There could be no telling what they might find themselves up against. Rumor had it that certain hard characters at one time made their headquarters somewhere up in the woods around the lakes, and who could say that the lone cabin might not prove to be a nest of yeggmen or hoboes?
"How does your thprain feel; think you can thtand it?" asked Ted of Red, as they got up from around the fire and prepared to sally forth on their mission of mercy.
"If you hadn't reminded me of it just then, I'd sure never have thought I had a game leg," remarked the other. "You're all to the good when it comes to doctoring a fellow, Ted; if only you wouldn't talk so much about sawing off legs and all such awful things."
"Well, I'll be along in ease you feel it again, and I'll make thure to carry a tin of that magic liniment," remarked the ambitious surgeon, as he reentered the tent, to make up a little package of things he thought might come in handy in case they found some one sick in the hut.
Meanwhile, acting on the suggestion of Elmer, the other boys selected such stout canes and cudgels as lay around camp.
"Be prepared!" grinned Lil Artha, as he swung a particularly dangerous looking club around his head until it fairly whistled through the air. "That's the motto of the Boy Scouts, and I reckon it applies in a case of this kind, just as much as when stopping a runaway horse. I'm prepared to give a good account of myself, that's dead certain."
Mr. Garrabrant had fetched out a couple of lanterns, making sure that the oil receptacles were well filled, so that they would last through the journey, going and returning.
"Now we're off, boys," he remarked, with a pleasant smile. "The rest of you stay here and look close after the camp. I've appointed Mark Cummings to serve in my place while I'm gone, and shall expect every scout to pay him just as much respect as though I were present. Lead off, Oscar, we're with you."
Red took up his place at the head of the little bunch. He carried one of the lanterns with which he cast sufficient light ahead to see where he was going.
"First to take you to the seven sentry chestnuts," he said. "We named 'em that, of course, when we came on 'em. The blazed trail commences right there, sir. We didn't think it worth while to do any more slicing of bark after that, because we knew we could easy enough find our way back to that place."