“Go ashore and take him off in the boat, Springer,” directed Grant. “He sure doesn’t seem very much frightened.”
Piper got into the boat as soon as Phil brought it to the shore.
“Just because you fellows are scarecrows yourselves,” he sneered, “you mustn’t get the idea that everyone else is a coward. Come on now, Springer, you can do the rowing as long as you have the oars. Let’s get to camp. I’m hungry for supper.”
“Sus-seen anything of the ghost?” asked Phil, with a laugh.
“Oh, piffle!” retorted Sleuth. “Ghosts don’t frighten me. Why, I’d be willing to stay alone all night on this island.”
“Yes, you would!” scoffed Springer, although he wondered that Sleuth betrayed no symptoms of perturbation other than those caused by resentment at the trick they had perpetrated upon him. “We’ve been waiting for you to holler. We took the boat and went round the little point yonder, where we’d be out of sight, and waited there.”
“Say,” called Crane from the canoe, “we heard a dog howlin’, and it seemed to be on the island, too. Did yeou hear it, Sleuth?”
“Sure,” was the careless answer; “I heard it. It was on the island, all right.”
“Pipe,” said Grant, “you’re really a wonder. I confess that I’ve never had you sized up just right. For pure, unadulterated nerve, you seem to have the rest of us roped and thrown.”
Sleuth’s chest expanded tremendously.