But Bill was too shrewd for that, and proceeded to sprinkle his bird shot over the surface of the ancient logs.
“Now we control the situation. Our guns are not useless, if theirs are!” exclaimed Frank, with a chuckle.
Still he did not seem in any hurry to open hostilities. Perhaps he hoped these eight followers of Pet might find a way to capture the hoboes, upon which they could appear on the scene and menace the enemy until they were glad to run away, leaving the fruits of their victory in the hands of Frank and his friends.
“Pet’s up to something tricky. I bet it’s the old game of firing the shanty. You remember, Frank, how he tried to burn us out last Fall when we were in camp. There goes some of the lot creeping up with armfuls of leaves. Say, are we going to stand by and see it done?” queried Bluff, warmly.
“At the last minute we can stop it. When Pet starts up to strike a match, then we’ll take a hand. No hurry. The chaps inside won’t thank us, remember. It’s out of the frying-pan into the fire with them,” came from his companion, who was observing all that went on with a critical eye.
“Looks like they meant to have a big enough pile of leaves there,” said Bluff, as the line of creeping forms kept depositing more and more fuel close to the wall of the cabin.
“Yes, and I reckon she’d burn like tinder if once started. Suppose those two hoboes rushed out suddenly, do you suppose Pet and his crowd have got sand enough to tackle them?” asked Frank of the recruit on his other side.
“They want that reward bad, I reckon, and would do some tall fightin’ to get it. Fightin’ is ther main suit, ye know,” answered Tom Somers, as he caressed the cut on his face tenderly.
“Now they’ve stopped piling up the leaves. Looks like they expected Pet to go in and put a match to the bunch. He don’t appear to hanker after the job, but to back out would put him on the blink with the crowd. There, Frank, he’s going to make the riffle, you see. Now, what?” panted Bluff, again seeking to rise, as he fumbled his gun nervously.
“There’s no need of our doing anything, after all,” remarked Frank.