Glancing furtively in the direction of the road, which ran parallel with the river path, and near enough to it to carry a voice from the woods to the road should emergency demand outcry, Grace stepped very gingerly out from her hiding into the open space in front of the famous "inhabited" tree.
Yes, there was the red flag! "Wasn't that a signal for war? The flag was a red handkerchief, and it swayed from a stick cut from a variegated birch.
"Oh!" sighed Grace, relief and excitement finding an outlet in that short syllable.
"Look at the signal!" called Benny, now going straight up boldly to the flag of fury. "See, it's a wig-wag, pointing to that big rock. Let's look!" and he followed the pointing stick which, tied to the top of the improvised flagpole plainly meant—due west—to any one who understood the scout wig-wag code. "Here!" shouted Benny, now casting caution to the light winds of murmuring pines. "Here's more trail. See? It's our secret code of turned over sliver leaves, and it leads to—let's see." Benny was visibly excited and Grace was almost pulling him down from the rock in her eagerness to follow the signs. He turned over a rock which showed loose soil, and dried leaves clinging to its jagged sides. "Here it is, Grace! Sure enough! Here is a letter from your dead tramp. Maybe he died right after he wrote it," and even the small boy found humor in the queer uncanny situation.
"Take it out by the roadway," suggested Grace, to whom the woods were now a little treacherous. She glared at as many trees as two brown eyes could embrace. "We can read it out under the big maple. Come on, Benny," she begged, dragging him forth again away from all the woodland mysteries.
CHAPTER VIII
CLUE TO THE MISSING
So many and such exciting sequels are divulged through helpless little letters! How innocently the page of paper carries the silent words, yet how powerful is the influence to cheer or sadden!
Grace had read her mystic letter, but beyond confiding in Benny, whose word of honor in secrecy she had exacted, not one single syllable of that note was to be divulged to any one.
She had hopes that something really wonderful would develop from her remarkable experience, and while she would have liked to tell Madaline and Cleo, she feared antagonistic opinions, and, as it was entirely her own personal secret, and not a matter of girl scout business, or even chums' interest, it seemed decidedly better to keep her own precious counsel.