Within, the place was dank and musty and cobwebs spread across the openings where the windows had been. Much broken glass and a couple of sash weights fastened to ends of rotten sash cord lay upon the floor. In the corner was a makeshift bed of straw, matted from age, damp and unwholesome. The place was in possession of spiders. Whole boards of the flooring had rotted, yielding like mud under the feet of the scouts.
“Some place,” said Connie Bennett.
“Oh, here’s a dime,” Pee-wee shouted reaching under an open space in the flooring. “I can get a soda with that.”
“Here’s another,” said Westy.
It seemed likely that some of the heroes who had made the world safe for democracy had beguiled their time playing craps before going forth to glory.
Suddenly Pee-wee shouted, “Oh look at this! I bet it has something to do with a spy! I bet it has secret papers in it! Look what I found!”
From under the edge of the rotten straw our observant young hero had pulled out an oilskin wallet. There were not many such places as this old ruin that did not yield up their treasures to Pee-wee. The veriest ash heap became a place of romance under his prying hand and inquisitive eye. This find was just one of those ordinary oilskin wallets which had held and protected many letters from mothers and sweethearts and which had been shot through and through in the trenches in France. Black spots of mildew were upon it and it had an oily, unpleasant odor.
“I found it! I found it!” Pee-wee vociferated, as the scouts all clustered about him eager to see.
“You’re the greatest discoverer next to Christopher Columbus,” Roy said. “Let’s see what’s inside it.”