"Why, as to that, I can't say. But they have beaten them at their own game. You will see."
Claus pricked up his ears when he heard this, and when the miners had all drawn away, one by one, and sought their blankets in their lean-to's, he asked of the man who sat near him, and who was waiting to smoke his pipe out before he went to bed,
"Where is Banta going?"
"Up to the haunted mine," was the reply. "You see, he went up there two weeks ago with the boys, and promised to come back in two weeks to see how they were coming on. His two weeks are up to-night."
"What is up there, anyway?"
"Well, you can ask somebody else to answer that question," said the miner, getting upon his feet. "I don't know what is up there, and I don't want to know."
The miner walked off and left Claus sitting there alone. He was certain that he was on the right track at last. As soon as Banta came back they would know something about the haunted mine.
CHAPTER XXVII.
BOB TRIES STRATEGY.
"Well, what did you hear this time?" asked Bob, who lay on his blanket with his hands under his head and a pipe in his mouth. "Everybody kept still about the haunted mine, I suppose?"