“Yes, those are the snakes.”
“Well, now, suppose you come out here and tell us the story.”
One at a time the boys wriggled through the trapdoor and came out, blinking, to face the audience. Each was bathed in perspiration and all were in stocking feet.
A reporter took their names: Willard Fox, 18 years old; Howillard Edward Montague, 22 years old, and Carl Espe, 17 years old. All were from Binghamton, N. Y.
They had been disguised as a piano box for seven days, and were on their way to Alameda, Cal., to the ranch of Montague’s uncle, Doctor William Tappan Lumb. They chose to go as a piano box because it was cheaper than three passenger tickets.
The box was built by a carpenter in Binghamton. It had a false bottom and the sides were padded. The boys put stones in the bottom, and also their suit cases.
“We expected to be on the way about three weeks,” said Monty, who seemed to be the leader of the expedition. “We took along canned goods, bread and cereals, coffee and tobacco.
“We had a phonograph and records, but it is broken. We had also arranged to have light. We had some electric batteries in the false bottom which connected with a bulb, but the bulb broke.
“There was also a stove and alcohol to run it. We have shoes, coats, sweaters, hats, and, in fact, all our possessions.”
They even had a framed certificate on the wall—Montague’s diploma from the “Boan Lake, Mich., College of Manopathy.”