Bob leaped around wild with joy. “Talk about a clue! Why, that’s the number of the cabin at Crazy Creek where this miner lived. Can’t we go right over and hunt for it, Dan? Do you suppose that the girls would care if Gerald and I go? We aren’t at all necessary to the birthday party. You and Julie are.”
“Of course, you may do as you wish,” Dan acquiesced. “It’s a long way to the camp, though.”
“Not if we can ride,” Gerry put in. “You and Meg came down on the horses. Where are they?”
“Back at the Heger cabin by this time,” the older brother replied. “Meg turned her pony’s head up the mountain road and said, ‘Go home, Pal,’ and the brown mare seemed to be quite content to follow. Perhaps you will overtake them.”
Bob caught hold of Gerald’s hand as he said: “We’ll have to hustle, old man, if we get back before dark.”
Gerry glanced at Julie to see if she were terribly disappointed, but the small girl smiled, though a bit waveringly. Dan, noting this, spoke for her: “Julie and I will stay at the cabin. It would hardly do for us all to leave Jane on her birthday.”
These two sauntered slowly along the brook, and before they reached the cabin they saw Bob and Gerald, fully clothed, starting to run up the mountain road.
Dan had little expectation that they would find the box of which the old Indian had told Meg, but he knew that Bob would not be able to enjoy the quiet party when be might be out following a clue.
The girls were seated on the rustic front porch when Dan and Julie appeared. Jane smiled a greeting to them, then asked: “Do tell us what has happened to Bob and Gerry. They dashed in and out again, nor would they stop when we called to ask where they were going?”
“Boys will be boys,” was Dan’s evasive answer as he sank down on the porch step and smiled up at Meg. Then he heard his questioning thought asking: “Is it possible that Meg’s real name is Giguette?”