“Of course we are game!” said Dee cheerfully. “Anything that will help to break up this gang goes with me.”
Ernest paused at the opening.
“I will telephone,” he said. “I won’t wireless on account of old De Lorme getting the message game as we have picked up his now and then. Don’t light a light in here unless you have to. No one knows who is prowling around.”
He went off, and the two boys sat down in the inner chamber and whispered together. A cave is never a cheerful spot. Even in daytime it gives you queer thrills and chills, and at night, without a light— Well, Bill and Dee sat close and said little. Every little while they heard strange sounds like someone stepping on the gravel outside. Or sounds inside like sniffles, or grunts, or breathing! Once, near them on the hillside, a fox screamed, and Eddie felt, as soon as he was able to feel anything at all, that his hair had turned white. He could tell by the chilly, creepy feeling at the roots that the damage was done. He wondered what Virginia and Elizabeth would say when they saw his snow-white head.
He thought that he was alone in his terror until he heard Dee whisper shakily: “S-s-s-s-say, E-e-e-eddie, w-what w-was t-that?”
“A fox,” said Eddie, smoothing his pompadour.
“Gosh!” sighed Dee. “I thought it was a woman crying.”
“Naw, that’s only a fox,” said the country-wise Eddie. “They make a fierce racket when they yell.”
“I wonder if that one wants to get in here. Perhaps it has a den in here somewhere,” whispered Dee.
“Shoo!” whispered Eddie hoarsely. He did not care to have a fox galumping in, in the dark. He was not afraid, but he carefully drew in his feet. He knew that Dee’s were well under him. But the sound was not repeated.