CHAPTER XXI
A MYSTERY OF THE OPEN GLADE
"This has been used since we had that hard rain, fellows," Paul observed.
Some of the others had noticed him handling the ashes that marked wherethe fire had been.
"Say, they are not warm, now, are they?" asked Phil, looking uneasilyaround, as if half expecting to see some rough men come swarming out ofthe bushes.
"Oh! I didn't mean that," replied the scout master. "But you can seefor yourselves that when it rains there's nothing to keep the waterfrom running down over this forge. In that case the ashes would besoaked. If you look again you'll see these are perfectly dry, and havenever been wet."
Several of the scouts picked up some of the ashes, and found that it wasexactly as Paul stated. They were as dry as powder; and could certainlynever have been rained upon.
"That means the forge has been used since the storm that helped us getthrough that muddy canal of Jackson's Creek; is that what you mean,Paul?" asked Bobolink.
"Nothing else," replied the other, still continuing his investigations,as if he hoped to make some further discovery, that might tell them whatthe field forge was intended for, when these unknown men carried it tothis secluded island.
"Great governor, Paul!"
Bobolink had stooped, and picked something from the ground. This he wasnow holding in his hand, and staring at it, as though he could hardlybelieve his eyes.
The other scouts crowded around him, and their eyes, too, widened whenthey discovered what it was.
"A quarter of a dollar!" exclaimed Jack.
"And a shining new one in the bargain," declared Tom Betts.
"What d'ye think of that, now?" said Phil.
Paul reached over, and took possession of the coin.
"Did you find that, Bobolink?" he asked, for sometimes the other wasknown to play tricks.
"I sure did, Paul, right like this," and stooping over, Bobolink wasabout to pretend to pick up something when he uttered a gasp.
"Another one!"
He was holding a second coin in his hand, the exact duplicate, so far asthey could see, of the first one.
"Must grow here in flocks!" exclaimed Phil; "let's see if we can dig up awhole bunch of 'em, boys!" But although they all started digging with thetoes of their shoes, no more shining coins came to light; and it began tolook as if Bobolink had been fortunate enough to pick up all there were.
Paul closely examined the two bright quarters.
"If those are queer ones then they'd fool me all right, let me tell you!"declared Bobolink.
"I never saw better in my life," Paul admitted.
The boys were looking pretty serious by now. It began to seem as thoughthat guess made by one of their number could not have been so wide of themark as at the time some of them believed. Here was pretty strongevidence that these men were engaged in manufacturing spurious coins.
Ought they to consider they had gone far enough, and give up theexploration of the island, returning home to sound the alarm, andsend word to the authorities, so that these men might be trapped asthey worked?
Paul was tempted to consider that his duty lay that way. Still, therewere some things that puzzled him, and made him hesitate beforeconcluding to follow that idea.
Why should they keep the forge out here in the open, when some shelterwould seem to be the proper thing, if, as the scouts now believed, theywere using the fire to smelt metals, and blend them to the properconsistency for the bad coins?
That was something that puzzled Paul greatly. It caused him to lookaround in the neighborhood of the forge, in the hope that he might pickup some other clue.
The ground was pretty well trampled over, as though a number of men hadbeen walking back and forth many times in their occupation, whatever itcould have been. Paul also saw a number of indentations in the earth,which made him think some heavy object had rested in that open space.
"Whatever they brought here," remarked Jack, presently, "it looks likethey must have used some sort of vehicle to carry it; because thesetracks have the appearance of ruts made by wheels."
"Rubber tires, too," added Phil. "I've seen too many of 'em not to know;for my father has a garage."
"Is that so?" exclaimed Bobolink, shaking his head, as if to say thatwith each discovery the mystery, instead of getting lighter, only grewmore dense.
"And look how close together they seem to be, would you; a pretty narrowbed for a wagon, don't it seem?" asked Tom Betts.
"But they run off that way," observed Bobolink, "and there are so many ofthe tracks you can hardly tell which are mates. There's Paul followin''em up; reckon we'd better keep with him, boys. We don't want to getseparated."
Paul soon came to a stop, and was joined by the others.
"Queer how the marks all seem to knock off about here," he remarked,pointing to the ground. "You can't find one further on. And it isn't thatthe ground suddenly gets hard, either. This looks the queerest thing ofthem all. What do they run that thing with wheels up and down here for?Anybody know?"
But silence was the only answer he received, since every one of the sixother scouts seemed to be scratching his head, and wrinkling hisforehead, as though deep in thought, yet unable to see light.
So they went back to the field forge, to look around again, though theirlabor was all they had for their pains.
"Not even another lovely quarter to be picked up where it got spilledwhen they made 'em here, p'raps by the bushel," grumbled Bobolink,scratching the earth with his toe in vain.
He had recovered the coins from Paul, and jingled them in his pocket;though the envious Bluff warned him that they might get him into a peckof trouble, should he be caught by Secret Service men.
"Huh! guess you think you c'n scare me into droppin' them," declaredBobolink, thrusting out his chin at Bluff. "Let me know if you see medoin' it; will you? I c'n just see you falling all over yourself, tryin'to grab these dandy coins, if I let 'em slip by me. Shoot a ball upanother alley, Bluff. Go hunt a fortune for yourself, and don't want tograb mine. Hands off, see?"
"Do we go back now, Paul; or had we better keep on to the hill?" Jackasked, as though he knew the other must have been settling this importantmatter in his mind.
"I think as we've come this far, with the hill just ahead of us, it wouldbe a disappointment not to get up to that cedar tree," Paul replied; atwhich every one of the other scouts nodded his head.
"W-w-want to s-s-see what the old p-p-place l-l-looks like," remarkedBluff, in his positive way.
"And there's no use in our staying around here any longer, either, Ishould think," ventured Phil. "How do we know but what some of the menmay just happen to butt in on us, while we're looking their old forgeover? And if they did, I just guess they'd make things hum for us. So Isay, into the woods again for me--the sooner the better."
"I hope we're doing the right thing by keeping on," Paul observed,looking at his companions in a way they took as an invitation toback him up.
"Who's got a better right to go where we feel like?" demanded Bobolink.
"Honest men wouldn't have any kick coming, just because a troop of BoyScouts happened to camp on their island; and it only goes to showthey're doing something shady, that's what. I say go on," Phil gave ashis opinion.
Jack, Andy, Bluff and Tom were quick to declare themselves opposed to anychange of plan, at least, until after they had reached their goal, whichwas the foot of the cedar on top of the hill.
This decision seemed to give Paul more heart, and when they left the openspace he cast a last glance back at it, as though still puzzled.
The trees grew even more dense as they drew nearer the foot of thatpeculiar rise in the ground which went to make up what they called ahill. Indeed, the boys were astonished to find such an almostimpenetrable jungle.
"Isn't that some sort of shack you can see over yonder?" asked Phil,presently.
As the rest looked, they agreed that it looked like a rude shelter, madeout of branches, a
nd some boards fastened together in a crude way.
There was no sign of life about the place, and after making sure of thisthe scouts grew bold enough to advance upon it from what seemed to be therear, though this could be settled only by the fact that the entrance tothe rustic hut appeared to be on the other side.
Creeping noiselessly up until they were alongside the shelter, the scoutsset about finding loopholes through which they might obtain a glimpse ofwhat lay on the other side of those frail walls.
Then one by one they drew back, and the looks they cast at each otherindicated that what they had seen was not a pleasant sight.