The proprietor came back with the name, and Rob added to the man with the bugle, “And the names of your party, too?”
“Say five trampers,” the other answered. “I’ll tell you our names later. We aren’t essential to the story.”
“But I would like to know why you have the bugle,” said Rob.
“I’ll tell you that later, also,” the man laughed.
Rob turned his little account over to the proprietor, and the party left the warm house, and went out again into the cloud and the chilling wind.
It was almost like stepping out upon the deck of a ship in a heavy fog. They could see the board walk ahead, as far as the railroad platform—and that was all. The rest of the world was blotted out. The wind was wailing in the telephone wires and through the beams of the railroad trestle, just as it wails through the rigging of a ship. It was getting dark, too. The boys shivered, and nobody suggested any exploring.
“Me for supper, and bunk,” said Peanut.
They crossed the railroad with its cog rail between the two wheel rails, and descended a long flight of steps. At the bottom was the end of the carriage road, which they could see disappearing into the cloud to the east, a barn on the left, chained down to the rocks, and on the right a square, two-story building, the carriage house.
Inside, a lamp was already lighted, and the four men who had come down the mountain with the bugler, as well as the evident proprietor of the house, were sitting about the stove, which was crammed with wood and roaring hotly.
“Well?” said the four, as the Scouts and the bugler entered. “Any more people to go down and rescue?”