“Maybe they won’t trace us here, Tom,” said Will; “now you keep close to me, and when we’ve found a snug spot we’ll keep quiet and await developments.”
The dilapidated old structure, gone to wreck and ruin many a year agone, was a familiar place to the boys of Watertown. Will clasped Tom’s hand and led the way through the doorless entrance to its lower floor.
As he did so Tom uttered a frightened cry.
“Some one’s here,” he whispered.
Some one certainly was there, for at that moment a flashing light in one corner of the place showed dimly its entire interior.
Will soon made out the cause of the unexpected illumination. On a heap of straw sat a trampish-looking individual. He had just lighted a match preparatory to taking a smoke from his pipe, and did not apparently notice the intruders.
“It’s some old tramp,” whispered Will. “Come, Tom: yonder’s a ladder leading to the next story. Go slow on it, for it’s old and rickety. Here we are.”
He crept up a creaking ladder and Tom followed him. Will took the precaution to pull the ladder up after them, and closed the broken trap door over their means of entrance.
“Now we’ll sit down and wait,” he said, and both boys slid to the floor.
It was so still that they could hear every near sound. Will felt Tom tremble as from the outside echoed faintly the gruff, harsh voice of Captain Morris.