“We’re here, what there is left of us,” Bob laughed as he glanced down at his torn clothes which were literally covered with dirt.
“You look lak’ you been deegin’ wid your hands, oui,” the breed suggested looking at them both with a curious glance.
“I’ll say we’ve been digging,” Jack broke in. “But what are you down here for?”
“Me blow breakfas’ horn two tree time; you no come; we wait long time, still no come; we geet scared, oui, so me tak’ boat, come down here, see if find you.”
“Well you’ve found us all right,” Bob said as he led the way toward the boat. “Let’s get back to camp and we’ll tell you all about it on the way.”
The boat was soon chugging merrily up the lake and Bob suggested that Jack begin the story.
“You haven’t told me how they got hold of you, you know,” he added.
Jack began his story by telling Jacques how they had started out the night before determined to catch whoever it was that, as he put it, was responsible for the monkey shines at the camp.
“I was following along after you, Bob,” he continued, “when, all of a sudden, somebody grabbed me from behind and, before I could cry out, had clapped a big hand over my mouth and pulled me over backwards onto my back. Oh, it was a slick job all right and they didn’t make the least bit of noise about it. I know it sounds fishy and all that, but it’s a fact nevertheless. There were three of ’em and I didn’t have a chance. They slipped a gag in my mouth and tied it so tight that I couldn’t yip a sound. Then they tied my hands behind my back and told me to stand up.
“All this didn’t take half so long as I’ve taken in telling it, but you must have gotten quite aways ahead. Well those two big huskies took hold of me, one on each side, and we started off. I wouldn’t believe it could have been done if I didn’t know that it had been. Gee, but that was the hardest trip I ever took, but at last we got back and they put me where you found me.”