“It is a flag flying. Some one must be there, and though it may not be your Uncle Tod they perhaps can tell us where to find him. We’ll head for the flag.”
This they did, taking the left trail, and a little later they came to a sort of plateau jutting out from the sloping side of the mountain valley. On this plateau, or shelf, which was several miles in extent, was located a camp, consisting of a comfortable-looking log cabin, a small tent and a slab shack, open on one side. In this shack stood a mule that might have been a twin to Salamander, and a battered and rusty flivver. Scattered about were various objects—picks, shovels and some pieces of apparatus the use of which Rick and Chot could only guess at. From a tall tree, stripped of all lower branches and growing in front of the cabin, floated a United States flag, a most welcome sign in that wilderness.
But what attracted the attention of the boys, no less than that of Mr. Campbell, was not so much the camp, the flag (glorious as that emblem was) or the mule, but the sight of two men sitting in dejected fashion in front of what seemed a tunnel or cave leading into the side of the mountain.
And as he caught a view of the face of one of these men Rick joyfully cried:
“Uncle Tod!”
The owner of the name, for he it was, seemed startled from a deep train of thought, his companion likewise rousing himself from a reverie that the arrival of the touring auto had not broken for either. Then Uncle Tod cried:
“Rick and Ruddy! Shiver my grub stake, it’s Rick and Ruddy!”
“How are you, Uncle Tod?” cried the lad as he leaped from the auto, while Ruddy, who followed, frisked about his master’s relative and also made quick friends with the other man. “How are you?”
“Oh, so-so to middling,” answered Mr. Belmont as he put his arm around Rick’s shoulder. “And you brought Chot along, too! That’s fine.” He looked questioningly toward Mr. Campbell, and Rick made the introduction.
“This is my partner, Sam Rockford,” said Uncle Tod, indicating rather a gloomy-appearing individual who shuffled from his seat in front of the log cabin. “Well, Rick, you and Ruddy got here at last. Have any trouble?”