The Banner Boy Scouts Afloat Part 24

There was no sign of life about the place, and after making sure of this the scouts grew bold enough to advance upon it from what seemed to be the rear, though this could be settled only by the fact that the entrance to the rustic hut appeared to be on the other side.

Creeping noiselessly up until they were alongside the shelter, the scouts set about finding loopholes through which they might obtain a glimpse of what lay on the other side of those frail walls.

Then one by one they drew back, and the looks they cast at each other indicated that what they had seen was not a pleasant sight.

CHAPTER XXII

THE WIGWAG MESSAGE

The other side of the rough shack was partly open, so that considerable light managed to gain admittance. This had enabled the scouts to see a figure lying on some old blankets, together with the skins of several animals.

It was without doubt the wild man who had given some of their troop such a bad scare when he turned up near the camp soon after their arrival on the island.

He seemed to be sound asleep, and none of them were at all anxious to make any sound calculated to arouse him. Indeed, more than one put a finger to his lips to indicate that they were sealed, as he turned and looked anxiously at his comrades.

Paul made motions to let them know it would be just as well if they quit the vicinity of that queer shack, where the crazy man, as they now deemed him, had his home.

A few minutes later, when they had put enough distance between themselves and the rude shelter to permit conversation, Bobolink could no longer keep his opinions to himself.

"He was a jim-dandy, all right, and a genuine wild man of the woods!" he remarked. "What are the circus fellows thinkin' of, to let such a fine chance slip by to get a real 'What-is-it,' fresh from the jungles of Borneo, half man, and the rest gorilla?"

"And he had Nuthin's dog, after all," observed Paul, quietly.

"What makes you say that, Paul?" asked Jack.

"Because, in the first place, I saw a lot of bones, picked as clean as a whistle, lying on the ground over in a corner. Then there was a lair that looked as if an animal slept in it. And if that wasn't enough, I noticed a piece of broken rope fastened to a stake, close by that corner. You remember I said the dog was dragging a piece of rope around with him, when he came creeping up near our camp last night? He broke away, all right; and I guess the wild man will be minus his dog after this."

"Well, that's one thing settled," a.s.serted Phil "We know now, for sure, there _is_ a wild man up here; and some of the officers will have to come and capture him. My father is one of the county freeholders, and he's overseer of the poor in the bargain; so I suppose it'll be up to him to carry out the job. They can't afford to have people say there's a crazy wild man at large, in our district, you see."

"Did any of you notice that there was a rude sort of table in the shack?"

asked Paul, as they kept on moving forward, wondering if a third discovery might be made at any minute.

"Well, now, that's a fact," replied Bobolink. "I did see that, but somehow didn't think it queer at the time, not enough to mention it, anyhow. But come to think of it, it was kind of out of the way in the shack of a wild man, eh?"

"There was something on the table that would seem stranger, if you'd noticed it. I saw a battered old coffeepot there!" observed Paul, smiling grimly.

"What?" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Bobolink. "A wild man liking coffee! Where d'ye suppose he gets the roasted bean? It don't grow on the bushes up here; and he sure don't look as if he had the cash to buy it. Oh! p'raps they use him to pa.s.s some of this bogus coin they make! Mebbe he goes to towns, and buys their supplies, all the time they're workin' like beavers up here, makin' the stuff."

"I don't just agree with you there, Bobolink," said Paul. "In the first place, as Phil will tell you, if such a scarecrow ever came into Stanhope, or any other town in the country, the officers would be sure to arrest him, and examine him to see if he oughtn't to be shut up in the asylum. If he got the old pot and the coffee to go with it from these men, then it was in the nature of a bribe not to interfere with their business, as they wanted to stay here on his Island."

"Great brain, Paul; you seem to hit the right idea every time. And chances are, that's just what happened," Bobolink remarked.

"That dog didn't come back," observed Tom Betts.

"And therefore he's still loose," added Phil, uneasily. "Hope we don't run across the beggar again; but if we should, remember Paul, the country expects you to do your duty. You must bag him, no matter what noise you have to make doing it"

"Leave that to me," remarked the scout master. "Now that we know pretty well how the land lies, and whose dog it is, perhaps I won't be so squeamish about shooting the beast if the chance comes along."

"Here's the foot of the rise," Jack broke in.

"And the trees grow more thin as the ground ascends, you notice," Paul went on. He called their attention to all such things, because he was acting as scout master of the troop, and it seemed to him that he should not allow any chance to pa.s.s whereby he might enlarge the horizon of scout lore of the lads under him.

"Then it strikes me that we ought to be a bit careful not to show ourselves too plain, as we go up," Jack suggested.

"You're right," added Bobolink. "For all we know, these fellows may have a lookout in a tree, as well as we have, and he'd see us if we got careless. That means we must dodge along, taking advantage of every sort of shelter that crops up. Great fun, boys, and for one I'm just tickled to death over the chance to prove that we learned our little lesson O. K."

All were presently stooping at one moment, where the bushes grew spa.r.s.e; crawling in among some sheltering rocks at another, and even getting down to wriggle along like so many snakes, when not even so much as a bush offered a means of hiding from observation, in case hostile eyes happened to be turned upwards toward the hilltop at the foot of the lone cedar.

It was not a great distance to cover, and before long they found themselves close to their goal.

Already could they see over the southern side of the island; and after they gained the cedar it would probably be easy to also survey the northern half, the part which doubtless held more of interest to them than any other, since they had reason to believe that the mysterious dwellers on the isle were somewhere there.

"Five more minutes will do it," remarked Paul, when they had gathered in a shallow depression which afforded shelter until they caught their breath again for another climb.

Paul was looking hard at something far beyond the lake. Bobolink, of course, being attracted by his scrutiny, also allowed his gaze to wander in that quarter; but all he saw was what he took to be a buzzard, almost out of sight--a dim speck in the heavens, and about to pa.s.s out of sight altogether where clouds hovered above the southern horizon.

"I c'n see about where our camp is," Phil was saying, "and I think I know which tree the signal corps is stationed in. Anyhow, I seem to glimpse something white moving among the green leaves, which, I take it, is a flag being held ready to wave at us."

"I reckon Paul will soon let 'em know we're still on the map," observed Bobolink. "But won't they be s'prised when they learn that we saw the terrible wild man in his own den; and ran across the plant where those rascals make their bogus coin, that looks as bright and good as any Uncle Sam stamps out?"

Just then the leader gave the signal for another advance, and the six scouts who followed set about completing the last leg of the climb.

They finally found themselves at the roots of the cedar tree that crowned the elevation, and which proved of a size far beyond what any of the scouts had imagined.

"Well, here we are at last," said Phil, breathing hard after his exertions.

"And," added Bobolink, also badly winded, though he would chatter; "now to see Paul get one of the other fellows on the line, to wig his wag at us, or do something that sounds that way. There he goes at it. And looky there, they've been watching us climb, I reckon, because almost before Paul made the first sign, that other fellow began sendin'."

They watched the fluttering red flag with the white centre. Some of them had taken more or less interest in sending and receiving messages; but the boy in the tree proved too fast for any of them to follow. They suspected that it was Jud Elderkin himself; for outside of Paul and Jack, he was the best hand at that sort of thing.

"My stars! he keeps right along doing it; don't he?" muttered Bobolink.

"Must be some message, too, believe me," added Phil.

"N-n-now, what d'ye s-s-suppose has happened at c-c-camp since we q-q-quit?" remarked Bluff, anxiously waiting for the message to be translated.

Not once did Paul break in on the sending of the message. He sat there, close to the base of the big cedar which sheltered his back from the north side of the island; and seemed to be wholly engrossed in transcribing the various signs of the flag code.

They could not see the boy in the branches of the tree; but from their elevated position the white and red flag was in plain view. Up and down, and crosswise, it continued to write its message, that was doubtless like printed letters to Paul and Jack, while unintelligible to those who had never taken lessons in wigwagging.

Finally came the well known sign that the message was done; and that the sender awaited the wishes of the party with whom he was in communication.

Paul turned upon his comrades. They saw that the frown had come back again to his usually smooth forehead, as though he had learned something to add to the perplexities of the problem they were trying so diligently to solve.

"It's Jud," he said, simply, "and he's just sent an astonis.h.i.+ng message. This is the way it ran, boys: 'Presence here known. Man in aeroplane pa.s.sed over camp. Went down lake half hour ago. Out of sight now. Answer!'"