"Shall we go upstairs?" whispered Bob.
"We might as well. I don't believe there's any one here anyway."
The stairs leading to the second floor creaked and groaned under the weight of the boys, but as they were now convinced that the house was uninhabited they were not worried. Coming to the second story they proceeded to the room located in the front of the house.
"This must be the place," whispered Bob excitedly.
A table stood in the center of the room; around it were grouped five seats, chairs and old boxes, as if five men had had a meeting or conference there.
"This is where they had their meeting last night," said Hugh. "Here are places for five men, and we saw that many come out."
"Yes, sir," echoed Bob. "This looks like headquarters."
"Suppose we could expose them," exclaimed Hugh. "Wouldn't it be great?"
"If we only could," said Bob eagerly. "Let's look around."
Pen and ink, together with a pad of writing paper were lying on the table. Besides the table and seats, however, there was no furniture in the room, and there seemed small promise of anything of interest to the two searchers. They lifted every box and searched under it, but all in vain. Finally Bob looked behind the door. With an exclamation of delight he stooped and picked up a piece of paper lying upon the floor.