“I gess ’tis safe enough now,” Tom declared, as the clock on the wall struck the hour.
There was no moon, but the night was clear and the stars, aided by the whiteness of the snow, gave enough light for them to see some distance ahead as they made their way to the place where Tom had seen the “ghost” three nights before. Somewhat to their surprise they found the snow unbroken save for the tracks which they themselves had made that morning.
“’Tis mighty strange, so it is.” Tom Bean rubbed his chin thoughtfully as he stood facing the two boys. “Do yer spose there might be sich a thing after all?” he asked slowly.
“Tom, you surprise me,” Bob replied. “Of course there isn’t.”
“Well, I dunno, but will yez tell me how inything made of flesh an’ blood could git here an’ lave no tracks at all at all?”
“That’s what we’ve got to find out, and I have an idea. Come back to the office and I’ll tell you what it is.” And Bob started to lead the way back.
“It’s like this,” he began, as soon as they were once more seated in front of the hot stove. “I’m going to try and get a picture of that thing, whatever it is. You can’t photograph a ghost you know,” turning with a smile to Tom, “and if I can do it it’ll settle that part of it anyway.”
“I get you,” Jack spoke up. “And right now’s the time to fix it up. You see, the show’s over for the night and there’ll be no one hanging around, so let’s get busy.”
Among the other things which they had brought with them was a good camera and a supply of flashlight cartridges. The latter for taking pictures of animals at night. Tom seemed rather skeptical but offered no objection as they set about putting their plan into execution. It took them until nearly half past eleven o’clock before they had things arranged to their liking, but when that time came the camera was hidden in a nearby tree in such a way that, although not likely to be discovered, the lens had a good view of the space where the “ghost” was scheduled to appear. Wires hidden beneath the snow ran to the office and were so arranged that, when connection was made, the current from six dry cells would set off the flash powder and at the same time open the lens.
“There now, I’m going to watch here every night till something happens,” Bob declared, as he finished connecting up the cells.