“Probably not,” Murphy replied cheerfully; “but there may be something to eat in it just the same.” And he headed for the house.
There was no smoke coming out of the chimney and nothing to show that it was occupied or had been for some time. The porch in front of it was really a landing with steps coming down to the water. They shouted but there was no answer. Scott thought they were wasting time in stopping there at all, but Murphy was determined to see if there was anything there to eat. He declared that he would never forgive himself if he passed it up now and found out later that there was food in it.
They tied the boat to the steps and went to the door. Murphy pushed it open gently and looked in. It was rather dark inside and it was a few minutes before their eyes became accustomed to the half light. Then things loomed up plainly and Murphy uttered a shout of satisfaction. The shelves all along one corner of the building were piled with provisions of all kinds. A number of bunks were built against the wall at the other end of the building, but they paid very little attention to that except to glance at them to make sure there was no one there. Their interest was centered in those shelves.
“Whew!” Murphy whistled as he gloated over the great store of provisions, “wouldn’t we have been sore if we had passed this up? I don’t know who lives here, but I am going to have one full meal on him whoever he is. Gee! he has enough stuff here to stand a siege of six months.”
“Strange!” Scott pondered as he looked over the supplies. “It does not look as though any one had lived here for several months at least and yet these provisions are all fresh and could not have been here such a great while. This looks like an old house on the outside but from the looks of the floors I don’t believe it has ever been lived in much. I don’t understand it.”
“I am not going to try to understand it till I have had my fill of this bacon and flapjacks. What do you want, tea or coffee? He, whoever he is, has them both here.” Murphy did not seem to care whether the provisions belonged to man or devil, and felt that the mystery could wait for a solution till he had satisfied his appetite.
Scott built a fire in the stove for Murphy and then returned to look things over some more. Suddenly he uttered an exclamation of such profound astonishment that even Murphy paused in his cooking to see what had happened. Scott had found a sales slip wrapped up with one of the bundles and the groceries listed on it were charged to Mr. Roberts.
“By cracky!” Scott exclaimed, looking at Murphy with eyes round with surprise, “I have it. This is the very cabin where those fellows are coming to hide. They keep it stocked up for just such an emergency.”
The fact that they had walked into the very den of the scoundrels who had been out gunning for them all the night before and were probably even then on their way there startled them a little at first. But nothing could divert Murphy’s attention from his frying pan for very long.
“Oh, well,” he said philosophically, “we have their boat, so they are not likely to get here before we have finished dinner. Nothing could stop me from eating now; it would take more than that outfit to spoil my appetite.”