"How should I know?" asked Jed. "I tell you I don't know anything about them."
"Why were you hiding in those bushes?" demanded the leader, of Frank.
"We were watching those two men," Frank returned promptly, indicating Jed and his companion.
"Watching them? Helping them, you mean."
"We don't know yet what they were up to. We were watching the Shore Road for automobile thieves and we saw those men going down into the woods, so we followed them."
The boys were still completely mystified. Just what errand had brought Jed and the other man to this lonely place at that hour of night, and just who were their captors, remained a puzzle to them.
"You didn't come here to spear fish?"
"Spear fish?" exclaimed Frank.
"Don't be so innocent. You know Jed and this fellow were coming down to spear fish by night-light, and it's against the law!"
The whole situation was now clear. Frank and Joe felt supremely foolish. Instead of trailing two automobile thieves, they had merely been following two farmers of the neighborhood who had been engaged in the lawless activity of spearing fish by night. This explained the mysterious conversation and their allusions to fearing capture. The other men were nothing more or less than game wardens.