Part 23 (1/2)

The log, which had been partly hacked up for firewood, was found, and a slender resinous strip was torn from it. Lighting one end of this strip of wood, Piper fanned it into a bright flame, and, bearing it in his hand, boldly entered the shanty.

The torch revealed nothing they had not previously seen, but it did give them complete a.s.surance that the boy they sought could not be hiding there.

”Yes, he got away, that's sure,” said Nelson; ”and there's only one way by which he could do it. He had to go back as he came.”

”And therefore,” said Billy quickly, ”he must be in the woods somewhere yonder. That's where we should look for him now.”

”Perhaps,” ventured Crane, ”he's near enough to hear us. Oh, Hooker!

Hey, Roy!”

Piper sprang at him savagely. ”Stop that, you idiot!” he snarled. ”Stop shouting that way! What are you trying to do?”

”Why, I thought he might hear me.”

”Yes, he might and be frightened into fits. No more of that fool business, Sile. Keep still and come on. We'll get off right away and do the best we can hunting for him over yonder.”

Over the treacherous crossing they returned to the solid ground beyond the border of the swamp. Looking backward, Cooper tugged at Springer's sleeve.

”Now I'm afraid we _won't_ find him, Phil,” he confessed. ”I'm afraid n.o.body will find him tonight. And when they do, it wouldn't surprise me if they dug his body out of this old swamp.”

CHAPTER XXII

A SURPRISING CONFESSION.

After a time Osgood and Nelson became separated from the rest of the searchers. They had come to a little opening where the moonlight shone upon a small pile of cord-wood that had been cut and left there during the past winter, and here they stopped and faced each other.

”It's worse than useless, this searching without lights of any sort save what the moon affords,” said Jack. ”There are thousands of places were one could hide from searchers if he chose. It would be better to go through the woods calling to Hooker and a.s.suring him we are friends.”

”I doubt,” returned Ned, ”if we'd find him then.”

”What do you suppose has become of him?”

”You can answer that question fully as well as I.”

”Well, then,” said Jack suddenly, ”what do you suppose was the cause of all this trouble, anyhow? How was Hooker hurt?”

Osgood's answer was a shrug. Motioning toward two short stumps which stood nearby, he suggested that they should sit down.

”I want to talk to you, Nelson,” he said, when they were seated. ”I've got to talk to some one, and I'd rather it would be you than any one else. We've never been what might be called real friendly, have we?”

Surprised and wondering at his companion's words and singular manner, Nelson replied:

”I don't know that we've been exactly chummy, but--”

”Tell the truth,” interrupted Osgood, reaching out and putting his hand on the other boy's knee. ”We haven't been even friendly, although you seemed willing enough to be, and I've put up a bluff that I was. All the same, you didn't trust me. You knew I was bluffing.”

”I-I don't think-that I-actually knew it,” stammered Nelson, still more astonished.