The boys, watching him, laughed, even while his fright made them uneasy.
“I believe he’s more afraid of that mountain than he is of Ramirez and all his gang,” said Jack Benton on one of these occasions. “Poor Bimbo. I’m afraid he won’t be much help to us when the need for action comes.”
“Well I don’t know about that,” Phil disagreed with him. “He wouldn’t be a bit of good with a rifle—I doubt if he would even know how to fire one—but when it comes to a knife or a club, he’ll come in mighty handy.”
“Well, we’ll see,” said Benton absently, and once more his eyes turned to the mountain.
“Phil,” he said, after a minute, “I believe Bimbo’s right. Have you noticed any change in that smoke cloud lately?”
Phil nodded gravely.
“It’s been spreading and growing blacker for a long while,” he said. “Something tells me that this island is going to be a pretty unhealthy place to live on before long.”
Jack Benton spread his hands in a helpless gesture.
“What are we going to do?” he asked.
At that moment, as though he had heard the question and were trying to supply the answer, Bimbo ventured forth from the cave once more and approached Phil. He kept glancing over his shoulder at the mountain continually and his teeth chattered as he made his proposition.