Dick and Bob now jumped into the saddle and resumed their interrupted ride, going with the girls to the house in Maiden Lane. The friends of Alice and Edith were very charming girls, and the boys spent an hour or two very pleasantly, telling the story of their adventures in the afternoon and evening, and talking of the situation in in the city. The boys at length left the house to return to the camp, Alice and Edith expressing considerable anxiety, however, lest they be way-laid by the men who had already made an unsuccessful attempt to keep them prisoners.
In a short time they were back in camp, the occasional tramp of a sentry or the sudden flaring up of a fire from a puff of night air being the only things to show that there was any one there. The Liberty Boys were always vigilant, for one never knew when an enemy might be about, and Dick had taught them to be on the lookout at all times, whether they expected a foe or not. After breakfast Dick took a party of about a dozen of the boys in addition to Bob, and set out for the stone house on the river. Reaching the lane, the boys dismounted, the descent being rather too steep for the horses, and Dick, Bob and seven or eight others went down. The door toward the road was closed and there was no sign of life about the place. Dick and Bob went down to the shore where there was a little wharf, and here they found a door on the lower story, this being closed, however, as were the windows, and no one stirring either in or about the house.
"The place looks like an ordinary storehouse," remarked Dick, "and I suppose that the people about here think it is such. I shall have to get permission from the general to examine it, for it is a nest of thieves whatever else it may be."
"That is plain enough!" muttered Bob.
Taking Bob, and leaving the boys to watch the place, Dick set out for Putnam's headquarters to report concerning the place and ask what should be done. Some of the boys remained on the bank above, and some on the wharf and near the lower door. They found a passage under the wharf, and then another dug through the earth, and leading to a door evidently in the stone house under the bank and back of the wharf.
"These fellows are regular smugglers as well as thieves!" exclaimed Harry. "This is an important discovery. They use this place to take in stolen goods when they are afraid to take them in any other, I guess."
"See if the door is locked," suggested Sam.
Then he and Harry tried it, and found that it was not fastened, but opened readily when they lifted the latch.
"Hallo! Who is there?" cried a gruff voice, as they advanced.
"Here's one of the rascals! Catch him!" cried Harry.