“That sounds all right to me,” said Joe, and as Jimmy saw a chance of getting back to camp in time for dinner, he put in no objections.
“Now, for the love of butter, try to go quietly, Jimmy,” warned Bob. “If those fellows hear a sound from this direction, they’ll be right after us, because their suspicions are already aroused.”
“I’ll do the best I can,” promised his rotund friend. “But I’m heavier than you fellows, and I can’t slide around so easily.”
“Well, go easy, anyway,” said Bob. “Now, are we all ready?”
With infinite caution the boys wormed their way through the brushwood, Bob leading. By luck rather than good management Jimmy managed to be as quiet as his friends, and after almost an hour of this slow progress Bob judged that they were far enough away from the cabin to risk a faster pace. The shack was out of sight among the trees when he sprang to his feet, followed by the others, and in a short time they had reached the path leading to the main road. Here it was still necessary to be extremely careful, for they never knew at what moment some turn in the path would bring them face to face with some of the robber band. Fortunately nothing of the kind happened, and soon they reached the main road and started at high speed for camp.
“I wonder if we can’t take some sort of a short cut,” came from Joe as they raced along.
“That’s the talk,” puffed poor Jimmy, who had great difficulty in keeping up with his chums. “The shorter the better.”
“We won’t dare risk it,” returned Bob. “Why we might get lost.”
“Who’s afraid of getting lost?”
“We are, for we might lose too much time and all our plans would go to smash. No, we’ve got to stick to the main road.”