Skippy felt himself trembling too.
CHAPTER IX
TRAPPED
Skippy was destined to remember that night. Whether it was the chill gloom of the house or the nameless dread which seemed to hang like a pall over the wilderness hideout, he did not know. Certainly, everything they said and did gave them a feeling of unreality, as if they were merely moving puppets in a play. He missed his father, as he never had before, and that was saying much.
After their peculiar meeting with Timmy Brogan (as they afterward learned was his full name), Barker gravely invited them to the kitchen for refreshment. They followed Frost through two unfurnished rooms, wading through the dirt and dark until they emerged into a sprawling room running the width of the house and which, like the sitting room, was illuminated by means of a lantern dangling from a hook in the high ceiling.
A small oil stove, battered and rusty, was trying to send up a yellow flame strong enough to boil the coffee. Another stove, a wood-burner, stood back in the opposite corner as if it were trying to hide its antiquity from the boys’ eyes. A sprawling cupboard stood in another corner and in the center of the room, surrounded by broken down chairs and boxes, was a dilapidated table holding several plates of freshly-made sandwiches.
“Sit down, boys,” Barker said simply. “The coffee will be ready in a minute.”
“Seems like I ain’t fed in a million minutes!” Timmy said with bitter complaint. “Since you left me that lousy sandwich when you beat it at dawn, I....”
“Shut up!”
Barker’s funereal voice filled the room for a tense second, then he turned on his heel and walked toward the cupboard in long, determined strides. Timmy grew pale and sat down on the nearest box, reaching hungrily for a sandwich.
Frost chuckled mirthlessly for no reason at all that Skippy could see. Barker took out several thick cups with which he strode back toward the stove and poured the coffee when it was ready. After that they ate, and a strange, silent repast it was with the lantern sending eerie shadows up on the smoke-blackened ceiling and leaving the little group in a semi-gloom about the table.