"Whew! listen to Thad, would you?" said Step-hen, drawing a big breath, which betrayed his state of mind, and the excitement that was beginning to make his pulses thrill. "Whatever do you suppose these unknown men can be doing around here?"
"You remember what I said before about this country having been stocked with game, and this lake with thousands of young bass years back?" Thad continued. "It is possible that some of the late gamekeepers have a neat little plan to make a pile of money out of their knowledge. And as the law would punish them if they were caught, perhaps they're hiding while we're in camp so close by."
"That sounds good enough for me," remarked Giraffe, taking advantage of Thad's attention being diverted to softly toss another pine knot upon the fire.
"Perhaps it's worse than that," Step-hen remarked, in a half-awed voice. "I've been reading a lot lately about some convicts that broke out of a penitentiary up in the next county. Mebbe now some of 'em have located here, and are living off the game they snare in the woods, or the fish they hook."
"That might be, of course, though I doubt it," Thad went on to remark. "In the first place, if they were convicts they would be wearing heavy brogans, such as are always used in prisons. One of these men had on a neat pair of pointed shoes, for I saw the marks clearly. The other's shoes were pieced. I pointed that out to Bob White, didn't I, Bob?"
"It is just like you say, suh," replied the other, readily; "and you showed me how I could tell that shoe again any time, and under any conditions; foh it had a home-made patch on the sole, running crisscross from side to side," and he made the figure with his finger in the earth beside him.
Davy Jones had left the fire again, to go back to the lake shore, and so did not happen to hear this explanation. He seemed to be hoping another glimpse of the moving lantern would be granted to him. There was something so weird and fascinating about the mystery that Davy wished it to keep up.
"How about our moving the camp over on the island to-morrow; have you changed your mind about that, Mr. Scout-Master?" asked Allan.
"Yes, I was just hanging in the balance, when this new thing happened, and settled it for me," replied Thad.
"Then we don't go?" asked Step-hen, guessing the way things were moving from the expression he saw on the other's face.