From the platform outside came the sound of footsteps. Jack started, listened a moment, and uttered a low cry of triumph. At last he understood.
“Well, what a dolt I am,” he laughed. “Why didn’t I think of that?
“The fellow is simply out beneath the platform, making sounds against the under side of the planking—probably with a stick!”
JACK MADE OUT A THIN, CLEAN-SHAVEN FACE BENDING OVER
A DARK-LANTERN.
Jack was still chuckling delightedly over this simple explanation of the mysterious “walking” when the noise ceased, and the light of the lantern returned.
On reappearing, the unknown dragged after him a long pole. As Jack watched, puzzling over its use, the “spectre” hoisted the pole to his shoulder, cautiously picked his way amid the freight to the telegraph-room partition, and mounted a large box.
And then, while Jack fairly shook with internal laughter, he laboriously raised the pole, and began bumping and scraping it up and down the under side of the roof.