“What do you say, Brad?” Dan asked eagerly. “Shall we find out where this path leads?”
The question stirred the Den Chief to decision.
“We might follow it a little ways,” he said. “But someone ought to stay here, just in case Mack or Fred should come looking for us.”
“I don’t want to stay—not alone,” announced Chips, as the Den Chief’s gaze singled him out.
“Then you and Red wait here together,” Brad directed. “Dan and I won’t be gone long.”
“If you hear us whistle twice, come a-running,” Chips advised as the pair started off together. “Mr. Hatfield may get back any minute and want us all in a hurry.”
With Dan leading the way, the two boys walked swiftly along the path. The ground sloped upward away from the general direction of the creek. All along the tunnel of bushes, Brad noticed broken branches, indicating to his observing eye that an object wider than the path itself had been carried along the trail.
“I hardly can see ahead,” Dan complained. “It’s sure getting dark fast.”
“Since we’ve come this far, let’s keep on a little longer,” Brad urged. “I think I see a clearing ahead.”
A few yards more and the pair came to a small lean-to constructed of second-hand lumber marred by numerous knot holes. The building, low to the ground, had been set back almost out of sight amid the bushes.