“What’s that?” inquired Mr. Porter, who was still nervous and easily drawn into almost any meaningless conversation.
“Don’t you hear it?” explained the chauffeur. “That noise every little bit. Sounds like a scream coming right out of the water.”
“Oh, that’s natural enough,” declared the manual training instructor. “It’s a twist or eddy sucking into some crevice in the rocks.”
“I don’t believe it,” insisted Pepper. “Many a time I’ve been here on Sunday afternoon and set here listenin’ to them falls, an’ never before heard that noise.”
“What do you think it is—a ghost?” inquired Mr. Porter with an uneasy laugh.
“No, sir,” replied the other indignantly. “But it’s something ’at ought to be looked into. We’re huntin’ for a missin’ boy, you know.”
“There is something strange in that sound,” put in Dr. Byrd at this point. “I wonder what it can be. Mr. Porter, your explanation doesn’t satisfy me.”
“Nor me either,” said Mr. Frankland.
Just then another and louder scream came seemingly right out of the tumbling flood, thrilling fearfully every member of the boy-hunting party. For a few moments everybody present stood as if frozen to the ground; then Dr. Byrd sprang forward exclaiming:
“Come on; we’ve got to find out what that means.”