"Ugh!" he ejaculated, with a shudder. "Come in, yer fat wad o' Dutch. What yer waitin' fer?"
"Someding has my hat stolen off mit my head." Carl's voice expressed both perplexity and awe.
Evidently something unusual had happened, and Bud put on his hat and stepped outside.
He had no sooner passed through the doorway than his own hat was snatched from his head.
He drew his revolver, leaped into the open, and looked about him.
There was no one in sight except Carl, who was standing near him with his arms full of blankets and bundles.
Carl could not have played the trick on him, and there was not wind enough to have blown the hat away. Anyhow, it had been snatched from his head by a hand and not by the wind.
There was something uncanny about this.
It was still light enough to see out in the open, and the snow-covered ground reflected light enough to have discovered an intruder had one been there.
Bud ran around the house, but could find no person, and there were no tracks of a man's foot in the snow.