"Exactly. But this is a serious matter for us, boys," the scout master went on. "Our new friends are in danger, for there can be no telling to what extremes such unprincipled scoundrels might go, once they started. Perhaps they may have an old grudge against Abe, for the boys say they were threatening him. And it gives me a cold chill to think of these two innocent children being in their power."
"Will you go over, thir, and try to do thomething?" asked Ted, eagerly.
"Surely," came the instant reply. "I would be unworthy to call myself a man if I failed in my duty there. But tell us more, please, how did you first learn of the presence of these ruffians there, and did you give away the fact that you had discovered them?"
"Oh! no, thir, they didn't thee us a bit!" exclaimed Ted.
"We happened to hear loud voices, you see, sir, when we were close to the joint," said Arthur, bent on having his share in the recital.
"Tho we crept up, as thly as any Indian could have done," added Ted.
"And peeked in at the window, just like we did that night we went over in a bunch," the tall lad remarked.
"Then we thaw what it meant," Ted continued, catching his breath again. "Those two big bullies had been eating, and made poor Little Lou cook nigh everything we left there yesterday. Why, they were as hungry as hogs, I guess."
"And they kept on shaking their fists at poor Abe, who was lying on his cot, too weak to do anything," Lil Artha took up the narrative. "He seemed to be atryin' to get them to let up on him, but he looked nearly done for."
"Then we just crawled away again," Ted concluded, "and run pretty near all the way back, because we knew you would want uth to report. Lil Artha wanted to tackle 'em by ourselves, but it was thilly to think we could do anything against a pair of desperate jailbirds like that."