COMPOSED, PLATED AND PRINTED BY
C. H. SIMONDS COMPANY
BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS, U. S. A.
BECAUSE THEIR ENCOURAGEMENT AND CRITICISM HAVE
BEEN HELPFUL TO ME DURING THE WRITING OF
THIS STORY, I AM DEDICATING IT TO MY BOYS
BOB AND JACK
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE [I. Friends—New and Old] 1 [II. Copper Coleson] 19 [III. The Haunted Mine] 29 [IV. The Race] 37 [V. A Strange Conversation] 52 [VI. In Training] 64 [VII. The Big Game] 74 [VIII. A Summer Proposition] 87 [IX. Housecleaning] 103 [X. A Note from a Ghost] 110 [XI. The Light on the Wall] 118 [XII. Warnings] 127 [XIII. The Night Watch] 140 [XIV. The Mystery Ship] 152 [XV. Weary Ceases to Scoff] 167 [XVI. Puzzled] 182 [XVII. A Sinister Discovery] 191 [XVIII. The Apparition at the Dance] 212 [XIX. A Startling Disclosure] 229 [XX. Exploring the Tunnel] 243 [XXI. Trapped in the Mine] 252 [XXII. A Daring Attempt] 262 [XXIII. Escape] 273 [XXIV. The Chase and Capture] 285 [XXV. Profits] 298
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE [“A figure catapulted from the rear of the vehicle” (See page 295)] Frontispiece [“‘We’ve got ’em licked!’ screamed Dick”] 46 [“From the oak panel fluttered a scrap of paper”] 137 [“Ned brought him down with a hard diving tackle”] 231
CHAPTER I
FRIENDS—NEW AND OLD
In the rear of a white cottage, known to all residents of the town of Truesdell as “the Blake homestead,” stands a great apple tree, whose leafy boughs have afforded shade in summer and fruit in autumn to several generations of Blakes. At present, its hospitable branches have been converted into an out-of-door gymnasium by Ned Blake, great-grandson of old Josiah Blake, from whose half-eaten apple-core the tree sprang some seventy years ago. “Six feet, two inches in his socks and as wide as a door,” is how tradition describes old Josiah, and although Ned Blake at seventeen stands less than seventy inches in his sneakers and tips the scales at a trifle less than one hundred and fifty pounds, he has something of the supple strength and a goodly measure of the courage and grit that made old Josiah respected among the early settlers of Truesdell.
Clad in a sleeveless jersey, duck trousers and sneakers, Ned has just climbed a rope hand over hand to an upper limb from which he descends in a veritable cascade of cat-skinning, toe-holding, ape-like swings to drop on the turf beside his friend, Tommy Beals.
“Bully stuff!” applauded Tommy. “You sure can do the monkey tricks, Ned, but it makes me sweat just to watch ’em this weather,” and Tommy hitched his rotund form farther into the shade of the friendly tree.