He heard a slight noise down below him and stood at attention.
“All ready—drop the key!” called up Chief Drayton from within the cabin. The voice came to Bob as through a speaking tube, carried up the fireplace flue.
“Here it comes!” answered the lad.
The next instant he had dropped the brass key down the black opening.
CHAPTER VIII
JOLLY BILL’S TALE
Tense was the silence that had fallen over the little group of experimenters—Bob on the roof of the log cabin, Ned, Harry, Chief Duncan and Jolly Bill Hickey on the ground below—Chief Drayton inside the cabin, squatting down near the embers of a dead fire on the hearth.
The key had fallen.
What was the result?
They were not long left in doubt. Up the flue came the voice of Chief Drayton reporting on the first test. “No good!” he called to Bob.