“By hokey! Can this be it?”
Plunging through the thick bushes, he reached the place where the branches spread out over the ground, first noticing that the withered leaves, like needles, still sharp and pointed, were undoubtedly of the hemlock variety. Moreover, the big rock which had first caught his attention seemed to be about the proper distance from where the roots showed the hemlock must have stood before the storm, or whatever caused it to fall, had done its work.
About this time he heard calls from his partners, for Phil was yet hidden from them by intervening bushes. Moreover, he was some distance away, which confirmed one of two facts. Either the two lads had measured or counted wrong in their advance with the tapeline or, as Phil concluded, the distance was only approximate. A prisoner, trusting largely to memory, Coster could not be exact, unless by sheer accident.
“Hullo! Here I am, boys! Come this way!”
They came, Phil assisting their progress by calling out now and then. When they arrived, no hemlock being in sight, the boys stared first at Phil seated on the trunk of an upturned tree, then at the boulder close by.
“How’d you get way out here?” demanded Paul.
“Followed my nose! How would you think?” Phil looked amused. “What’s that you got—a tapeline?”
“Yep,” replied Dave. “Wanted to be exact as possible.”
Phil laughed. Said he:
“Do you reckon Coster was very exact when he drew that map—from memory?”