"So do I," added Tom.
The two boys had divided the cabin neighborhood into two sections. Each one walked half way around the shack at intervals, so that part of the time they met in back, and part of the time in front, like two coast guards meeting each other on their beach patrols.
After a while it grew more silent as the creatures of the night ceased their calling, and seemed to go to sleep. It was colder, too, and Tom and Chot were glad they had put on warm clothes. But they rather liked the time they were having. As Boy Scouts they had often camped out, but never for the reason they were now doing it—to help a chum get back his dog.
"Well, our time is 'most up," remarked Tom, as he looked at the radium-dial of a wrist watch his father had given him. "It'll soon be twelve," he added.
"Then Rick and Sam will come out," spoke Chot. "Wouldn't it be funny if Rick should find his own dog when it was his turn to be on guard."
"It would be dandy!" said Tom. "But I guess——"
All at once the two boys heard a little crackling and rustling in the bushes which grew almost up to the old log cabin.
"Someone's coming!" whispered Chot.
"Yes," agreed Tom, in a low voice. "I wonder who it is?"
And just then there came the bark of a dog close at hand—the bark of a dog in the night.