"Did any of you notice that there was a rude sort of table in the shack?" asked Paul, as they kept on moving forward, wondering if a third discovery might be made at any minute.
"Well, now, that's a fact," replied Bobolink. "I did see that, but somehow didn't think it queer at the time, not enough to mention it, anyhow. But come to think of it, it was kind of out of the way in the shack of a wild man, eh?"
"There was something on the table that would seem stranger, if you'd noticed it. I saw a battered old coffeepot there!" observed Paul, smiling grimly.
"What?" ejaculated Bobolink. "A wild man liking coffee! Where d'ye suppose he gets the roasted bean? It don't grow on the bushes up here; and he sure don't look as if he had the cash to buy it. Oh! p'raps they use him to pass some of this bogus coin they make! Mebbe he goes to towns, and buys their supplies, all the time they're workin' like beavers up here, makin' the stuff."
"I don't just agree with you there, Bobolink," said Paul. "In the first place, as Phil will tell you, if such a scarecrow ever came into Stanhope, or any other town in the country, the officers would be sure to arrest him, and examine him to see if he oughtn't to be shut up in the asylum. If he got the old pot and the coffee to go with it from these men, then it was in the nature of a bribe not to interfere with their business, as they wanted to stay here on his Island."
"Great brain, Paul; you seem to hit the right idea every time. And chances are, that's just what happened," Bobolink remarked.
"That dog didn't come back," observed Tom Betts.
"And therefore he's still loose," added Phil, uneasily. "Hope we don't run across the beggar again; but if we should, remember Paul, the country expects you to do your duty. You must bag him, no matter what noise you have to make doing it"
"Leave that to me," remarked the scout master. "Now that we know pretty well how the land lies, and whose dog it is, perhaps I won't be so squeamish about shooting the beast if the chance comes along."
"Here's the foot of the rise," Jack broke in.