The Utway twins stared at each other again as the door of the office closed behind them. Jerry seized Jake’s arm in an excited grip. “Why didn’t you tell the Chief about the man you saw down by Fifteen the other night?” he whispered urgently.
“I didn’t have a chance. Besides, why should we give that prison guard all the glory of capturing the convict?”
CHAPTER VIII
THE DISAPPEARING ACT
The Chief’s announcement that an escaped convict was in their neighborhood fell like a bombshell in the midst of the campers assembled at lunch.
“All boys are forbidden to go out of sight of camp, unless a councilor is along,” he ended. “We must take precautions until this dangerous man is captured. Now, to-night we will assemble here in the lodge, for Stunt Night. Every tent-group will be expected to have an act or other stunt prepared, and prizes will go to the winners. Dismissed!”
The groups scattered from the mess-hall to their respective tents to pass the daily siesta hour which was set aside as a period of rest and quiet from the brisk, noisy turmoil of the camp’s activity. Mr. Jim Avery cocked his long legs up on the end of his bunk in Tent Ten. “We have the whole afternoon to get ready,” he observed to his followers. “That should give us plenty of time to work up a first-class stunt that will bring home the prize. Anybody got any ideas?”
Wild Willie Sanders spoke up. “We’ve got an edge on the other tents, haven’t we? Here we are with Chink Towner, the most famous Mandarin Magician in captivity. Say, I’ll bet we can put over a magic show that will knock the rest of the tents silly!”
“How about it, Chink?”
“Sure, that’s right,” Chink Towner agreed modestly. “We could do it, all right. I’ve got a lot of new tricks up my sleeve that nobody ever saw before. The best one, though, needs to have Jerry Utway, and that means we’d have to take Tent Eight into partnership with us.”
“That can be arranged, I think,” said Mr. Avery. “I’ll speak to Dr. Cannon about it. He knows it’s next to impossible to separate the twins. And with fourteen campers on the job, it ought to be some show. Well, what’s your trick?”