickens gone, and the trap sprung, but no victim in it, for the thief
had been too smart for him. But he said it beat him all hollow when he
found tracks of _bare feet_ around on the partly frozen ground in the
morning, because it seemed queer that any tramp would be going around
without shoes so near winter time!"

"Whew!" gasped Toby, entranced, and almost held spellbound by this
thrilling recital of facts and fancies.

"The other farmer," Elmer went on to say, "told me that twice when he
had had a visit from the strange thief he managed to glimpse something
white that was making off at top speed, and which he expected was a man,
though he couldn't be sure. He also said he had loaded up his
double-barrel shotgun, and was going to give the rascal a hot reception
the next time he called around. All of which kept making me feel that I
was on the right track."

"You just bet you were, Elmer!" Lil Artha exclaimed.

"A figure in white, remember, fellows; and the one we saw to-night was
dressed that way, as sure as shooting!" said Toby, convincingly.

"The poor Oxley fellow was in Cuba during the Spanish war, and must have
fetched the white uniform of a Spanish officer home with him," suggested
Ty Collins; "when he went out of his mind he imagined himself a Spanish
recruit, and they let him wear that soldier suit to humor him."

"Yes, and right now he believes he has escaped from an American prison,
and is trying to hide from the guard. He has to eat to live, and so he
steals things from the farmers around. Of course it's only a matter of
good luck that he hasn't been shot before now; and it couldn't last much
longer."

"Why, when winter gets here in dead earnest the poor fellow would freeze
to death, like as not," George remarked, showing that he was being
convinced against his will.

"But what gets me is his staying around the old haunted house," remarked
Toby.

"Oh! I don't see what there is queer about that," Lil Artha declared.
"Course he couldn't know anything about all this talk, so it's hardly
likely he's been trying to play ghost on us. We fooled ourselves, that's
what," with a quick look toward Chatz, as though to intimate that
possibly the Southern boy had had considerable to do with their being
hoodwinked; which was a lamentable fact, for a small fraction of yeast
will scatter through the whole pan of dough.

"And when you come to think of it," added Lil Artha, who had something
of a long head when a knotty question was involved, "where could a crazy
man find a better hiding place than in a house said to be haunted, I'd
like to know?"

"The poor fellow!" Ted was heard to say, that being his first utterance.
"Tell you what, we ought to put in all the rest of our time up here
trying to capture him. I'd never feel thatithfied to lie in my comfy bed
at home nighth, thinking of him up here, freezing perhapth. Thay we
will, Elmer, and you too, boyth!"

Ted was tender-hearted, and could never bear to see any one suffer if he
had it in his power to alleviate the pain. He promised to make a fine
doctor some day, for his knowledge along the line of medicine and
surgery was really wonderful; but while the other scouts had been so
deeply interested in figuring things out, and settling the question of
the strange man's identity, Ted had doubtless only considered his
physical sufferings past and present.

"I promise you that, Ted, with all my heart," Elmer assured him,
promptly enough, "because I wouldn't be satisfied to go away and leave a
helpless fellow like that here. I only wonder that he hasn't tried to
steal some of our stores before now; and perhaps we could set a trap
that would catch him, if he ever does come into camp. But we won't
depend too much on that. Sometimes the mountain won't come to you; and
then you've got to go to the mountain. That's one of the sayings the
Mohammedans have about their prophet, you know. Well, to-morrow we'll
get busy looking around, and see if we can locate this Ralph Oxley."

"Oh! is that his full name, then?" asked Toby, and he repeated it to
himself, as though he rather liked the sound: "Ralph Oxley!"

"He must have some sort of hiding-place around here," Toby ventured,
"and who knows but what we might run across the trail of a barefooted
man somewhere, that would lead us to his den."

"These crazy people are pretty slick, let me tell you," George hinted;
"and it ain't going to be an easy job to run him down."

"It mightn't be for some fellows who knew next to nothing about
tracking," Lil Artha spoke up, proudly; "but when scouts have been
through as much as we have it's different. Once we get a sight of his
tracks, and believe me there'll be something doing right away."

"I'm glad to hear you say that, Lil Artha," the scout master told him;
"it shows that you've got a heap of confidence in your knowledge of the
trail. Well, you've a right to feel that way. I can remember several
times when you beat us all out in finding signs, and getting there in
the end. We'll all do our level best to find his lair, and bring back
Mr. Oxley's son in the flesh. They must be dreadfully worried about his
absence by this time, and believe he has been drowned in either Lake
Jupiter or the Sweetwater River. It would be a feather in our caps if we
could restore the poor fellow to his folks."

"You told us he was a soldier, didn't you, Elmer?" pursued Toby; "and
say, p'raps now he thought he was on guard when he kept marching back
and forth dozens of times to-night. How about that, Elmer?"

"No doubt about it at all, Toby," came the reply; "for that was what he
was doing. I remembered what they had told me about his wearing white
clothes, even if they were soiled some by now, and thinking he is a
Spanish soldier. I believe he had a stick held up against his shoulder,
for all the world like a sentry's gun, and if we hadn't frightened him
off he might have kept that thing up for hours."

They continued to talk it over for some further time, and then having
apparently about exhausted the subject made ready to turn in. First
Elmer picked out two others who were to constitute the first watch with
him. They had to sit it out for a certain length of time, and keep
constantly on the lookout for a visitor; but as the limit of their vigil
was reached, and nothing happened, Elmer aroused three other scouts, and
bade them take the places vacated by himself, Toby and Lil Artha.

Morning arrived, and there had been no alarm. It was to be assumed that
those who had fulfilled the duties of sentries during the latter part of
the night had not slept on their posts. Elmer made an examination of the
stores, and found nothing amiss there; so it was settled that the crazy
man could not have mustered up enough courage to invade the camp of
those he considered his enemies.

After breakfast Elmer, accompanied by Chatz and Lil Artha, started out
to take a turn around in the woods, and look for signs of a trail made
by bare feet. Some of the others amused themselves as they saw fit, sure
that if the trail-seekers did make any interesting discovery they would
hear all about the same, and undoubtedly be given a chance to help
follow it.

It was Saturday, and had they been at home no doubt these same boys
might have been kicking the pigskin oval around with their fellows,
since it was still the gridiron season, and most of them belonged to the
Hickory Ridge football squad. They were much happier, however, in having
chosen this last camping trip of the season, for like true scouts their
keenest enjoyment lay in getting in close touch with Nature, and
learning many of her most cherished secrets. Football was all very good
in its way, but there were better things, as they had learned through
experience; and a search after practical knowledge was one of them.

"Now, I'll never get a better time to try it out," Toby up and declared
as he began to gather that bundle of his in his arms; "and I hope a
couple of you fellows will come with me to see my crowning triumph."

"I s'pose that means you're thinking of taking that fool jump off the
tower of the old house, and want us to be parties to the crime?" George
suggested, bitingly.

Toby surveyed him scornfully.

"I'm intending to make a glorious drop, and land on the ground as light
as any chicken feather might," he went on to say, with emphasis. "If
that's all the faith you've got in your chum's ability, George, mebbe
you'd better stay here in camp. It will spare you the sight of my
getting a broken leg, you know. I didn't ask you when I extended that
invitation; but I would like to have Ty and Ted come along; Landy too if
he wants to join us, and shout when I prove the great value of my noble
invention along humanitarian lines."

"Whew! you have got it down pat," chuckled Landy.

"Sure you want Doctor Ted along," sneered George; "you know which side
of your bread's buttered, don't you, Toby? If a cog slips in your
wheels, and you take a hard tumble you'll find his being on hand mighty
acceptable. I'd carry splints and bandages in plenty, Ted. And if I
have time I think I'll start to shaping up some kind of crutch while
you're away. Things like that come in handy sometimes. This is going to
be one of those times, I'm afraid."

"Rats! you old croaker, nothing would ever be accomplished in this world
if everybody was like you. They'd be afraid to take a chance. Things
that their ancestors used 'd be good enough for them, like the Chinese.
But thank goodness there are _some_ progressive people livin' these
days, like Edison, Marconi, and a few others."

"Jones, f'r instance!" chuckled George. "Well, if I don't show up at the
exhibition good luck to you, Toby. I hope it won't be anything worse
than a leg, or your collarbone, or five teeth knocked out. I wish you
great success. Tell me all about it when you get back. And I'm in dead
earnest about that crutch, too. I think I know how to shape one out of a
thick wild grapevine, if I can only find the right sort."

There was no use trying to talk George down, once he got started, and no
one knew this better than Toby, who had been worsted in many a verbal
encounter before now, so he only jerked his head contemptuously, and
lifting his burden, called out to the others:

"Come along, boys, if you've decided to be witnesses to my triumph.
Mebbe your names will go ringing down the ages too, as being present
when the glorious test was made that marked the end of aviators'
perils."

"One thing I think we'd better do, Toby," suggested Ty.

"Well, name it," the other threw over his shoulder as he tramped
sturdily along, carrying his wonderful parachute ready for business.

"When you say you're all ready for the jump I'm going to give the wolf
call, so Elmer, Lil Artha and Chatz can have a chance to come around,
and share the honor with us of being living witnesses of your work."

Toby seemed to ponder this for half a minute; and then remarked:

"I guess that would only be fair, because Elmer might feel huffed if I
jumped into glory, and him not there to see it. Yes, I'll get up on the
tower and when I say the word you give the '_how--oooo_' call that'll
fetch 'em running."

"Consider that a bargain then, Toby," Ty told him; "and remember, don't
you go to making your jump till they come up. Elmer might be provoked,
and believe you sneaked off unbeknown to him to try the same. They're
likely somewhere close by, I reckon, and we're apt to run across the
trackers hard at work while we're on our way to the haunted house right
now."

But they did not, although they caught the sound of voices through the
aisles of the dense woods, and knew that Elmer with his comrades must be
somewhere, not far away.

The old building stood there just as they had seen it before. Landy and
Ty had not been along when the nutting party met with their first
adventure here; but on the preceding afternoon they had surveyed the
wreck of a house, so that their only experience had not been the one at
midnight.

Besides, now that the halo of mystery had been removed, so that they
knew the white object they had seen was only a poor crazy fellow and not
a ghost from the other world, the boys experienced far less timidity
about approaching the house.

"We'll stay down here, Toby," said Ty, as he took up a position that was
directly underneath the tower.

Ted had carried a burden along with him also. This he now threw upon the
ground, and it proved to be one of the stout camping blankets. Toby only
chuckled when he saw that.

"Please yourselves, fellows," he assured his comrades, "but you won't
need anything like that. I'm going to float like a thistledown. It'll be
the triumph of the age, and don't you forget it. Watch what I do, now,
everybody!"

With that Toby boldly entered the house, and started to make his way up
to the tower. Apparently he must have noticed how one could reach that
elevated region, though as yet none of them had thought to go there.
Inside of five minutes the boys below saw him looking down at them from
far above.

"Wait till I get my parachute ready, fellows!" he called; "and there's
Elmer and the rest hurrying up, waving their hands like they wanted me
to hold on till they got here. Mebbe I will; the more the merrier!
Stretchin' out your old blanket, are you? Well, take my word for it you
won't need to grab me any. I'm staking a heap on this thing to hold me
up easy. Wow! what's this? Let go, there, you don't get that precious
thing away from me! Hey! fellows, here's that crazy man tackled me! He's
wantin' to grab everything! Quit pushin' or you'll have us both tumblin'
over the edge! Whoop! somebody come up here and help, or he'll get me!"

The two boys below heard all this shouted at the top of Toby's voice;
although of course they had but slight glimpses of the struggling
figures above. A desperate wrestling for the possession of the parachute
was evidently going on, for they could hear the sound of scuffling feet;
and besides, Elmer and the others who were fast coming on the run,
seemed to be shouting at the top of their voices, as though under the
impression that by the noise of their yells they might alarm the man who
was out of his mind and had attacked the scout, believing him an enemy.




CHAPTER XVI

HOMEWARD BOUND--CONCLUSION


"HELP! Let go of me! Hi! Elmer, he's up here! Come quick, I can't hold
him any longer!"

That was what Toby was shrieking excitedly, as he struggled with the
poor demented Spanish War veteran. Then there came answering shouts from
Elmer, now close at hand; but of course Toby could not carry out any
directions that were fired at him.

Presently those below saw the two figures topple over the edge, Toby
still frantically clutching his beloved parachute, which was extended to
its fullest dimensions, and the other evidently fiercely trying to hold
on to his supposed enemy.

The extended blanket was torn from the grasp of the two boys, despite
their earnest attempt to hold it taut; but at the same time it must have
helped break the fall of the pair. The parachute had not been built for
two, and could not be expected to bear their combined weight, in spite
of Toby's boasts about half a ton not being too much.

One of the recumbent figures instantly sprang to his knees. It was Toby,
and he still gripped the rod of his parachute with a determined hold.

"Never hurt me a teenty bit!" he shrilled, in his excitement; and then
he suddenly stilled his ardor, for on looking down he saw the crazy
man, dressed in that soiled white uniform brought from Cuba, lying there
with the blood trickling down the side of his head, and the sight
shocked Toby into repressing his exultation.

But Elmer was coming on the run, and already Doctor Ted had knelt beside
Ralph Oxley, with his professional instincts all aroused. He sent one of
the boys racing to the camp for his medicine case; and Elmer on his
arrival suggested that they carry the unconscious young man to where the
fire burned.

Being scouts, and accustomed to making a good litter out of almost
anything, they speedily arranged it so that between four of them the
victim of the fall was borne to the camp. On the way they met Lil Artha
and George, hurrying toward the house; but of course these parties now
returned with them, since the medicine case was needed in camp.

Ted first of all washed the wound in the young soldier's head with cold
water, and then applied a cloth soaked in soothing balm, that would
assist in stopping the bleeding.

"Oh! I hope he isn't going to die on us," said Toby, who seemed to feel
that in some way his desire to test his parachute life-saving appliance
from the tower of the old house had brought this near-tragedy about, and
hence he felt unusually sorry.

"I don't think tho," Doctor Ted hastened to tell him; "he got a nathty
cwack on the head, and it's fwactured it thome, but right now he theems
to be coming out of the daze. There, did you thee his eyeth open and
thut again? Next time he'll keep them open, believe me, fellowth."

Imagine the amazement and consternation of the boys when a minute later
Ralph Oxley not only opened his eyes, but stared all around at each one
in turn, then at the tents and the burning camp fire.

"Where am I?" he stammered, weakly. "What's all this mean? Are we still
at the front? Where's my khaki uniform like the ones you're wearing, and
why have you put this old white one on me? It's a Spanish suit. I know
because I've got one like it home. Who are you? I don't seem to
recognize any of you boys."

What seemed next door to a miracle had been wrought! Elmer and Ted
stared eagerly at each other as though they could hardly believe their
senses.

"He's got his mind back again!" exclaimed Chatz, wildly exultant. "It
must have been the crack on the head did it. I've heard of such things,
but never thought I'd ever run up against a case. Why, he's as sensible
as any of us, fellows!"

Elmer rushed forward, and stood over the recumbent man, who looked at
him with a puzzled air.

"Your name is Ralph Oxley, isn't it?" asked the scout master, quietly.

"Yes, it is, but--" began the other, when Elmer raised his hand to stop
him.

"I'll explain as near as I can to you," he went on to say. "You were
hurt on the head a few years ago, and went out of your mind. Ever since
your folks have kept you at home because they said you were not
dangerous, but there was an attendant employed to look after you. Some
weeks ago you escaped, and nobody has ever found where you went. They
feared you had been drowned somewhere. But you must have had the idea
you were a Spanish soldier escaped from an American prison, for you have
been in hiding up here at the old Cartaret house, and getting what food
you could by raiding the farms all around. We are Boy Scouts belonging
at Hickory Ridge, and the other day when we were up here we thought we
glimpsed somebody, but a few of my chums believed it was a ghost. Now
we've come to spend our Thanksgiving holidays in camp. You had a bad
tumble, striking your head again, and cutting it; but somehow it has
brought you back to your right mind, Ralph Oxley."

The young man, who could hardly have been more than thirty-five years of
age, though a veteran of the Spanish war, put up his hand, and felt of
his head, wincing with the pain the contact gave him. A tinge of color
was creeping back into his pale face, which Elmer was delighted to see.

"It is all a mystery to me," Ralph Oxley told them, shaking his head.
"I have no recollection of doing anything like you say. In fact, the
last thing I remember seems to be of riding out to look over a new farm
my father had bought, and of my horse running away when some one shot
close by the road. After that it is all a dead blank; and yet you say
some years have passed since then?"

He seemed awed by the thought.

"That must have been where you were thrown, striking on your head,
received the injury that caused your mind to become a blank," Elmer told
him; while Doctor Ted nodded vigorously as though seconding the motion.

"But I'm in a terrible position, with only these thin clothes on, and no
shoes or socks on my feet," remarked the man, who, now that he had
returned to his senses, could apparently feel the sting of the cold air,
something that doubtless he may not have been sensitive to before.

"Perhaps we can fix you up with something to tide over," Chatz told him.
"Here's Lil Artha, whose feet must be the same size as yours, and I
happen to know he brought a pair of new extra moccasins along, which he
hasn't worn yet."

First one, and then another proposed lending Ralph certain garments,
until in the end he was well taken care of. He even sat with them,
propped up in a comfortable seat, and ate the dinner the scouts
prepared, asking dozens of eager questions, many of which they were not
able to answer, because they concerned his people, and none of the
scouts happened to know them.

"I'm going to make a proposition to you, fellows," said Elmer, when they
had finished their meal; "and here it is. You know Stackhouse is about
eleven miles away from here, though twice that far from Hickory Ridge.
My map shows a fairly decent road leading there. Suppose we pull up
stakes and start for Mr. Oxley's home? We could make it before sunset, I
should think. It's true that our camping trip would be cut short a day,
but I'm sure I voice the sentiments of every fellow that we'll feel
mighty well repaid for any little sacrifice like that when we turn in to
the Oxley place and bring back their lost son, not what he was when he
ran away, but clothed in his right mind. Everybody in favor of that move
say aye!"

A chorus answered him in the affirmative; why, even that hardened
objector, Doubting George, shouted with the rest; for once having
apparently chosen to be what Toby called "civilized."

Ralph Oxley had tears in his eyes as he insisted on shaking hands with
every one of the scouts.

"You're a fine lot of boys, let me tell you!" he declared, with deep
feeling; "and I wouldn't accept your sacrifice only for my mother's
sake. They ought to know the happy news as soon as possible. Every
minute that I'm delayed is just so much more suffering for my dear
parents; and a sweet girl too that I was going to marry when that
accident came about. But I'll never forget it, fellows; and you'll hear
from the Oxley family later on."

"Not a word about any money reward, suh!" cried Chatz, sternly; "we're
scouts, and we'd scorn to accept anything in the way of pay for doing a
thing like this. It's given us a heap more pleasure than anything that's
happened for many moons, believe me, suh!"

"And to think," added Toby, with a beaming smile on his face, "my
remarkable parachute came near holding up double weight. I really
believe if only Mr. Oxley here hadn't managed to strike his head on that
cornice when he fell, both of us would have landed without a scratch.
And let me tell you that I think it's already shown what a life-saver
it's bound to be."

"Hurrah for Jones, the greatest after Edison this country has ever
produced," cried Lil Artha, pretending to wave his hat furiously.

They were soon all at work, and the tents came down with a rush, for
long experience along these lines had made Elmer and his scouts clever
hands at anything pertaining to camp life. Nancy was hitched up, and the
wagon loaded. They made a comfortable seat with the tents and the
blankets for the injured young man; and before an hour had elapsed,
after finishing that last meal, they had said good-bye to the haunted
house, and were on their way.

It was a long though not uninteresting afternoon ride; because they were
passing over a district that was practically new to them.

Presently they overtook a young woman who was tripping along ahead of
them. Just as Elmer was about to ask her something about the Oxleys she
gave a shriek, and rushing to the tail-end of the wagon commenced to
reach out toward the wounded passenger, calling his name in great
excitement.

It developed, of course, that this was the same girl Ralph had been
about to marry at the time of his unfortunate accident; and her wild
delight at finding that the missing one had not only been found, but was
restored to his proper senses as by a miracle, can better be imagined
than described.

Shortly afterwards they turned in at the fine Oxley farm, and it was not
long before the greatest excitement came about that had been known in
that region for many a month. The mother had her boy in her arms, and
was trying to laugh and cry at the same time; the father came running
madly to the spot; and what with dogs barking, and people shouting,
persons passing must have thought a lunatic asylum had broken loose.

The boys did not linger long after they had seen the family reunited;
though everybody wanted to shower them with thanks, and praise for their
having brought such happiness to the bereft home of the Oxleys. And
Ralph assured them that he and the young woman who was to be his wife
would certainly drive over to see the Hickory Ridge folks just as soon
as he was able to be about again.

Well, as they were a long distance from home, with darkness near at
hand, the boys determined to go as far along the road toward Hickory
Ridge as Nancy could draw the load, and then proceed to camp somewhere
for one night.

It was all a part of the outing, and no one appeared to regret having
followed the generous dictates of their warm young hearts.

While their camp that night may not have been as comfortable as before,
because of the lack of time to do certain things, they managed to get a
fair amount of sleep. No doubt the consciousness of having responded to
the demands of scout duty afforded them more or less solid satisfaction;
for even George was heard to say, as they drew near the familiar home
scenes on that quiet Sunday afternoon, it had been one of the best
little outings the Hickory Ridge Boy Scouts had ever enjoyed; and it
must needs be something beyond the ordinary that could coax this kind of
stuff from Doubting George.

But that year was fated not to die out without Elmer and his chums being
given another splendid opportunity to show what their scout training was
worth, as the reader will discover upon securing the volume that follows
this, and which is to be had under the title of "The Hickory Ridge Boy
Scouts Storm-Bound; or, A Vacation Among the Snow Drifts."


THE END




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LIST OF TITLES

    ETHEL MORTON AT CHAUTAUQUA
    ETHEL MORTON AND THE CHRISTMAS SHIP
    ETHEL MORTON'S HOLIDAYS
    ETHEL MORTON AT ROSE HOUSE
    ETHEL MORTON'S ENTERPRISE
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       *       *       *       *       *

Transcriber's Notes:

Obvious punctuation errors repaired.

First advertising page, "Chenoweth" changed to "Chenowith" to match
actual book usage (Elmer Chenowith, a lad from)

Page 131, "Sandy" changed to "Landy" (Landy was complaining)






End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Hickory Ridge Boy Scouts: Under
Canvas, by Alan Douglas

*** 