“No, we didn’t. I wish to goodness we had. We camped in old Stebbins’ barn; and ‘thereby hangs a tale’—one that will astonish you, too.”
“I am very sorry you went near that barn,” said George. “If you had come up here last night—I waited for you at the road until after dark—I should have told you that the old fellow gave me fits for taking you across his sheep pasture last Saturday. He had a good notion to horsewhip me.”
“He had a good notion to serve us worse than that this morning,” said Dick Langdon. “But don’t waste any more time in standing here. Bob and I went to bed without any supper to speak of, and we are as hungry as wolves.”
While they were on their way to the cabin, George came to the conclusion that his friends must have had a very animated interview with Mr. Stebbins, during which the latter had said some things that were in the highest degree exasperating; for they grumbled at him every step they took, and gave full and free expression to the opinions they had formed concerning him.
Having relieved himself of his heavy pack—a neat camper’s basket, which was provided with straps like a soldier’s knapsack, and filled so full of something that a cloth had been tied over the top to keep the contents from falling out—and deposited his gun and fishing-rod in one corner of the cabin, Bob Howard took possession of the bench beside the door and said, abruptly, addressing himself to George:
“You remember of saying something to us about the money that Mr. Stebbins is supposed to have hidden in his house, do you not? Well, sir, three masked robbers came there last night and tried to get it. At least, they tried to break into the house, and we suppose they were after the money.”
George was profoundly astonished.
CHAPTER IX.
LOST IN THE WOODS.
“I suppose you don’t know who the robbers were?” said George, as soon as he had recovered his power of speech.
“No, we don’t,” answered Bob Howard. “They wore masks, as I told you; and, besides, the night was so dark that we could not have recognized our most intimate friends at the distance we were from them.”