"You certainly hit it that time in the bull's-eye, suh," admitted the Southern lad; "and I confess that I thought it half an hour later. I'm still some shy, it seems, on telling time by the sun and stars."
A low hiss from Elmer just then, as he wielded the pole, caused the two scouts to stop talking, and turn their attention to what was going on. The first thing they discovered was that the skiff was now heading for the near shore. Then looking further the boys could see that evidently someone must have camped there, for to the practiced eye many things indicated as much.
When the prow of the flat-bottomed boat ran gently up on the shore, at a low order from the skipper, Ted, who happened to be further up in the bow than any of the others, jumped to the land and began to draw the skiff up.
There was a bank several feet high just beyond, but Ted waited until the others had also disembarked before attempting to ascend this. By now the other boat had also reached shore, with its crew tumbling out, though avoiding any sign of confusion, for they were pretty well drilled in the elements of obedience to orders, as all true scouts should be.
No sooner had the boys gained the higher ground than they readily discovered that it had been the site of a camp at some time in the not far-distant past.
A number of things told them this, chief of which might be mentioned the little pile of dead ashes that lay in plain sight. They could even see the sticks that the unknown party had used when cooking some sort of meat close to the red coals.
All of them gathered around. Elmer gravely examined the ashes, while the others eagerly waited to hear his decision.
"Quite some time old," said the leader at last, having figured out the solution by means of certain rules well known to those who have made woodcraft a study. "At least a couple of rains have passed over since this fire was left. There are no footprints that I can see. That also goes to show it was some time ago; but I think it was only one person who camped here."
He pointed as he spoke to where soft hemlock browse had been gathered as if for the purpose of forming a couch; and there being but a single bed even Landy could guess Elmer was correct when he said one party had made the temporary camp.
"Then it must have been the unknown man," said Lil Artha, "and our chum Hen wasn't along at the time."