From time to time during that day they talked matters over. Toby was not left alone in the endeavor to invent some scheme whereby Link might be caught. Steve hatched up one that they determined to try that same night. It was to dig a pit, cover it skillfully with a delicate mattress that, when sprinkled with earth would seem to be perfectly sound; but which was calculated to give way, once a weight of thirty pounds or more had embarked on the covering.
With high hopes, then, they carefully baited this trap just before retiring to the interior of the tent. Toby, always sanguine, was confident that it was going to work. He had told long stories as they sat around the camp fire, about how hunters of big game, sent out by those who dealt in wild animals, always used this trap in the shape of a pit in order to secure various species that could not be caught in their lion and tiger nets.
They had slept so poorly of late that once they did manage to forget things the entire four boys slumbered heavily for several hours. Any ordinary noise would not have awakened Toby when at home; indeed, his folks had threatened to get a patent bed that, connected with clock-work machinery, would throw him out on the floor at a certain hour arranged for. But he had something on his mind now, and hence when there suddenly arose a tremendous squealing and crashing, Toby was up on his feet as quickly as any of his three chums.
"Whoop! hurrah! we've g-g-got him at last, fellers! Quick, let's hurry and k-k-keep the beggar from c-c-climbing out again! Oh! joy! D-d-didn't he make an awful r-r-row, though? Listen to him, would you? P-p-please hurry, Bandy-legs; you're as s-s-slow as molasses in winter!"
Not stopping to even pull on their shoes they all hastened to reach the outer air, and rush toward the spot where the pit had been dug.
CHAPTER XVI
THE LAST CAMP FIRE—CONCLUSION
"Ain't he a squealer, though?" cried Steve, as they came close to the place, and saw that the thin mattress had indeed been broken down.