“I’ll go with you,” put in Pepper. “I am tired of being boxed in here.”
“Well, be careful, or you’ll give the snap away,” cautioned Andy. “Some of the steps of the back stairs squeak terribly. I left my shoes in the trunk room when I went down.”
“We’ll leave them here,” answered The Imp, and took off the footwear then and there, and Jack did likewise.
It was no easy thing to climb through the ceiling opening into the trunk room, and once above they had to feel their way through the darkness to the door. Pepper stubbed his toe on a trunk and drew a sharp breath of pain.
“Hurt?” whispered Jack.
“No, but I put an awful dent in the trunk,” was the joking reply. “Let us get a candle when we go down. I hate this darkness.”
With bated breath the two cadets walked out into the deserted hall and then down the back stairs. Once they heard somebody close at hand slam a door and their hearts leaped into their throats.
“If anybody sees us, run like mad for the trunk room and fasten the door somehow,” said Jack. “We don’t want a soul to know what we are up to. If we can get food we can stand Cuddle and Crabtree off indefinitely.”
At last the boys reached the back entryway, and through a crack of the door peered into the kitchen. Nobody was present, and the big pantry was also deserted, and so was the mess hall.
“We’ve got it all to ourselves!” whispered Pepper joyfully. “Jack, this is a cinch, a picnic! Let us take up all the food we can carry!”