When he looked again the man had disappeared and the door of the cabin was closed.
“Well, one thing’s settled. There’s someone there all right, and there’s no knowing how many others,” he whispered.
“And there comes the old sun,” Jack exulted as the rays broke through the clouds.
Two more hours, which seemed as Jack declared, like so many weeks, passed without any other sign of life about the cabin. Then came from far off in the deep forest the call of the whip-poor-will.
“That’s their signal,” Jack whispered. “Wait a minute and you’ll hear the answer.”
Almost at once the door opened and this time the little man whom they had trailed the day before stepped out followed by the thick set stranger. The former gave the hoot of an owl and a moment later the signal was answered by the whip-poor-will.
“He’s getting that bird down a bit better. Guess he’s had his whistle tuned. If I hadn’t heard it before I’d let it pass for the real thing,” Jack declared after the men had returned to the cabin.
“I wonder why they seem so scared of showing themselves.”
“I was thinking that very thing myself,” Bob replied. “I doubt if there is a human being except us and their crowd within twenty miles of here. Still they may know a lot that we don’t.”
“We’d better be getting back to our den. Whoever it was that signaled is probably coming here, and judging from the sound, we’ll be just about in his path.”