From this spot the path descended into the thicket and down the steep declivity. Below them lay Black Lake with tiny black specks upon it—canoes manned by scouts. The faintest suggestion of human voices could be heard, but they did not sound human; rather like voices from another world.
Suddenly, in the vast, solemn stillness below them a shrill whistling sounded clear out of the dense jungle. It might have been a hundred yards down, or fifty; Tom could not say.
He was not at all excited nor elated. Holding up one hand to warn Hervey to silence, he stood waiting, listening intently.
Again the whistle sounded, shrill, clear-cut, in the still morning air.
“Take off your shoes and leave them here,” Tom whispered; “and follow me and don’t speak. Step just where I step.”
Tom’s soft moccasins were better even than stocking feet and he moved down into the thicket stealthily, silently. Not a twig cracked beneath his feet. He lifted the impediments of branch and bush aside and let them spring easily back into place again without a sound. Hervey crawled close behind him, passing through these openings while Tom held the entangled thicket apart for both to pass. He moved like a panther. Never in all his life had Hervey Willetts seen such an exhibition of scouting.
Presently Tom paused, holding open the brush. “Hervey,” he said in the faintest whisper, “they say you’re happy-go-lucky. Are you willing to risk your life—again?”
“I’m yours sincerely forever, Slady.”