"Are you coming forward?" asked Ned in a rather impatient tone, for his experiences of the last few moments had been enough to cause him to be slightly irritable. "I'd like to see you."
As the lad spoke he peered eagerly toward the blackness surrounding himself and his chums. Owing to the faintness of the flame from their small fire, the darkness lying about them like a dense pall was too great for his eyes to pierce. Try as he might, he could not distinguish even the faintest outline of the stranger.
"If you are afraid of the rats or the Germans you might step over this way and we'll go to a more convenient and pleasant place. This isn't a cheerful spot," was the stranger's suggestion.
This invitation was received in silence by the three boys.
"Of course," the other continued, "if you prefer to remain here and talk it over with the rodents, I have no objections."
"Perhaps we would rather take our own way out of here," Ned stated with little friendliness in his voice.
"Perhaps," was the dry response from the utter darkness. "But," went on the stranger, "you'd have a beautiful time doing it. There's only one way out of this place except by the trap door through which you came. Unless you're regular little derricks you can't move all that rubbish piled on top of the trap door, and you'd not be apt to discover the underground exit if you had the eyes of a hawk and an electric light plant besides. Better come along."
Ned had not relaxed his clasp on the hands of his companions, and now drew them closer to him. In a whisper he asked:
"What do you think, boys? Shall we do as he suggests?"
"Might as well," said Jack. "We can't be in much worse case than we are now, and those rats might get good and ugly when they get wise to our being here. I move we follow him."