Compelled at last to give up their search in disappointment, the boys were about to climb out of the protected nook the bluff formed on three sides of the camp, when John observed a small pile of wood such as would be gathered for a campfire in the forest. It was partially covered with leaves and being a rod or two from the site of the camp had not sooner been noticed.
“It may mean that they’re coming back and it may not,” the lad remarked. As he spoke he saw Kingdom pick up something a few feet away and quietly put it in his pocket.
“At any rate they’re gone,” Ree answered. “We may as well go, too.”
The boys climbed the ascent to the higher ground without further comment. When they had gone some distance John asked:
“What was it that you found, Ree? I thought I saw you pick something up.”
“What do you think, John? It was a glove, the mate to that other one. What do you think of that?” was the low but earnest answer.
And while the boys hurried quietly through the woods, there emerged from a small cave, screened from view by sumac and other bushes, in the little ravine, a roughly dressed man who climbed the bluff and gazed after them.
CHAPTER XV—THE GIFT OF WHITE WAMPUM
The effect on the minds of the boys of the discovery Kingdom had made was much the same as if they had seen a ghost. A vague fear of something unexpressed and unknown took possession of them and they hastened through the misty, sodden forest as though expecting every minute to be pursued. Kingdom remarked about their apprehensiveness.
“We act like a couple of thieves,” he declared, “the way we are hurrying to get away! But suppose we were seen hunting around that camp and it was noticed that I picked up this glove; it wouldn’t be exactly healthy for us, I suppose? Still, it’s not that that makes us both nervous and fidgety as a fox in a trap; but what is it?”