After Matt was made secure, Whipple and Needham went out of the hut. The young motorist had had a trying day, and even his exciting situation was powerless to keep the sleep from his eyes. He dozed off, while his thoughts were trying to straighten out the queer tangle in which events had bound him. He roused up for a moment when Pete, Whipple, Needham and Grove came into the hut and dropped down on their cots, but almost immediately he went to sleep again.
It seemed as though he had hardly closed his eyes the second time before he was awakened by a light hand pressed upon his forehead. The other cots in the room were empty, it was morning, and the girl was standing beside him.
"I have brought your breakfast," said she, in a low voice. "We can talk a little, but will have to be quick. Dad, or some of the men, may come in here at any second! There's a lot that you've got to know, and——"
She was interrupted by the sharp explosion of a firearm outside. Stifling a cry, she whirled from the cot and ran to the open door.
[CHAPTER XI.]
A FOE IN THE AIR.
"What is it?" asked Matt, struggling up on the cot.
No revolver had caused the report he had heard. From the sound he knew that a rifle had been fired.
A babel of excited voices now came to him from without, accompanied by sounds of running feet diminishing rapidly in the distance. Then came another report, and another, both from a more distant point than the first.