“Hello, there! Will you kindly repeat that last remark of yours. I couldn’t keep it all in my mind.”
And this was followed by a perfect roar of laughter from somewhere; it seemed fairly to shake the hillside. The yearlings realized how they had been duped, and you can just guess that they were mad!
CHAPTER XV.
A BATTLE WITH THE ENEMY.
Now, the first thing for the crowd to do was to locate that “echo.” If they found it, they were mad enough to make trouble for its originators. The originators did not seem to be the least bit afraid of that, however, for they kept up a merry chaffing from their hiding place.
“Hello, down there! You needn’t be looking for us in the trees, because we aren’t crows. We nest in the rocks. What are you going over that way for, stupid? Can’t you hear my voice? Ah, now you’re warm! Keep on hunting. An echo is an awfully hard thing to find. You’re looking a little too high up now. Go home and get a ladder. Go home and get a cannon and lay siege to us!”
During all this, which was in a disguised voice, the exasperated cadets had been staring helplessly about them. They heard the voice, but, to save their lives, they couldn’t tell where it came from. In fact, they were on the point of giving up in despair when something else happened.
There was a plainly visible movement in one of the bushes that grew on the side of the rock. A moment later a bit of white cardboard sailed down.
Rogers made a leap for it and picked it up. His companions rushed to his side.
“What is it?” they demanded, eagerly.