"Say," he grinned, "but you fellows were somewhat scared last night."
"Yes," admitted Dave. "Weren"t you?"
"Not a bit," a.s.serted Hen bravely. "Sa-ay----"
He paused, looking around him in wonderment, then demanded tartly:
"What on earth are you fellows laughing at?"
"Laughing just to--to think what b.o.o.bies we were when we had the brave Hen Dutcher with us to set us a better example," answered Tom Reade sarcastically. "No use in talking, Hen! You"re the only fellow in this outfit that has any sand."
"Say, you needn"t try to get too funny, now," remarked Hen suspiciously.
"You fellows were all so scared that maybe you thought I was as bad as you. But I was only putting it on, just to see how far you"d all go."
"You must have been satisfied, then," returned d.i.c.k grimly, "for we surely were uneasy."
Hen blandly took to himself all the credit that was offered him for his "courage," seeing which the Grammar School boys winked slyly one at another, then busied themselves with the tasks of getting breakfast.
"To-day"s programme will be more work, I suppose," began Tom, as the lads seated themselves around the table.
"As I see it, it will have to be a day of work," d.i.c.k nodded. "For that matter, we"re learning that it"s no use for boys to go camping, especially in the winter, unless they"re willing to work."
"What"s to be done first?" Dave wanted to know.
"Well, we"ll need more wood, and more water," Prescott replied.
"As it doesn"t make much difference which we do first, I"m for getting the wood, if that suits the rest of you. Our path of yesterday is blown over a bit with snow, but we can dig it out again in a little while.
And, while we"re at that, we may as well dig through to the cook shack again. I want to get a good look in there this time."
"Expect to find Mr. Fits there?" Dave asked.
"Hardly, if we didn"t find him there yesterday. But, the more I think about it, the more I feel certain that the noises of last night were in some way connected with the shack."
"I"d like to believe that," muttered Tom. "If that"s the case, some of us might sleep in there to-night and catch hold of the noise maker."
"Who"d sleep there?" grimaced Dan.
"Well," responded Reade slowly, "we might let Hen sleep there. He"s the bravest of the lot, you know, and so he"s just the fellow for the job."
Dutcher choked over the food he was swallowing, and shifted his feet uneasily.
Soon after breakfast was over d.i.c.k, Dave and Tom stepped outside with the shovels. Here and there the path had been left fairly clear, though at other points they had to shovel industriously through the new drifts.
At last, however, they reached the same window through which they had looked in the day before.
"No sign of any one inside," muttered d.i.c.k. "Nor have we seen any signs of fire from the chimney. I can see the stove, now, but there doesn"t seem to be any sign of fire in it."
"Let"s dig around to the door," proposed Dave, "and go inside."
Accordingly the three bent to the new work. A few minutes later d.i.c.k gave a tug at the latch-string and the door swung open.
"It doesn"t seem as cold in here as you"d expect to find it," murmured Reade.
"That"s because we"ve just come from where it"s a good deal colder," Tom answered.
d.i.c.k stepped over to the cook stove, raising a lid.
"Look, fellows; here are a few live coals left here yet."
Dave and Tom joined him, staring at the embers in some astonishment.
"Yet there"s no one here, and no tracks in the snow outside," observed Tom. "Say, if the tenant of this place can go over the snow without leaving a trail, it does look rather ghostly, eh?"
"A ghost wouldn"t need warmth," d.i.c.k retorted promptly.
"Then what"s the answer?" challenged Dave.
d.i.c.k shook his head, but went to one window after the other.
"No one left or entered here by way of the window," Prescott soon announced. "It struck me that Mr. Fits might have used a window, instead of a door, but if so, there"d be tracks under the windows."
"Mr. Fits hasn"t been here at all," Dave replied, with a good deal of positiveness. "When we turned him out into the storm he went somewhere else."
"Then how about the ghostly noises, and the embers in the stove?" Reade wanted to know.
"Ask d.i.c.k," prompted Dave.
"I can"t tell you," laughed Prescott. "I guess you"ll have to ask Hen Dutcher."
"Well, there"s no one here but ourselves," Tom went on, as the boys stood staring about the tiny shack. "As far as finding anything here is concerned we may as well go about our task of wood gathering."
"I wish we could get at the bottom of the ghost mystery," muttered d.i.c.k wistfully.
"So do I," agreed Reade, "but wishes aren"t snow plows, and never were.
Fred Ripley and his cronies would be mean enough to come down here and spoil our rest at night, but they"d never be brave enough to face the long trip through the deep snow."
"Well, let"s go along and get in the wood," d.i.c.k urged. So they went, and more than an hour was spent in carrying logs into the main cabin. Of course Greg, Dan and Harry a.s.sisted in this, while Hen was put to his usual morning task of washing dishes and straightening things in the cabin.
For dinner the main dish was a platter of steak, broiled over the wood ashes in the fireplace, where the fire was briefly allowed to burn nearly out.
In the afternoon water hauling was the main occupation, as well as the only sport, for the boys had tried the slight crust on the snow, and had found that it would not bear.
"If it grows colder, and stays so for twenty four hours," declared Dalzell, "then we"ll have a crust on all this white stuff that will be strong enough to bear our weight. Then ho for tramping, and for hunting with the air rifle!"
"Huh-m-m-m!" answered Harry. "Rabbits and rabbit stew!"
After the water hauling the Grammar School boys settled themselves for some quiet enjoyment inside the cabin. Dave, Tom, Harry and Greg picked out books and sat down to read near the windows. d.i.c.k, on the other hand, elected to rove about the interior of the cabin, looking into odd nooks.
"This water barrel might be a little nearer the fire," proposed Prescott. "Then we wouldn"t have to break a crust of ice mornings. Dan, you don"t seem to be doing anything. Suppose you come and help move the barrel."