CHAPTER XII

THE “FOLLOW ME”

The danger of a smash and overturn was imminent. The heavy bobsled was plunging toward the obstruction, and there was neither time nor space to steer clear of the branch.

The girls, breathless from the swift ride, could scarcely scream; and Billy was himself speechless. But Dan did not lose his head.

In a trice he whipped out his claspknife, sprung open the blade, and just before the collision occurred he cut the kite-string.

The huge kite turned a somersault in the air, and then plunged to the ice. But the boys and girls on the bobsled did not notice that.

The sled smashed into the tree-branch—and stuck. Dan went over on his head, but arose unhurt. The others had managed to cling to the sled.

“I know who did this!” yelled Billy, when he got his breath. “It was that Spink fellow.”

“Oh! he wouldn’t do such a thing,” said Mildred, timidly. “It—it must have fallen here.”

“Not much,” declared Billy.

When they dragged the bobsled back to the rest of the crowd, Spink had already gone home. As Dan said, smiling, there was no chance for a row then; and before Billy met Barry Spink again, he had got quieted down and, on Dan’s advice, did not accuse the fellow of the mean trick.

The kite was smashed all to pieces. Dan decided that that method of coasting was perilous, after all.

Besides, there was other work and other plans to take up the Speedwell boys’ attention; already Dan and Billy were giving their minds to the new iceboat, which they believed would prove a very swift craft indeed.

The regatta committee, headed by Mr. Darringford and made up of influential sportsmen of Riverdale and vicinity, had set the date for the iceboat races in that week between Christmas and New Year’s, when business is slack. It was holiday week at the academy, too, and the Darringford Machine Shop hands had a few days off.

Seldom had any public sports “taken hold” on the people of Riverdale like this iceboat sailing.

“It’s the greatest stunt ever,” Biff Hardy declared, “and if the cold weather keeps up all the grandfathers and grandmothers in town—as well as the rest of us—will be out cavorting on the ice.”

There were some spills and a few minor accidents. But with the ice in the condition it was, there was little peril of accidents on the Colasha save through absolute carelessness.

Dan and Billy were busy these days racing in theFly-up-the-Creek. Nobody but the family knew it; but most of the parts of the wonderful new boat Dan had invented, were finished. The engine had been set up and tried on the barn floor. Then the boys went over to Compton and got the parts Mr. Troutman had made for them, and with the parts Mr. Speedwell had helped them build, and certain others from the Darringford shops, the brothers secretly removed them all to John Bromley’s dock, and assembled them in an old fish-cleaning shed.

The boys were very secret about it. Ever since the first plans Dan had drawn disappeared so mysteriously at Island Number One, the brothers had been worried for fear somebody had found and would make use of them.

The principle upon which the motor-auxiliary worked was novel and Dan was confident that by the aid of the rapidly-driven wheel that would grip the ice under the boat amidships, and her spread of canvas, the new craft would beat anything in the line of an iceboat ever seen on the Colasha.

Mr. Darringford joked with the boys a good deal about the invention. He had examined the parts they had had built at the shops with much curiosity, and threatened to steal their ideas. But Dan and Billy knew they could trust him to the limit. It had been through Mr. Darringford that the Speedwell boys had obtained their real start in the racing game with theirFlying Feathers—the motorcycles which were the particular output of the machine shops.

Nobody, Dan was sure, would guess the combination he had invented without seeing all the parts assembled. Only their father was in their confidence in the building of the boat.

Therefore, if any craft appeared like theirs at the regatta they could be sure that the lost plans had been made use of.

“And if anybody’s guilty,” declared Billy Speedwell, “it’s Barry Spink. He is crowing to the other fellows that he’s got us beaten already, and he won’t let anybody look into that shed behind his mother’s barn where the boat is being built.”

“If he’s doing it all himself, I’m not afraid,” chuckled Dan. “Not if he had our plans fifty times over.”

“But he isn’t. There is a foreigner working there—I’ve seen him. He is a mechanic Mrs. Spink hired in the city, Wiley Moyle says, and they’re paying him eight dollars a day.”

“Ow! that hurts!”

“I believe it’s true, just the same,” said Billy. “Spink has got his heart set on beating us.”

“If that’s the price he’s paying for it, he really ought to win,” returned the older lad. “Eight dollars a day—gee!”

The Speedwell family—down to little Adolph—were vastly interested in the new boat. Finally, when it came time to put it together, the question of naming the craft came to the fore.

Naming theFly-up-the-Creekhad been something of an inspiration; but now they all wanted a hand in the christening of Dan’s new invention. The matter was so hotly discussed that Mrs. Speedwell suggested finally drawing lots for the name.

One evening as they sat around the reading lamp each member of the family wrote his or her choice on a slip of paper (’Dolph printed his in big, up-and-down letters) and then the papers were shaken up in a bowl.

’Dolph was blindfolded and with great gravity drew a slip. It was Carrie’s choice, and the paper read “Follow Me”—and thus the motor-iceboat was christened.

CHAPTER XIII

THE STRANGER

It was both a cold and windy day on which Dan and Billy finally got the motor-iceboat down upon the ice. It was in Christmas week.

“I reckon that old blizzard you were telling about is pretty near due, Dannie,” quoth the younger boy, blowing his fingers to get some semblance of warmth into them, for the boys and old Bromley had to work without gloves part of the time.

“There’s a storm brewin’,” declared the old boatman, cocking his eye toward the streaky looking clouds that had been gathering ever since daybreak. “You can lay to that! And it wouldn’t surprise me if it brought a big snow, boys. Ye know we ain’t re’lly had our share of snow this winter so fur. We’ve had ice enough, the goodness knows!”

“You bet,” agreed Billy, with a chuckle. “And ice gathers some fast, too—if you take it from Money Stevens.”

“What’s happened to him now?” asked Dan.

“Why, Money went fishing up Karnac Lake way last Saturday—didn’t you hear? Says he would have had great luck, if only he could have kept the hole open through which he was fishing. He swears he hooked a pickerel so big that he couldn’t get it through the hole he’d cut in the ice!”

“That sure must have been some pickerel,” chuckled Dan. “Now, John, what do you think of this craft?”

“By gravy! I don’t know whattothink of it, boy,” grunted the old boatman. “It ain’t like nothin’ in the heavens, or on the airth, nor ag’in in the waters under the airth! If you say that dinky little ingine is goin’ to make her go, why I reckon go she will! But seein’s believin’.”

“Right-O!” agreed Dan, smiling. “And we will proceed to put the matter to the test right now before we step the mast. Get aboard.”

But Old John wouldn’t do that. He preferred to watch the proceedings from the dock—and he said so.

“I ain’t got so many more years ter live no way ye kin fix it,” he said, grinning. “Lemme live ’em whole. I wouldn’t venter on one o’ them sailin’ iceboats, let erlone this contraption.”

Dan and Billy pushed out from the shore and started the engine. Dan could easily manipulate the power as well as steer theFollow Me. Billy was passenger only on this trial trip.

There was a stiff breeze blowing and they headed directly into it. The moment the wheel under the boat gripped the ice she began to drive ahead. As Dan gradually increased its revolutions they moved faster and faster, while the whine of the engine and the sharp strokes of the wheel-points joined in an ever-increasing roar.

Behind them the ice showed a plain trail of punctures from the wheel-points. TheFollow Meleft a trail that might easily be followed anywhere on the ice.

But its speed was not great at first. Dan increased it slowly and, when she rounded to and headed back toward the landing, Billy was flatly disappointed.

“Crickey! this isn’t going to do much, Dan. Why, the old boat can beat her.”

“What did you expect?” asked his brother, smiling.

“But, old man! we’re going to race with this thing!”

“Of course.”

“And theFly-up-the-Creekcan beat her out—easy.”

“Sure of that; are you?”

“What you got up your sleeve, Dannie?” the other demanded. “Did you get all the speed out of her you could?”

“You saw that she was wide open,” chuckled Dan. “But you forget that we had no sail set. Let’s get the mast up and the sail bent on.Thenwe’ll give her a fair trial.”

Billy shook his head, however. He had believed that his brother’s invention was going to prove as fast as a power-launch, without any canvas.

The mast and sail were both ready. They had the new boat rigged in an hour. There was still a full hour before sunset and again Dan took his place in the stern while Billy raised the sail.

The canvas of theFollow Mewas not as heavy as that of the Speedwells’ first iceboat. They had made some short runs in theFly-up-the-Creekthat had equalled fifty miles an hour—and more. Billy’s heart had fallen pretty nearly to his boots. He did not believe theFollow Mecould do anything like that.

But Dan only grinned at him. The wind filled the sail almost immediately and the motor-iceboat staggered away from Bromley’s dock. The old boatman stood there and watched them with a grim face, for the new craft started very slowly. She seemed really to hobble at first.

“Them boys air going to be disappointed—by jings!” muttered Bromley. “And that’s too bad. But these yere new-fangled notions——”

“By gravey! what’s happened?”

Suddenly the “put, put, put!” of the engine reached his ears. And at the same time the sail filled and bellied full. The motor-iceboat leaped ahead, the exhaust became a rumble, and theFollow Meshot up the river faster—it seemed to Bromley—than he had ever seen any craft move before.

She crossed the frozen stream diagonally and in two minutes was out of sight behind the humpback of Island Number One! Her disappearance left the old man breathless.

“Some boat—that,” said a voice behind him.

“Heh?” exclaimed John Bromley, turning to see a strange man standing coolly on his private wharf.

“That’s a fine sailer,” said the stranger.

“Mebbe ’tis,” returned John, eyeing the man fixedly.

The latter was a keen-looking chap, lean and wiry, and dressed in a long, loose, gray ulster, buckled about his waist with a belt. He returned the old boatman’s look, after a moment, with interest.

“You know those chaps who are running that boat?” asked the stranger.

“I reckon I know the Speedwells pretty well,” grunted John.

“Speedwell—eh? Is that their name?”

“Yes, it is.”

“What business have they got over on that island?”

“What business have you got asking me?” returned the old man, freezingly.

“I want to know.”

“Keep wanting. Everything comes ter them that waits, they tell me.”

“You are of a sour temper, I see,” observed the stranger, eyeing Bromley quite calmly.

“Mebbe. But my temper is none of your business. Something else is.”

“What’s that, old timer?” asked the thin man, grinning slightly.

“You’re on a piece of the earth I own. Get off it,” said John Bromley, advancing truculently. “This dock is mine—and I own to the road. You git back to the road and stay there.”

The man eyed him for a few seconds, as though to see whether he really meant the command, or not. It was quite plain that Bromley meant it. He was beginning to roll up his sleeves, and old as he was he looked to be a bad man to tackle.

“Oh! very well,” said the stranger, backing off. “No offense meant.”

“And that’s lucky, too,” growled John. “For if you was meanin’ offense I might come out into the road to you, at that!”

The stranger said no more, but gradually “oozed off the scenery,” as Bromley told the boys afterward. “But that feller’s got some reason for nosin’ around here,” the old boatman added, as he helped fasten the motor iceboat to the spiles of the dock. “I didn’t like his looks—not a little bit.”

“Do you suppose it is somebody trying to see what kind of an invention you have here, Dannie?” asked the awed Billy.

For the second trip of the motor iceboat had convinced the younger Speedwell lad that his brother was a marvel. He wasn’t talking much about that trip, but if John Bromley had considered the speed of theFollow Mequite surprising, how much more impressed was Billy—and even Dan himself.

It was true they had had a favoring breeze—and a stiff breeze, too. The wind would have driven the boat at high speed, alone. But with the auxiliary motor at work theFollow Mehad traveled at a breath-taking pace. She had gone the length of Island Number One, and the island beyond it, rounded the farther end of that second island, and come rushing back down the river to John Bromley’s dock in an almost unbelievably short time.

“It doesn’t matter who the fellow was,” said Dan, finally; “you know we don’t want anybody examining this boat. John understands that; don’t you, John?”

“I’ll keep me eye on her,” growled the boatman. “They’ve got to be wide awake to beat old John. You leave it to me.”

But both boys felt some worriment of mind as they scurried around that evening in the motor truck, picking up the cans of milk from the dairies.

If it had begun to snow they might have felt better about it. With a storm under way it would not be likely that anybody would seek out theFollow Meat John Bromley’s lonely dock, for any purpose.

The Speedwell boys got back to the house, however, finished the chores for that night, and went in to supper before a single flake of the promised storm had fallen.

CHAPTER XIV

GATHERING TROUBLE

The telephone tinkled in the kitchen just after Dan had pulled off his boots. He and Billy were the last to go to bed on this evening, for it was so cold that they had gone out to the milk room to blanket all the bottled milk for fear the bottles would freeze and burst their caps.

Billy, still having his boots on, went down the back stairway and Dan heard him speaking into the instrument. It was several moments before the older boy realized that Billy was growing excited.

And no wonder! Billy was listening to something over the ’phone that quite amazed him. In the first place he was surprised to hear old John Bromley’s voice.

Bromley seldom if ever called them up, although the boys had paid for having him put on the party wire. It was handy for them to be in communication with Old John, summer and winter.

“You and Dan had better come down here,” said the boatman, his voice very low. “There’s something——”

It died out there and Billy asked him to repeat it. Old John seemed to keep right on whispering:

“I’ve chased ’em off, but they come back.”

“Whohas come back? What d’ye mean?” gasped Billy.

“And so you better come. Don’t want ’em ... hear me talkin’——”

“What under the sun are you getting at, John?” exclaimed Billy. “Let’s have the details.”

Bromley’s voice on the wire was strong for a moment. “Now, you wait——”

And that was all—every last word Billy heard! He rattled the hook, and shouted into the mouthpiece, and tried to call Central. He got her after a while and demanded that Bromley be called again.

“Doesn’t answer!” snapped the girl, after a fruitless minute.

Dan, hearing Billy’s voice rising to crescendo, pulled on his boots again and ran down to the kitchen. “You’ll wake the whole house up,” he exclaimed, admonishingly.

“Well, what do you know about this?” Billy demanded.

“About what?”

“Something has happened down to Old John’s——”

He turned and made frantic efforts to get Central again. She said finally: “Don’t answer. I think he’s got the receiver off the hook.”

Billy, at this, repeated as near as he could remember the broken sentences he had heard over the wire.

“Sure it was Bromley?” asked Dan.

“I hope I know his voice, even when he whispers,” replied Billy, with scorn.

“We’d better go down there,” said Dan, slowly. “John is old; somethingmighthave happened.”

“I reckon something has happened, all right, all right!” growled Billy, beginning to struggle into his coat.

“Wait till I speak to father. We mustn’t go without telling him. Get out the motorcycles, Billy.”

“Betcher!” responded his brother, unlocking the kitchen door.

Five minutes later they were astride their machines and were wheeling for the crossroad that led down to Bromley’s dock. The wind cut like a knife and it was pitch dark. Without their headlights they would not have dared venture along the black road. Now and then—it seemed to Dan—a flake of snow stung his cheek. The long-gathering storm was about due.

They shut off the noisy engines as they slid down the hill to the river’s brink. TheFlying Feathersrattled a little over the ruts; but they approached the dock rather quietly, after all.

There wasn’t a light anywhere about the premises—not even in Old John’s little green painted shack where he had lived alone so many years.

“Let’s go easy, Billy,” advised Dan.

They hopped off their wheels and stood them carefully under the trees by the roadside. They quenched the light of their lamps, too; but Dan removed his lamp and carried it in his hand against emergencies.

“Don’t see a soul around,” breathed Billy. “Shall we hail the old man?”

“Not yet,” returned Dan, quite as disturbed now as was his brother.

They were almost at the door of the cabin when Billy suddenly clutched Dan’s arm. He pointed toward the outer end of the dock.

“Where—where’s that other mast?” he demanded.

“What—you can’t see it in this black night, Billy,” Dan declared.

He, too, recognized the lofty mast of theFly-up-the-Creek. The mast of the motor iceboat should have stood beyond it; but——

“It’s gone!” gasped Billy, and started on the run down the dock.

“Wait!” called Dan, softly.

He raised his hand to knock upon the door of Bromley’s hut, but halted in a panic. Out on the ice—seemingly from a great distance—sounded the explosions of a motor exhaust!

“They’ve robbed us!” shrieked Billy, from the end of the dock. “Look, theFollow Meis gone!”

Dan did not wait to rap on Old John’s door. He lifted the latch and found it unbolted. As he stumbled into the place he fell over a body lying on the floor. Opening his lamp, he turned the ray upon the obstruction. It was Bromley, bound hand and foot, and gagged, lying helpless on the floor, but very much awake!

The old man’s eyes glared like a mad cat’s in the dark; and when Dan jerked away the bandage that had smothered his speech, the old boatman “let go” some deep-sea language that—at another time—would have quite startled the Speedwells.

“Those sculpins jumped on me—three of ’em. I knowed they was sneakin’ erbout, an’ I was tryin’ ter warn ye over the ’phone. But while I was talkin’ ter Master Billy they rushed me—broke right inter the house here an’ grabbed me.

“Ye kin see I did some fightin’,” said Bromley, who was now sitting down and holding his head, on one side of which a big lump had come into sudden being. “There’s my butter crock smashed—I heaved it at one of the villings—I did so!

“But three ter one is big odds for an old feller like me. Ye see what they done to me? And they went off with your new boat, Master Dan.That’swhat they was after.”

“What did they look like?” queried Dan, sharply.

“They was masked—every one o’ them,” replied Bromley.

“They went up the river, Dan,” said Billy, eagerly. “Didn’t you hear the exhaust of their engine?”

“I couldn’t place it.”

“Icould,” declared Billy, earnestly. “I was out on the end of the dock, and I marked it well. ’Twas up-stream——”

“Ye’d better telephone to the constable,” said Old John.

“To Josiah Somes?” laughed Billy. “A fat lot of goodthatwould do us.”

“You ’phone to the sheriff, John,” commanded Dan, suddenly deciding the matter. “And tell father about it, if he asks. But Billy and I will follow the robbers.”

“Say! them three villings was powerful mean to me,” objected the boatman. “What they’d do to a couple of boys——”

“We needn’t get into a tussle with them,” said Dan, quickly. “We’ll just get on their trail—if we can.”

“We can,” cried Billy, confidently, and ran out of the cabin at once.

His brother was soon after him. They unleashed the bigger iceboat and pushed her off from the dock. There was a strong gale blowing, but they had been out in some pretty keen blows with theFly-up-the-Creek, and knew well how to manage her.

“Sure they went up stream?” asked Dan, as he helped Billy raise the big sail.

“Pos-i-tive!”

“Then——We’re off! Look out for yourself, Billy, when the boom swings over.”

Dan barely caught the stern of the craft and scrambled in. The wind had filled the canvas suddenly, and she shot out from the dock. He had her in hand in a minute, however, and sent the boom creaking over and they got upon the right tack.

Almost at once the iceboat set a pace that made the boys cower and cling as they could to the rocking, wrenching timbers of the craft. The gale did not show its fury until they were well out of the lee of the land.

Then the boys discovered that it was snowing, too. The few flakes that had whistled past them while they were riding down to the dock hadgathered in infinite numbers now. The gale whipped them along so speedily that they did not seem to touch the ice at all; yet the air was soon filled with hurrying, stinging ice particles which blinded them.

Somewhere ahead they believed three robbers were flying up the river in the stolen motor iceboat. Of course, they would carry no lamps, and it would be difficult to see the runaway until they were right upon it.

But if they continued to use the motor Dan and Billy knew they would soon be able to place theFollow Me. They strained their ears to distinguish the put-put-put of the exhaust.

CHAPTER XV

ON ISLAND NUMBER ONE

Dan Speedwell, naturally more thoughtful than his brother, realized immediately that they were up against a difficult proposition.

The storm was gathering rapidly and through the curtain of snow it was impossible to see far. It was true the falling flakes lightened the scene greatly; yet they interposed a white wall that was impenetrable a few yards beyond the bow of the iceboat.

In which ever direction the thieves had gone with theFollow Me, the pursuers’ only chance of overtaking them was to follow by sound—not sight. Therefore the thickly falling snow did not balk the Speedwell boys much. It only would serve to deaden the sound of the motor iceboat’s engine.

Although the bulk of the falling snow was swept on upon the breast of the gale, and little stuck to the ice, the big iceboat made less noise than usual. Her shoes did not clog; But the scale of new snow upon the river smothered the shriek of thesteel. Billy, standing on the crossbeam, strained his ears to catch the faintest sound from the motor of the boat they were pursuing.

If the robbers continued to use the motor only, both boys knew that theFly-up-the-Creekwould soon overhaul the stolen craft.

For they were now tearing up the river at a furious pace. On, on, on—the boat rocking and bounding—often shooting into the air completely when the runners struck a “hubbly” piece of ice—peeling the miles off under the runner-shoes with nerve-racking speed.

Directly they saw the gaunt outline of tree-tops on the right hand. They were passing some island; but which one, neither boy could have told at the moment. The usual landmarks were wiped out.

For what point along the upper reaches of the Colasha were the robbers headed? That was a disturbing query in Dan’s mind. Had the fellows prepared some hide-out for the motor iceboat, even before they had stolen her?

And the puzzle was: What did they want of theFollow Me? Was the robbery merely for the sake of keeping the Speedwell boys out of the regatta—which was now but a week away? Or, was the crime committed for an entirely different reason?

Unless the scoundrels removed the boat from the river it would be rather difficult to hide her for long.

“But they can make us a whole lot of trouble—that’s a dead certainty,” muttered Dan, striving to clear his goggles of the wet and clinging snowflakes.

“D’ye hear anything, Dan?” yelled Billy at that moment.

“Not a thing.”

“Crickey!” cried the younger boy. “Mebbe those fellers have run her under the ice.”

Dan caught most of what his brother said, but only shook his head. Billy, as he stood clinging to the leather hand-hold, was outlined by the snow, which made his figure bulk hugely in the uncertain light.

Standing there, Billy should be able by now to hear the motor’s exhaust—if ever! Unless, of course, the thieves had put canvas on theFollow Me, too.

Dan was trying to puzzle the thing out. If the robbery was solely for the purpose of putting him and his brother out of the regatta, why this long run up the river? Suppose the three men had merely motored over to one of the islands, or to the far shore of the river? There they could have hidden, or destroyed, her before this. A few strokes of an ax would have put an end to the usefulness of the motor and machinery on the stolen boat—andthatmight have been done at Bromley’s dock.

No; it looked very much to Dan as though, had the intention merely been to keep her out of the race, the thieves never would have taken theFollow Meout on the river on such a blustering night as this.

There was something else behind it. Because he believed that somebody had gotten hold of the plans he had drawn for the boat Dan, like Billy, had jumped to the conclusion that this incident was along the same line—that somebody who was afraid of their prowess wished to keep them out of the ice races.

His mind had suddenly shunted back to the repeated conversation between the strange man that afternoon on Bromley’s wharf, and Old John himself. The man had connected him and Billy with Island Number One. There was a mystery about that island—and the unfortunate lad who spent at least a portion of his time in that locality.

The connection between this present affair and the stranger’s conversation was suddenly clinched in Dan’s mind. The mist of uncertainty which had bothered him was dissipated on the instant.

“Those fellows aren’t trying to do us out of the races,” he thought. “It’s something about Island Number One and the dummy. They never came up the river as far as this—and that’s good reason why we don’t hear the motor.”

His decision brought about instant action. He yelled to Billy and the latter heard:

“Look out, boy! I’m going to swing her over!”

Dan took up the sheet and for a few moments the boat lost headway. Then the stiffened canvas filled again and they shot away on the other tack.

Billy shouted some objections; but Dan gave him little attention until he had swung her clear across the river and they were headed down stream, and on the other side of the chain of islands.

“Don’t give it up! don’t give it up, Dan!” begged the younger lad.

“I’m not. But I’ve got a hunch, Billy,” returned Dan. “See where we are. What light is that?”

“Must be the light at Benzinger’s Inn,” sang out Billy, after a moment. “But it’s hard to tell. Landmarks seem different when the river’s frozen——”

“You’re right! you’re right!” cried Dan. “It’s the Inn. I see the big oak beside it.”

“That white staff——?”

“Yes. It’s the snow makes it look so ghostly. Now we’ll slip across nearer the islands.”

“What for?”

“Because we’re going to try to make Island Number One,” declared Dan, emphatically.

There seemed to fall a lull in the gale. The iceboat creaked over the gathering drift of snow that had sifted down here and lay in a thick sheet upon the ice in the lee of the islands.

And how deep it was! How fast it had gathered! It actually amazed Dan and Billy that so much snow had banked up here in so short a time; for on the other side of the islands—between them and the river bank—there were but small, thin patches.

“There’s Island Number One!” shouted Billy, pointing ahead.

Dan shook his head at his brother and put a finger for a moment on his own lips in warning.

TheFly-up-the-Creek, at greatly reduced speed, crossed the open space between the two islands. They saw nothing of the missingFollow Me; but in a very few minutes their own craft staggered into a tiny cove and the runners plowed into a two-foot drift.

Dan dropped the canvas, and it came down stiffly and creakingly. Billy trampled it into some sort of a bundle on the main beam of the craft. He grumbled meantime:

“What are you doin’, Dan? We’ll never catch those fellows—never!”

“How about if they’rehere?” queried Dan.

“Where’s theFollow Me?”

“We’ll look,” grunted Dan, stamping his feet and trying to slap some life into his numbed hands.

“This is some storm, Dan.”

“It sure is.”

“Regular old blizzard—just as you said.”

Dan seized his brother’s arm suddenly, and held it tight. “What d’ye know aboutthat, Billy?” he asked, pointing with his free hand into the tops of the snow-masked trees above them.

There was a faint, rosy glow just above the tree-tops on the high hogback of the island. This dim, ghostly light was twenty feet above the ground, at least, and all of forty feet above the ice where the two boys stood.

“That—that beats me!” chattered Billy.

“What does it look like?”

“A fire in the air.”

“Isn’t that just about where you thought you saw the smoke that other day?”

“I bet you!” gasped Billy. “A fire in the air,” he repeated.

“No. The reflection in the air of a fire, I grant you,” Dan chuckled.

“But—but——Say, just what d’ye mean, Dan?”

“It means that there is somebody on this island,” Dan said, gravely. “Whether it is that poor dumb chap, or these robbers—or both!—we’ve got to find ’em.”

“But theFollow Meisn’t here,” objected Billy, weakly.

“How do you know?” returned his brother. “Mean to tell me you can see all over this island—into every cove and inlet—from where we stand?”

“No-o——”

“Then don’t be foolish, Bill! Maybe the boat isn’t here. But I’m going to find out what that light means——”

“It’s gone!” exclaimed Billy.

“Yep. The fire was so fierce for a minute that its rosy hue reflected on the smoke. We can’t see the smoke now—the snow drives altogether too hard.”

“Crickey, old man!” ejaculated Billy. “We’ll be buried here if we stand much longer.”

“Then let’s keep moving. Come on!”

Dan started for the higher part of the island at once. It was a rocky, steep ascent, and the snow covering everything made the way more arduous. As they panted along Billy whispered:

“D’ye suppose that dummy and the three men that stole the boat are in cahoots, Dan?”

“Give it up,” returned Dan. “But we’ll find out.”

“Maybe they’ll treat us as badly as they did Old John—if they’re here,” suggested Billy, showing more caution than usual.

“We’ll be careful,” said Dan, in the same low tone. “They won’t be expecting us, I bet!”

“That’s right. They’d never look for pursuit in this storm.”

“B-r-r-r! I guess not,” grumbled Dan. “It’s not fit for a dog to be out in.”

“Well—if there’s a fire——”

“And there must be some shelter,” added the older lad. “If it’s only the dummy we’ll get under cover all right.”

“And let theFollow Mego?” groaned Billy.

“My goodness, Billy!” muttered Dan. “It’s snowing so hard now that we could not see our hands before our faces. Lucky we beached theFly-up-the-Creekas we did.”

Just then Billy fell over something. It was a section of tree trunk. Beside it was quite a heap of split wood, too.

“What do you know about this?” asked Dan, helping his brother to his feet.

“Cord wood, by crickey!” exclaimed Billy.

“Sh!”

“But who’s been cutting wood over here on this island——? Why! the dummy—if he’s the one that’s got the fire,” muttered Billy, asking and answering his own question.

“Correct!” agreed Dan.

By this time they were among the trees that covered the backbone of the island. There was quite a thick grove at this point.

“Step softly,” begged Dan.

“The snow will come pretty near deadening our footsteps,” whispered Billy. “Hullo! here’s a hollow stump.”

“What’s that?” exclaimed Dan, under his breath. “A hollow tree?”

“Stump, I said. About twenty feet high. It was a big tree once, you bet,” whispered Billy. “When Lettie and I were ashore here the other day we found it. I know it’s only a shell, for I pounded on it.”

He lifted his fist, but Dan stopped him. “Don’t pound on it now, you chump!” ordered the older boy.

He put out a tentative hand himself and touched the black tree trunk. He had already noticed that no snow clung to it. The bark was still on the wood and there was no mark to show that the big stump was hollow.

But when Dan placed his bare hand upon the bark it seemed to him as though the hollow stump was warm!

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