“Well, you are a pretty fellow,” said Roy, with a slight accent of disgust in his tones. “After what he has done to you, do you want him to get off?”
“Yes, I do; and I can’t help it,” answered Joe. “But it is not on his own account, I assure you. To me there is something repugnant in the thought that such a fellow as Matt Coyle can get any body into trouble, especially such a boy as Tom Bigden might be if he only would. If Tom put it into his head to steal my canoe, or if he told him that we had taken the six thousand dollars with us to No-Man’s Pond—why, fellows, just think what a story that would be for him to tell in court?”
“Well, could Tom blame any body but himself if he did tell it?” demanded Arthur. “He had no business to have so much to do with that squatter. Where do you suppose the money is, any way?”
“Did it never occur to you that some of the vagabonds who live at the outlet might have stumbled upon it?” asked Roy.
“Or that some other member of Matt’s family, Sam for instance, might have found it where Jake hid it?” chimed in Joe.
“That’s so,” exclaimed Arthur. “But if Sam’s got it what is he going to do with it? It would be little satisfaction to me to have so much money in my possession unless I could use some of it.”
“The twenty minutes are up,” said Joe, examining the face of his watch by the light of a match. “Mr. Swan has had time to ‘surround’ the camp, and we must be moving. We must be careful, also, and not get out of supporting distance of one another, for there is no telling what we may run onto in the dark.”
It was not without fear and trembling that the boys began their advance upon the squatter’s camp. They had given Mr. Swan to understand that they were not afraid of Matt, and they would have made their words good if it had been daylight and they had been standing on the defensive; but advancing upon his supposed hiding-place in the dark was something they had not bargained for. Matt might be standing guard with a club in his hand, ready to brain the first one who showed himself.
“I declare, that’s just what he is doing. There he is, standing by that fire.”
So thought Joe Wayring, who by good luck happened to strike the well beaten path that led through the evergreens from the cove to the spot whereon the squatter’s miserable lean-to had once stood. Having no bushes to impede his progress, Joe crept rapidly forward on his hands and knees without making the slightest sound, and in a few moments came within sight of a glowing bed of coals, with a clearly defined pair of legs in front of it. A second glance showed Joe that the legs belonged to a man who loomed up wonderfully tall and stout in the darkness, and that he held across his breast something that looked like a bludgeon. He was gazing in Joe’s direction, too, and that was the way he would undoubtedly run when he became aware that his enemies were closing in upon him. What was to be done now, and where were Mr. Swan and the other boys?