And the boy's appeal for aid was answered at once by the two chums.
"Say, he is 'way down in the muck!" exclaimed Ted. "Isn't he?"
"He must have walked in the wrong place," added Chot.
However it had happened poor Rick was indeed, as he said, stuck in the mud. His two chums saw this as they ran back to him.
"You got off the path, that's what's the matter!" declared Chot, as he looked at Rick—standing at a safe distance, of course, so that he, too, would not get caught in the swamp.
"You ought to have followed us," went on Ted. "We kept to the path. You got to stay up on one side when you cross this field. There's a sort of brook running through the middle of it, and you can't see it 'till you get right in it."
"Well, I didn't see it, and I'm in it all right," announced Rick. "I can't hardly lift my feet. Look!"
He rested his weight on one side, and tried to lift the opposite foot. There was a sucking sound made, as his shoe came partly up out of the mud, but it was hard work for the boy to pull himself loose.
"Look out!" suddenly called Tom, as he saw Rick tottering as if about to fall to one side. "Look out or you'll go all the way in!"
"That's what I think," agreed Rick himself. "Say, get hold of me and pull me out; will you?"