Joe Dawson felt a sense of almost unaccountable uneasiness steal over him as his straining eyes watched his chum slowly vanish into the gloom, and then finally disappear under the shadows of the trees at the edge of the forest.
“I wonder if I ought to have kept him back?” chafed Joe Dawson, again and again, as he trudged vigilantly around the bungalow, pausing to peer off into the darkness whenever he came around to the side from which Skipper Tom Halstead had departed.
Joe became more worried every moment. Yet the time slipped by. From the forest came not a sound or a sign of any kind. At last the first pale streaks of dawn appeared.
“Say!” muttered Joe, almost angrily, halting to glare off at the forest. “What on earth is Tom doing—taking a nap under the trees?”
Daylight became more pronounced. Surely, there could be no harm in leaving the yard for a moment or two—now. Joe darted into the bungalow, up the stairs, and into the room where Jeff Randolph slept.
“Come, get up!” commanded Dawson, energetically. “Get a gun and come down by the door. Tom Halstead is missing, and I’ve got to go after him.”
Though Jeff was, at first, inclined to resent the arousing, as soon as he understood what was in the wind the Florida boy tumbled off his cot in lively fashion and began to pull on his clothes.
“Anything up, Dawson?” softly called Henry Tremaine, poking his head through the doorway of his bedroom.
“Tom Halstead went into the woods, and hasn’t come back,” quivered Joe. “I’m going to look for him.”
“Don’t stir until I get down below,” called Henry Tremaine, sharply. “I’ll be there in a minute and a fraction.”