"What makes you think it's Ventner?" asked the caretaker. "Did you see his face? I don't think he is here."
"I didn't see his face," answered Will, "but I saw the shape of his shoulders and the hang-dog look of him."
"You're prejudiced against Ventner," laughed Canfield.
"I admit it!" replied Will. "He looks to me like snake in the grass.I don't think anything he could do would look good to me."
"Now," Canfield said, "perhaps we'd better be mapping out a plan of campaign. There are three gangways leading in three different directions. We'll leave one of the lights burning at the shaft, then we'll each take a light and proceed into the interior, making as much noise as we conveniently can, and flashing the light into all the chambers and cross headings we come to."
"How long are these gangways?" asked Will.
"Somewhere near a half a mile straight ahead," was the answer.
The caretaker went away swinging his electric searchlight, and Will and George pushed forward in their respective passages.
After proceeding a short distance, George heard Will calling to him.
"There's some one just ahead of me in the gangway!" Will declared. "I think we ought to go together!"
"Do you think it's that bum detective?" asked George.
"I certainly do!"
"Well, we can go together if you like," George said. "We can't cover quite as much ground in that way, but I guess we can accomplish more in the long run!"
The boys had proceeded only a short distance when they heard Canfield calling to them. A moment later they heard the caretaker's steps ringing on the hard floor of the gangway down which they were advancing. He came up to them, panting, in a moment.
"There's something mighty queer about this mine," the caretaker declared. "It was punk dry only two days ago, and now there are four or five feet of water where the gangway I started to follow dips down.
"And look there!" Will exclaimed holding his light aloft and pointing, "you can see plenty of water ahead! I guess all the gangways are taking a washing, and the water seems to be rising, too!"
"Is there any way by which the mine could be intentionally flooded?" asked George. "There may be some one planning trouble for the owners."
"There is only one way that I know of in which the mine could be flooded intentionally," replied the caretaker. "There is a large drain, of course, in what is known as the sump. Considerable water runs off in that way, and the rest of the drippings are taken out by the pumps. If this sump drainage could become clogged, the mine, of course, would become flooded though not to such an extent, unless the pumps were kept constantly at work."
"Then I guess you'd better set the pumps going," Will suggested. "We can't get into the mine in its present condition unless we swim."
"Haven't you got a boat?" asked George.
"Why, yes," replied the caretaker. "There's a couple of boats somewhere in the mine. The operators placed them here thinking they might come in handy at some future time, but I haven't any idea where they are now. Still, I think they're not far away."
"If you'll go and set the pumps in motion," Will advised, "George and I'll look around for the boats. We may need them before the pumps get under motion the way the water is pouring in now."
"I guess Tommy and Sandy don't come back because they're penned in by water," George suggested, as the boys began searching the vicinity of the shaft for the boats.
"If they're anywhere within hearing distance, they ought to answer us when we called out, hadn't they?" asked Will.
"We haven't tried that yet," George answered. "Suppose we let out a couple of yells!"
To think in this case was to act, and the boys did let out a couple of yells which brought the caretaker running back from the shaft.
The boys were listening for some answer to their shouts when he arrived, and so they paid little attention to his numerous questions.
"There is no time to lose," Canfield went on. "I'll go to the top at once and call an engineer and a couple of firemen. When you find the beat, take a trip down the main gangway here and stick your lights into all the cross-headings and chambers you see. But, above all," he continued, "don't fail to leave a light here at a shaft, and be careful that you never pass out of sight of it."
Canfield hastened away, climbing the ladders two rungs at a time, and soon disappeared into the little dot of light at the top.
The two boys searched patiently for the boat for a long time, but did not succeed in discovering it. At last, Will suggested that it might be in the mule stable and thither they went.
The boat was there, in excellent condition, and the boys soon had it swinging to and fro on the surface of the water which now lay several feet deep in the main gangway.
"Jerusalem!" exclaimed George, taking the depth of the water with an oar, "if the water is four feet deep here, how deep must it be at the middle of the dip?"
"About forty rods, I should think!" exaggerated Will.
The boys left a large searchlight at the shaft so situated that it looked straight down the passage they proposed following, and started away in the boat. The flashlights illuminated only a small portion of the underground place, but the boys could see some distance straight ahead.
Once they ceased rowing to listen, believing that they had heard calls from the darkness beyond. The sound was not repeated, and they were about to proceed when a sound which brought all their nervous energy into full swing reached their ears.
It was a bumping of an oar or paddle against the side of a boat. The blow echoed through the cavern as sharply as a pistol shot might have done. There could be no mistake in the cause.
"Now who's in that other boat?"
"Somehow," George grumbled in a whisper, "we always have propositions like that put up to us! There's always a mystery in every trip we take! We found one on Lake Superior, and one in the Florida Everglades, and one at the top of the Rocky mountains and one in the Hudson Bay wilderness."
"Yes, and we solved them, too!" grinned Will. "And we're going to solve this one! You remember about my seeing some one sneaking in here just ahead of us, don't you?"
"Yes," was the answer. "You thought it was that bum detective."
"I think so yet," replied Will.
"If it's the detective," asked George, "why didn't he give the alarm when he found that the mine was being flooded. He might at least have done that and saved the company a great deal of expense and trouble."
"Give it up," replied Will. "I might ask you," he went on, "why he was rowing away into a flooded mine which is supposed to be deserted."
"And I'd have to give you the answer you gave me," George declared.
The boys could now hear the strokes of the oarsman who was in the lead quite regularly and distinctly. Now and then he turned into crossheadings and chambers, as if to escape from their surveillance, but they kept steadily on after him, not taking into account the fact that they were leaving the light they had set at the shaft far out of view.
"Perhaps we ought to turn back now," George proposed, in a short time, seeing that they came no nearer to the boat in advance. "We left the main gangway some time ago, and we ought not to get too far away from it."
Will turned and looked back, facing only inky blackness.
"We should have stuck to the main gangway," he said. "I don't even remember when we left it. Is it very far back?"
"Some distance," answered George. "You see we followed this other boat without thinking what we were doing."
"Perhaps, if we continue to follow the other boat,' it will lead us somewhere. The fellow rowing must know something about the interior of the mine or he probably wouldn't be here!"
"I've been listening for a minute or more, trying to catch sound of the fellow's oars," George went on, "but there's nothing doing. I guess he's led us into a blind chamber and slipped away!"
"We don't, seem to be lacking for excitement," Will suggested with a grin. "We've lost Tommy and Sandy, and the machinery of the mine has been interfered with and the lower levels axe filling with water! Any old time we start out to do things, there's a general mix-up!"
"Aw, quit growling and listen a minute," suggested George.
The boys listened only for a moment when the sound George had heard was repeated. It was the call of the Wolf pack!
"That's Tommy!" exclaimed Will.
"I never knew that he belonged to the Wolf Patrol!" George observed.
"He might give the call without belonging to the Patrol!" urged Will.
The boys listened, but the sound was not repeated, although they called out the names of their chums and gave the Beaver call repeatedly.
"I guess it was a dream," George suggested.
"Then it was the most vivid dream I ever had!" Will declared.
They rowed about the chamber for some moments, searching for the source of the call, but to no purpose.
"Let's go back to the shaft," urged George.
"I'm agreeable," answered Will. "The only question now is whether we can find the shaft. The water is so deep that all branches of the mine look alike to me!"
In passing out of the chamber into another passage the boys were obliged to stoop low in order to avoid what is called a dip.
After passing under the dip so close to the ceiling that the boys were obliged to lie down in the boat in order to protect their heads, they came to a large chamber which seemed to be fairly dry save in the center, where there was a depression of considerable size.
"Nothing doing here!" Will exclaimed as he flashed his searchlight around the place. "This chamber looks as if there hadn't been an ounce of coal mined here for a hundred years."
"Then let's get out," George proposed, "and make our way back to the shaft if possible. If we can't, we'll make noise enough to attract Canfield's attention and let him come and lead us out."
"Here we go, then," cried Will, giving the boat a great push toward the dip. "We can't get out any too fast."
The boat came up against a solid projection of rock!
"I don't seem to see any way out!" George exclaimed.
"Well, it's there somewhere!" declared Will.
"I see it now!" cried George. "It's under water!"
"Under water?" repeated Will.
"Yes, under water!" answered George. "If we get out of this hole before the pumps get to working we'll have to swim!"
Will turned his searchlight on the dip and saw that it was now full clear to the down dropping roof.
"I guess we'll have to swim," he agreed.
"That black water doesn't look good to me," George exclaimed with a little shudder. "It seems to me that I can see snakes and alligators wiggling in it from here. Looks worse to me than the swamps of the Everglades! And there was a quart of snakes to every pint of water down there!"
"But we got to swim just the same!" urged Will. "In half an hour from now the air in this chamber will be unbreathable. There is no vent at all, now that the water fills the dip, and the coal gas is naturally seeping in all the time."
"That's all right, too!" admitted George. "But I'm not going to jump into that black water until I have to. If a rope or something should twine around my legs while I was in there, I'd drop dead with fright! Besides," he went on, "the chances are that Canfield will get the pumps going before long now."
The boys waited for a long half hour, during which time the water rose steadily. It seemed certain that the mine was about to be flooded throughout all the lower levels.
"Tommy and Sandy may have bumped into just such a situation as this," Will said, as he pushed the boat from side to side in the hope of coming upon some exit from the place.
"Serves 'em good and right!" exclaimed George.
Will chuckled to himself and held up a wet hand high up toward the roof of the chamber or passage.
"There's a current of air here!" he said.
"Then we won't smother to dead!" George grunted.
"And, look here," Will continued, as the boat bumped into a pyramid of shale which had been thrown up to within a few inches of the roof, "some one has been building this hill of refuse and using it for a refuge!"
"It does look that way," George agreed. "That shows that, at some time the water must have ascended to the very top of the wall. We may have to climb up there ourselves in order to keep from getting our clothing soaked in that ink down there!"
The water rose higher and higher in the passage, and it seemed to the boys that by this time most of the lower gangways were entirely impassible.
"It doesn't seem to me that the water in this blooming old mine could rise any faster if the whole Mississippi river were turned into it!" cried George in a tone of disgust. "If Canfield doesn't get his pumps going before long, he'll have a job here that'll take him all winter."
"I presume he's doing the best he can," Will argued. "For all we know, the boilers as well as the electric motors may have been tampered with. That would be just our luck!"
"I wonder what's become of that bum detective?" asked George after a short silence. "We heard him rowing along in front of us one minute, and the next minute there wasn't a single sound to indicate that there was another boat in the mine."
"As soon as I get out of this," Will stated, "I'm going to make it my business to find out whether that detective is regularly employed on this case. He looks to me like a crook."
It was dreary waiting there in the sealed-up chamber, and the boys found themselves dropping into long intervals of silence while they listened for the gurgle of the water which would indicate that the great pumps had been set in motion.
During one of these intervals of silence they heard sounds which brought them to their feet in great excitement. Almost unable to believe his ears, Will turned to George with a question on his lips:
"Did you hear that?" he asked.
"Of course I did!"
"I did, too, but I thought I must be dreaming."
"No dream about that!" replied George. "That's the call of the BeaverPatrol!"
"And that means that Tommy and Sandy are not far away!"
"We heard the call of the Wolf Patrol not long ago," suggested George. "I wonder if this blooming old mine is chock full of Boy Scouts of assorted sizes. There can't be too many here to please me!"
The boys returned the Beaver call but no answer came. At times they thought they heard whispers coming from the dark reaches of the cavern, but they were not quite certain.
"There may be real Beavers in here for all we know!" suggested Will.
"That's all you know about it!" chuckled George. "Beavers only operate in running water."
"Well, isn't that water out there running?" asked Will.
"No jokes now!" replied George. "I've got all I can endure now without standing for any of your alleged witticisms!"
While the boys sat in the boat, occasionally moving it from side to side, a shaft of light appeared directly above the point where the shale had been heaped up. It moved swiftly about for an instant and then dropped out of view. It was a moment before either boy spoke.
"That's some of Tommy's foolishness!" Will declared.
George repeated the Beaver call several times, but no answer came.
"That's a searchlight, anyway!" insisted Will. "And I don't believe these ginks in the mines have electric searchlights to lug around with them!"
Will unshipped an oar and struck the water with the flat of the blade several times, exerting his whole strength.
"Keep it up!" advised George. "That sounds exactly like a beaver's tail connecting with the surface of a stream!"
"Yes, keep it up!" cried a voice out of the darkness. "Keep it up, and perhaps some beaver'll come along and build a dam to get you out of that mess you're in! You're always getting into trouble, you two!"
"You've got your nerve with you!" exclaimed Willy, half-angrily. "Here you go out in the night and get lost, and we come out after you, and the mine gets flooded, and we get tied up between the solid wall and a bend in the passage, and then you blame us for getting into trouble!"
"Can you climb?" chuckled Tommy, throwing the rays of his searchlight on the boat. "If you can just mount up on that pile of shale and work your way through the opening between the two levels. This might have been used as a sort of an air hole a few hundred years ago," he went on, "but I'll bet that not one out of a hundred of the miners of today know that there is an opening here!"
Leaving the boat, the boys mounted the pile of shale and were soon making their way up the rugged face of the shaft in the direction of the level, which ran along above the one now being flooded.
"Can you find your way out of this dump, now?" asked Will as the boys stood with their chums at the end of the long passage.
"There seems to be fewer twists and turns in this level than on the one below it," Tommy explained, "and I guess we can find our way out readily enough. If we don't," he went on, "I shall be obliged to eat a ton or two of coal to keep from starving to death."
"Serves you right!" declared Will. "You had no business getting up in the middle of the night and wandering off into the mine!"
"What did you do?" demanded Tommy.
"We waited until morning, and then enlisted the services of the caretaker," replied Will. "So far as I can remember, this is about the nine hundredth relief expedition we've been out on in search of you boys!"
"Seems to me," Tommy chuckled, "that you're the lads that were in need of the relief expedition. We found you boxed up in a chamber in a boat."
"But we wouldn't have been in any such mess if we hadn't started out to look you up!" George declared.
"We should have been back before you got out of bed this morning, if some one hadn't cut our string," replied Sandy. "We had a cinch on getting out, but some geezer led us a fool chase by cutting our cord and steering us around in a circle."
"Did you see any one?" asked Will.
"Not a soul!" was the reply. "But there's some one in here, just the same. We heard the call of the Wolf Patrol a long time ago and we've heard it several times since."
"What do you mean by some one cutting your string?" asked George.
"Why," replied Sandy, "we tied the loose end of a ball of twine to one of the shaft timbers and unwound the ball as we moved along, expecting to follow it back when we wanted to get out.
"How do you know some one cut it?" asked Will.
"Perhaps you broke it," George suggested.
Sandy took a piece of the cord from his pocket and passed it over toGeorge with a shy chuckle.
"See if you can break that!" he said.
George tried his best to break the string, but it remained firm under all his strength.
The boys now fell into a discussion of the ways and means of getting out of the mine.
"I believe," Sandy exclaimed, "That if we follow the current of air which the rising water is forcing out of this old shaft, we will come to the entrance. As you all know, a current of air takes the shortest way to any given point, and this one ought to blow straight toward the shaft."
"Great head, that, little boy!" laughed Tommy.
After proceeding some distance the steady thud, thud of the pumping machinery was heard, and the boys understood that the efforts of the caretaker were at last bringing results. The sounds also aided them in direction, and in a short time they stood at the shaft on the second level.
When they came out to the timber work, Will, who was in the lead, motioned to the others to remain in the background.
"What's doing now?" whispered Sandy.
"There's a man working on the ladders," explained Will in a low whisper. "I can't see him yet, but I can hear the sound of a saw."
"He may be cutting the rungs," suggested Tommy.
"That's the notion I had," replied Will. "Suppose we all get around behind the air shaft and wait until we can find out what he is up to. It may be that bum detective, for all we know."
"What would he be doing there?" questioned Sandy.
"Sawing the rungs!" whispered Will. "He wouldn't cut them down, of course, but he might saw them so that they would break under our weight and give us a drop of a couple of hundred feet."
"It doesn't seem as if any human being would do a thing like that!" cried George. "It would be a wicked thing to do!"
While the boys whispered together, the sound of sawing continued. The man engaged at the task was evidently unfamiliar with such work, for they heard him puffing and blowing as the saw cut through the wood.
"He's cutting the rungs, all right!" Will said in a moment. "And that cuts off our escape until the cables can be put in motion and the cages started. I wish I had him by the neck!"
"We'll get him by the neck, all right, before many days," Sandy cut in, "if we can only get a sight of him so as to be sure of his identity."
Presently the man ceased working, and they heard him ascending the ladders, step by step. In a moment the saw which he had been using dropped from his hands and clattered to the bottom of the shaft.
Then they heard him springing swiftly forward, and directly they knew that he had reached the top. The boys all looked disgusted.
"And we never caught sight of him!" exclaimed Tommy.
Will now walked around to the front of the shaft and looked down. The saw which had been used lay shining on the lower level.
"I'm going down after that!" he said in a moment.
"Yes, you are!" whispered Tommy.
"I got to have it!" insisted Will.
"Well, go on and get it, then," laughed Sandy. "You've got to show me!"
"I don't think he cut the rungs between this level and the next one,"George interposed. "It may be safe to use the lower ladders."
"I can soon find out!" Will declared.
The cutting had been done between the second level and the top. The ladders below seemed perfectly safe. After testing them thoroughly, Will trusted himself on one of the rungs and let himself down slowly, bearing as much weight as was possible on the standards.
He was at the bottom in a moment, and in another moment stood by the side of his chums with the saw in his hand.
"I don't think that's so very much!" Tommy exclaimed.
"Right here, then," Will explained, "is where you get your little Sherlock Holmes lesson! This is a new saw, as you all see. It probably never was used before. Now the man who did the cutting bought this at some nearby store. Don't you see what it means?"
"That's a fact!" cried Tommy. "We can find out who bought the saw, and so discover the gink who tried to commit murder by sawing the ladders."
"And look here," Will went on, "do you see these threads hanging to the teeth of the saw? Do you see the color?"
"Blue!" replied the boys in a breath.
"That's right, blue. Now, what sort of a suit did the detective wear this morning? It was blue, wasn't it?"
"Sure it was!" replied George. "A blue serge! I noticed it particularly because it wasn't much of a fit."
"Well, these are blue serge threads!" commented Will.
"That's right, too," admitted Sandy.
While the boys still stood at the second level they heard some one moving down from the top. Will rushed around to the ladder and looked up.
He could not see the face of the man who was climbing down, but he could see that he did not wear a blue serge suit.
In a moment he called out to him, asking some trivial question regarding the action of the pumps. When the man looked down he saw that it was Canfield. The caretaker seemed surprised at finding the boys at the second level. He kept on descending.
"Wait!" Will called. "Stop where you are!"
"But I've got to find out what's the matter with the machinery at the bottom," the caretaker called out. "There's something wrong there!"
"Then you'd better take long steps," replied Will, "for if you put any weight on those rungs, you're likely to land at the bottom of the shaft. The rungs have been cut!"
"I can't believe that!" replied Canfield.
"Suppose you look and see!"
The caretaker advanced cautiously downward until he came to where a fine line of sawdust lay on one of the rungs.
"Do you know who did this?" he asked.
"We think we do," replied Will, "but this isn't any time for long stories. The first thing for us to do is to get back into the breaker and cook Tommy and Sandy three or four breakfasts apiece!"
"So you found them, did you?" asked Canfield.
"No; we found them," shouted Tommy.
"Well, how're you going to get out?" asked the caretaker.
"Get a rope," directed Will, "and throw it over the sound rung lowest down, and we'll climb up until we can trust our weight on the ladder."
This plan was followed, and in a short time the boys all stood, hungry and tired, in their room in the breaker. Tommy made an instantaneous dive for the provisions which had been brought in the night before.
"Nice old time we've had!" he exclaimed, with his mouth full-of pork and beans. "I guess we're some Boy Scouts after all!"
"I'm going to tie you up tonight!" Will declared.
While the boys talked and ate the caretaker darted to the door leading to the passage which ended at the shaft.
He returned in a moment looking both angry and frightened.
"The pumps have, stopped!" he said. "The line will probably be flooded before tomorrow morning. The very devil seems to have taken full charge here today. I never saw anything like it!"
"There are boys in the mine who will be drowned!" exclaimed Tommy.
"I'm not so sure of that," answered Canfield. "It was only a suggestion on my part that the boys we are in search of have taken refuge under ground. I think I must have been mistaken!"
"Do you know, whether these breaker boys belonged to the Boy Scouts or not?" asked Will. "Did you ever see any medals or badges on their clothing which told of Boy Scout experiences?"
"Sure they belong to the Boy Scouts!" declared the caretaker, "and that is the very reason why I sent for Boy Scouts to help find them."
"What Patrol did they belong to?" asked Will.
"If you had heard them howling like wolves around the breaker night after night," was the reply, "you wouldn't ask what patrol they belonged to!"
"Then they are in the mine!" shouted Tommy.
We all heard the call of the pack, but the funny thing is that they wouldn't show themselves.
"There's something funny about those boys!" exclaimed Canfield. "They seemed to be merry-hearted fellows, just a little bit full of mischief, but for some reason they never mixed with the others much."
"Where did they come from when they came here?" asked Will.
"The information in the letters I received from the attorney in charge of the case is that they came here from New York, not directly but by some roundabout way."
"Did this attorney ever inform you why he wanted the boys found?" asked Tommy. "Are we all working in the dark?"
"He never told me why he wanted the boys found. For all I know, they may be wanted for some crime, or they may be heirs to an immense property. My instructions are to find them. That's all!"
"Where did these boys lodge?" asked Will.
"They didn't have any regular room," was the reply. "They slept in the breaker whenever the watchman would permit them to do so, and when he wouldn't, they threw stones at him and slept in the railroad yard somewhere. But the strangest part of the whole business is the way they disappeared from sight."
"You didn't tell us about that!" exclaimed Sandy.
"I meant to," the caretaker answered. "The last seen of them here they were at work on the breaker. It was somewhere near the middle of the afternoon, and the cracker boss had been particularly ugly. The two boys were often caught whispering together, and more than once the cracker boss had launched such trifles as half pound block of shale at them. I happened to be on the outside just about that time."
"The boys didn't go up in the air, did they?" asked Sandy with a chuckle. "They haven't got wings, have they?"
"To all intents and purposes, they went up into the air!" answered the caretaker. "One moment they were on the breaker sorting slate and stuff of that kind out of the stream of coal which was pouring down upon them, and the next moment they were nowhere in sight!"
"Had any strangers been seen talking with them?"
"Now you come to a point that I should have mentioned before!" replied the caretaker. "Two days before they left a strange boy came to the mine and went to work on the breaker. He was an unusually well-mannered, well-dressed young fellow, and so the breaker boys called him a dude. He resented this, of course, and there was a fight at the first quitting time. These two boys, Jimmie, and Dick, stood by the new lad, and gave three or four of the tough little chaps who work on the breaker a good beating up."
"Now we've got hold of something!" exclaimed Will. "Were these three boys together much after that?"
"No," was the reply. "The new boy thanked Jimmie and Dick for helping him through his scrape, and that was about all. They might have talked together for five minutes that night, but they were never seen in each other's company again so far as I know."
"How long did this new boy stay here?" asked George.
"He quit the next day."
"He didn't go up in a pillar of fire, did he?" grinned Sandy.
"No, he walked up to the office and asked if he could get his pay for the time he had worked. The boss told him he'd have to wait until Saturday night, and he turned up his nose and walked out."
"And where did he go?" asked George.
"He said he was going down the river in a boat," answered the caretaker. "He bought an old boat, stocked it with quite a supply of provisions, and started on his way. The next day the boat was found bottom side up on a bar, and the lad's hat lay on the bank not far away."
"Do you think he was drowned?" asked Sandy.
"It would seem so."
"Drowned nothing!" exclaimed Tommy. "He sneaked those provisions into the mine under cover of the darkness and the three little rascals are feeding on them yet. You can see the end of that without a telescope!"
"Now, smarty!" exclaimed George. "You've told us where the boys went, and where the provisions landed, and all that, now tell us why these kids hid themselves in the mine. And while you are about it, you may as well tell why they gave the Wolf call and refused to reply."
"This story," replied Tommy with a grin, "is not a novelette, complete in one number. It's a serial story, and will be continued in our next issue. What did you say about the pumps stopping, Canfield?"
"They've stopped, all right!" the caretaker replied.
"Are you going to let the ginks flood the mine?" asked Sandy.
"While I was out a few moments ago," Canfield explained, "I notified one of the clerks in the company's office to send up a gang of men to repair the machinery. They ought to be here by this time."
"How long will it take to repair the pump?" asked Tommy.
"It may take an hour and it may take twenty-four.
"In the meantime," Tommy continued, "do you think you could send one of the county officers out to round up this bum detective?"
"You mean that you want him watched?" asked Canfield.
"Sure!" answered Tommy. "He sawed the rungs in the shaft, didn't he?He could get ten years for that!"
"All right," replied Canfield. "I'll send word out and have him arrested if you are positive that he is the man that did the cutting."
"We are positive that he's the man," replied Will, "but it'll spoil everything if you have him arrested. We want to give him a free hand for a time, and see what he will do. He's a crook, and he's bound to show it! And another thing," the boy went on, "we don't want anyone to know that he is under suspicion. We just want him watched."
"You're handling the case," smiled Canfield, "and I'll take any steps you advise. I can't tell you how sorry I am that I brought the detective in here this morning!"
"Well," Will said, "we put up a bluff about getting out of town and perhaps we can make that stick. We can take a train out and come back in on a lonely freight, and get into the mine without his knowing anything about it. The mine is the best place to work from, anyway!"
"That's why I wanted to know how soon the mine could be pumped out!" stated Tommy. "I don't care about wading around in a mess of water that's blacker than a stack of black cats."
"I think I can have the mine fairly dry by the time you boys get out of town and back again!" laughed Canfield.
"Well," Tommy said, "then you'd better got a couple of dry-goods boxes and fill them full of good things to eat, and drop 'em down to the first level. Perhaps you know of a cozy little chamber there where we can set up housekeeping."
"I know just the place," said the caretaker. "To the left of the old tool house there's a room where odd articles of every description have been stored for any number of years. The blacksmith and the fire-boss used to go there to smoke and tell stores, if I remember right."
"Does anyone ever go there now?" asked Will.
"Not that I know of," was the reply.
"Then we'll drop down there some time towards morning," Will decided. "And in the meantime," he added, with a wink at his chums, "we'll be looking for a boy tramp out in the railroad yards."
"What do you mean by that"' asked the caretaker.
"Oh, I've just got an idea," replied Will, "that there's a kid hanging around this part of the country whom we ought to interview."
"But I don't understand."
"You wait until we get hold of him, and you'll understand all right!" laughed Will. "We just need that boy!"
"But how do you know there is such a boy?" urged the caretaker.
"He gets it out of a dream book!" Tommy chuckled.
"Do you mean to say that there is some go-between the boys who may or may not be in the mine and some persons outside who are interested in them?" asked the caretaker.
"I didn't say anything of the kind!" replied Will.
"There are times," Tommy explained to Canfield, "when the gift of frank speech is taken away from Will, so you mustn't blame him for not answering. He'll tell you all about it when the time comes."
The caretaker went away with a puzzled look on his honest face.
"You've got to explanation me," George laughed as the caretaker left the room, and the boys began picking up their clothing, preparatory to the alleged journey. "I can't understand what you mean by saying that you'll watch out for a boy tramp in the railroad yards."
"It's a sure thing, isn't it?" Will asked, "that the boys we are in search of are in the mine? We don't know what they're in there for. They may be hiding there because of some fool notion they have in their heads, or they may have been sent here for some definite purpose."
"You bet they've been sent here for some definite purpose," George replied. "They never came here to work on the breaker without having some well-defined motive. Boys answering to their description don't accept such jobs as they accepted here!"
"Well, the boys are in the mine," Will continued. "As stated, we don't know what they're there for, but we know they're there. Now, this third boy comes to the mine and works just long enough to get in touch with the other two. Then he disappears."
"Buys a lot of provisions and goes down the river to leave his hat on the bank!" laughed Tommy. "I guess that was a pretty poor imitation of a suicide or a drowning accident, either!"
"But this boy didn't get to be intimate with the two breaker boys," contended George. "He talked with them about two minutes after the fight, according to Canfield, but paid no further attention to them after that. If he had any secret understanding with them, he must have done a whole lot of talking in a mighty short space of time."
"The right kind of a boy can say a good deal in a minute and half!" laughed Tommy. "But suppose we let Will go on and explanation us about that boy tramp in the railroad yards. I think I know what he's getting at, but I'm not quite certain. Go on, Will, it's up to you."
"In order to make the connection," laughed Will. "I will state for the third time that we know that the boys are in the mine. It may also be well to state, once more, that we are reasonably certain that this other boy came to the mine for the specific purpose of communicating with the other two. Now this boy didn't drop into the river. He dropped the provisions he bought for the boat into the coal mine, and left them there for the consumption of the two boys inside. That's reasonable, isn't?"
"Fine deduction, as Sherlock Holmes would say to Watson!" laughedGeorge.
"But this third boy," Will went on, "doesn't go into the mine. He stays outside to serve as a means of communication between the boys who are hiding in the mine and some interested person or persons on the outside. That's perfectly clear, isn't it?
"That'll do very well for a theory," replied George.
"I'll go you a plate of cookies," argued Sandy, "that Will is right, and that this third boy is hanging around taking messages from the two boys in the mine and also to the two boys in the mine."
"Didn't I say it was all right for a theory?" chuckled George.
"Now, the point is this," Will continued. "What are those boys in the mine for? What do they want there? Why didn't they answer our Boy Scout challenge when we replied to their call of the pack?"
"If you don't ask so many questions, you won't get so many negative answers," Sandy advised. "We're here to find the boys, and I don't see that it makes any difference to us what they're in there or not."
"But we've found the boys now," contended Tommy. "We haven't got our hands on them yet, of course, but we know they're in there, and we know it's only a question of time when we get hold of them."
"Well," Will insisted, "I'm going to find a motive before I quit the case. I'm going to know who sent those boys here, and all about it, before I make any report to Mr. Horton."
"Go as far as you like," laughed Tommy. "My bump of curiosity is growing half an inch a day, and will continue to spread out until I find out exactly what those boys are doing burrowing in a deserted mine."
"Now, we'll get back to the point we started from," Will explained. "This boy who is undoubtedly doing duty outside the mine in the interests of the persons who sent the two boys in, furnishes the clue to the whole situation! When we find him, and find out what he's up to, and trace any communications he may make back to their original source, we'll have the whole case tied up tight!"
"That's right!" declared Tommy. "We'll have the case tied up tight if we succeed in getting hold of this third boy."
"Oh, go on!" laughed Sandy. "We'll be picking third boys and fourth boys and fifth boys out of the air the next thing you know. We never went away on a Boy Scout expedition yet that we didn't find all manner of kids hanging around on purpose to be discovered. We found them on Old Superior; and in the Everglades; and on the Great Continental Divide; and up in the Hudson Bay country, we began to think we had stumbled on the center of population so far as Boy Scouts were concerned!"
"There's just one thing that's likely to make us trouble," Will resumed. "And that is the fact that Canfield very foolishly slopped over to Ventner when explaining the purpose of our visit here. That bum detective knows now that we're here to search the mine. Of course he might have received, as Canfield says, most of his information from outside sources, but the caretaker should have thrown him off the track instead of telling him exactly what our mission here was."
"But Ventner came here to search for the boys himself!" George broke in. "At least, he says that he did."
"There's a mystery about the whole matter," Sandy declared, "and I'd like to help clear it up from beginning to end!"
"We're likely to have a chance!" laughed Tommy.
"What are we going to do all the afternoon?" George asked.
"Wander around town," smiled Will, "and find out about the evening train, and ask fool questions about the pumps and the mine, and laugh at the idea of anybody living in there. That'll give Ventner the idea that we're going for good, I reckon. He's a pretty bum skate to pose as a detective!"
"I'll tell you what I'm going to do most of the afternoon!" Tommy declared. "I'm going to the hay! I never felt so bunged up for want of sleep in my innocent life."
"Haven't you forgotten something?" asked Sandy.
"Sure!" shouted Tommy. "I'm forgetting to eat!"
"And you're forgetting something else!" insisted Sandy.
"Nix on the forget!" declared Tommy. "When I forget my eatings and sleepings, the world will come to an end!"
"You forgot to read a chapter in your dream book!" said Sandy.
"Never you mind that dream book," Tommy replied. "Whenever you want to find the answer to any puzzle, you look in that dream book!"
After eating another hearty meal the boys, having already packed their wardrobes, locked the door of their room and addressed themselves to slumber.
They were awakened about five o'clock by a loud knocking on the door, and presently they heard the voice of Canfield calling to them.
"Wake up, boys!" he cried. "I have good news for you!"
"All right, let her go!" shouted Tommy.
"The pumps are working, and the water is lowering in the mine!"
"That's nice!" laughed Sandy.
"And we've found out what caused the sudden flooding," the caretaker went on. "It seems that a partition, or wall, between the Labyrinth and the Mixer mine unaccountably gave way. The Mixer mine has been flooded for a long time and, as it lies above the level of the Labyrinth, the water naturally flowed into our mine as soon as the wall was down."
"But what caused the partition to fall?" asked Will, opening the door for the admission of the caretaker.
"No one knows!" was the answer.
"If you look about a little," Tommy suggested, "I think you'll find traces of dynamite. Who discovered the break in the dividing wall?"
"A gang under the leadership of Ventner, the detective!" was the reply.
The caretaker was very much surprised and not a little annoyed at the effect his answer had upon the four boys.
"I don't see anything humorous about that!" he said as the lads threw themselves down on the bunks and roared with laughter.
"It looks funny to me!" Tommy replied. "It we had never showed up here, the mine wouldn't have been flooded. As soon as we start away or promise to leave the district, which amounts to the same thing, this cheap skate of a detective finds the break, and all is well again!"
"Why, you don't think that he had anything to do with the trouble at the mine, do you?" questioned the caretaker.
"Oh, of course not!" replied Sandy. "Ventner had nothing to do with cutting the ladder. That fellow will land in state's prison if he keeps on trying to murder boys by sawing ladder rungs!"
"I had forgotten that,' said Canfield.
"Well, don't forget that this man Ventner is playing the chief villain's role in this drama!" Tommy advised. "And another thing you mustn't forget," the boy continued, "is that you're not to say a word to him that will inform him that he is suspected."
"I think I can remember that!" replied the caretaker.
The boys prepared a hasty supper and then, suit cases in hand, started for the little railway station. There they inquired about the arrival and departure of trains, bought tickets, and made themselves as conspicuous as possible about the depot.
"Keep your eye out for the third boy," George chuckled, as the lads walked up and down the platform.
"Don't get excited about the third boy," Will replied. "We'll find him when the right time comes!"
"There's Ventner!" exclaimed Tommy as the detective came rushing down the platform. "Of course the good, kind gentleman would want to bid us farewell!"
"I'd like to crack him over the coco!" exclaimed Sandy.
"I'll bet he's got some kind of a fake story to tell," suggested Will."He looks like a man who had been working his imagination overtime!"
"News of the two boys!" shouted the detective as he came up smiling.