Part 14 (1/2)
CHAPTER VII
THE PROWLER OF THE NIGHT
The six youngsters stood looking curiously at one another.
”I wonder who it can be?” muttered Dan.
”Some one who has no business here, anyway,” returned Tom Reade bluntly.
”I wonder if it's some one who did live here, or some one who thinks he's going to keep on living here?” asked Dave Darrin dryly.
”Just the same, I'd like to know who has been living here,” d.i.c.k went on. ”For that matter, who would want to live here, in the depths of the woods in winter?”
”Well, we do, for one crowd,” Greg reminded him.
”Yes; but we're boys with a craze for open air and something different,”
Prescott maintained. ”Now, if men have been living here, the case is different. Men don't care about schoolboy junkets. If the man or men who have been living here are honest, I don't mind. Such men will move on if they find that we're here, and that we alone have the proper authority to live here. But suppose the men are not honest? Or rough characters?”
”It will depend on how many there are of them,” responded Dan, with one of his broad grins.
”Why?” challenged d.i.c.k. ”If we had to fight for the right to live in this cabin, how many do you think we could thrash?”
”Oh, I guess it won't come to that,” remarked Tom Reade coolly.
”And I hope it won't come to that, or anything like it,” d.i.c.k replied.
”But just the same, you're going to be scared until you find out? Is that it?” laughed Harry Hazelton.
d.i.c.k flushed, but he answered honestly:
”Until something happens I can't tell whether I'm going to be scared or not. Anyway, perhaps I won't show the greatest amount of fright that is displayed around here.”
”Now, you're answered, Harry,” muttered Dave in a low voice, his eyes flas.h.i.+ng. ”No fellow in this crowd has any right to doubt that d.i.c.k Prescott is all there with the grit when it's called for.”
”Can't a fellow joke?” asked Hazelton.
”But, while all this talk is going on,” chattered Dan, ”I'm not growing any warmer.”
”All lend a hand, and we'll get the fireplace cleaned out and the fire going,” urged d.i.c.k.
After that they made matters fly. The old ashes and hot embers were taken outside and spread. Logs were laid and coal oil spread over them.
A match was touched, flames leaped up in response to the heavy draft of the broad chimney, and the interior of the old cabin seemed ablaze.
”My, but that's going to be plenty hot, and some more,” chuckled Dan.
”Who'll chop the ice at the spring and get two buckets of water?” called d.i.c.k.
”I will,” Harry answered, and departed, Greg going along to help him. In a short time d.i.c.k had water boiling in a kettle that hung over the fire.
”I don't suppose anyone cares for coffee?” proposed d.i.c.k, glancing about him.