“Well, you sure did give us a good scare,” Jack declared, as he shook his friend’s hand and threw himself down on the ground by his side. “Tell us all about it.”

“Do you think that thing, whatever it was, knew that you were following it?” he asked as soon as Rex had finished his story.

“I don’t know, but it made off through the woods mighty fast. That’s what made me get so far away before I knew it.”

“You might not have been so far away at that,” Bob laughed. “You don’t have to go very far in these woods to get lost if you’re not used to them.”

“I’ll say you don’t,” Rex agreed, and then added: “Believe me, little Rexie is going to stick close to the fireside after this until he learns the ropes a bit better.”

They were all too tired to think of setting a watch that night.
128

“We’ll take a chance on it,” Bob declared. “But we’ll make it pretty hard for anyone to get any of our things just the same.”

So as soon as supper was over they rearranged their beds in the form of square, and piled all their supplies in the middle.

“Now Mr. Lalapaloosla has got to step over one of us in order to get away with any of our stuff, and I don’t believe even he can do it without waking at least one of us,” he declared, and Kernertok grunted approval.

They were up with the first break of day and found that nothing had been disturbed nor did a careful search disclose any additional tracks.

“I guess you scared him off,” Jack declared as they gathered about the fire for breakfast.

Breaking camp as soon as possible, they started for the upper end of Lake Umsaskis, which they reached about an hour later. Then, turning slightly to the right, they entered a long narrow pond, which Bob informed them was called Long Pond.

“And it looks as though it were well named,” Rex declared.

“When we get to the upper end of it we’ll enter the Allagash and then it’s only about forty miles to the Little Umsaskis,” Bob told him.
129

It was nearly noon when they reached the upper end of the pond, and they decided to land and eat dinner before starting down the river.

“We made one big mistake, Jack, when we started on this trip,” Bob said while they were eating.

“Only one?” Jack smiled.

“Well, I’ve only thought of one so far.”

“All right, spring it.”

“We should have left one of the pocket phones at home and brought the other with us.”

“What do you mean, phones?” Rex asked.

“Why, early in the summer we finished a couple of what we call pocket radio phones,” Bob explained. “We had been working on them for some time.”

“And let me tell you they came in mighty handy awhile ago.” Jack interrupted, and he told Rex and the Indian about their trip along the Canadian border in their search for liquor smugglers.

“And you didn’t bring them with you?” Rex asked.

“Oh, I brought them, but the trouble is that I brought both instead of leaving one at home, so we could talk with the folks.”

As Bob was speaking he took the two cases out of his pack and explained how they worked.

“Well, you boys do beat the bugs. And you never said a thing about it. Why, it’s wonderful. Mebby we’ll have a chance to use them before we get back.”

“Quien sabe,” Bob smiled.
130

The Allagash River flows from the upper end of Long Pond, nearly due north. In places nearly an eighth of a mile wide, it narrows in others to a small space through which the water rushes with the speed of an express train.

They had just finished dinner and were about to clean up when suddenly they heard a loud twang from a thicket near by, followed by a whirring sound as a feathered arrow flew just over their heads and stuck quivering in a white birch.

“What-do-you-know-about-that?” Jack gasped.

“I thought this was the twentieth century,” Rex whispered, as he gazed fascinated at the arrow. “A bit lower and you’d have been scalped, Bob.”

Only Kernertok seemed for the moment to retain his wits. Hardly had the arrow hit the tree than he leaped for the thicket whence it came. But even his swiftness was too slow, for he could find no trace of the shooter. For several minutes he beat about, but at length was forced to acknowledge that whoever had been responsible for the shot had been too quick for him.

Meanwhile Bob had noticed something peculiar about the arrow.

“Looks as though a piece of paper was wrapped about the end,” he declared, as he got to his feet. “There is, too,” he said a moment later, as he tried to pull the arrow from the tree.
131

So deep had the head of the arrow sunk into the tree that he broke it in pulling it out.

“That’s too bad,” he muttered. “Would have liked to keep that for a keepsake. Only time I ever had an arrow shot at me.”

“What does it say?” Jack asked impatiently.

“Just a minute and I’ll have it off.”

The slip of paper was tied tightly about the shank of the arrow with a short length of waxed thread, and it took him some time to get it off.

“Why it isn’t paper at all,” he declared, as he unwrapped it. “It’s a piece of white birch bark.”

“Any writing on it?” Jack asked impatiently.

“There’s something,” Bob replied as he smoothed the sheet of bark out.

“Well of all things.” Rex, who was peeping over Bob’s shoulders, made the remark.

There was no writing on the bark, but, drawn with a bit of charcoal, were a number of crude figures.

“You’d think this was back a hundred years ago,” Jack said, as he studied the drawings.

Three figures, evidently intended to represent white boys and one Indian, followed by a dog, were seen fleeing from a band of Indians. The air was filled with flying arrows.

“It seems to be a fairly broad hint to say the least,” Bob said.
132

“Whoever did it sure knows how to come to the point,” Jack agreed.

“Let’s see what Kernertok thinks about it,” Rex suggested.

“Good idea.”

The old Indian studied the drawing intently for several minutes, then handed it back shaking his head.

“What about it?” Bob asked.

“Injun no mak’ um.”

“You sure?”

“Heap sure.”

“What makes you think so?”

“Injun no mak’ many Injuns, mebby two, mebby three, no more.”

“Who did it then?” Jack asked.

“No can tell. Some white man.”

“Well, it’s dead sure that whoever did it wanted us to think that it was Indians,” Bob declared.

“That heap so,” Kernertok agreed.

“It all seems to fit in,” Bob said slowly.

“Fit in what?” Jack asked.

“Why some one is trying to scare us away from here. First they tried it with those tracks and then when that didn’t work they tried this warning.”

“And do we scare?”

“We do not.”
133

“Not so you’d notice it,” Rex joined in.

“But we’ve got to be on our guard every minute,” Bob insisted. “What do you say, Kernertok?”

“Must be heap sharp.”

“And then some,” Jack agreed.

“Well, it isn’t the first time we’ve been up against it and I guess we can take care of ourselves fairly well,” Bob declared.

“I reckon,” Jack joined in.

“They say that variety is the spice of life,” Rex said. “If that’s right, I’ll recommend Northern Maine to anyone who’s looking for spice. There’s more of that article to the square inch up here than any place I ever saw or heard of.”

“I guess you’re about right there,” Bob laughed. “But before we start, I move we take a look about and see if we find out anything about who shot that arrow.”

“I guess Kernertok made a pretty good search,” Jack said.

“Injun hunt quick. No look careful. We mak’ heap good look,” Kernertok advised.

But although they searched for the better part of half an hour beyond locating the place from which the arrow had been shot as indicated by a few broken twigs, they found nothing to help them. There was no trace of a trail to show in what direction the man had departed.
134

“He’s foxy all right,” Bob declared, as they gave up the search.

“Righto,” Jack agreed.

“Him heap good,” Kernertok added, shaking his head.

It was plain to the boys that the old man was worried. He always felt a keen sense of responsibility when in the woods with his boys, although he had great confidence in their ability to look out for themselves. “Them most as good as Injun,” he had once told Mr. Golden.

“Rex, do you think that this business can have any connection with that fellow who stole your money?” Bob asked.

Rex thought for some time before replying.

“That’s a pretty hard question to answer,” he said finally. “I do know that he came from somewhere up here.”

“But would he have any way of knowing that we were after him?”

“That’s what I don’t know. You see, he must know more or less people around here, and it’s possible that some one may have put him wise.”

“Well, it must be one of three things,” Bob declared after a moment’s thought. “It’s either he or some of those whiskey runners who think we are after them, or—”

“Or what?” Jack asked as he paused.
135

“Or a real lalapaloosla,” he said with a grin.

“Oh, rats,” Jack laughed.

“Mebby,” Bob replied.

“Mebby what?”

“What you said.”

“You know that you don’t believe in any lalapaloosla business,” Jack said.

“Who said I did?” Bob smiled.

“You came pretty near to it,” Rex broke in, but Bob only laughed.

“Well, this isn’t getting us anywhere,” Jack said as he started toward the canoe.

“Great Scott! Look at this, will you,” he shouted a moment later, pointing to the canoe.

All rushed to where he was standing.

“Well, I’ll be jiggered,” Bob said, and Rex added:

“Of all things.”

“Him heap big cut,” Kernertok shook his head slowly, as he gazed at the slit in the bottom of the canoe.

“Who could have done it?” Rex gasped.

“Same one who has done all the rest of this monkey business,” Jack snapped angrily.

“You mean who shot that arrow?” Bob asked.

“Well, I hope there isn’t more than one party after us.”

“That’s a consummation devoutly to be desired,” Bob declared.
136

“This is no time for verboseness,” Jack told him, and Bob apologized.

“But when could he have done it?” he asked.

“While we were hunting for him back in the woods, of course,” Jack told him.

“Of course,” Bob repeated. “We were big dunces not to have left one of us to watch the canoe.”

“You said a mouthful,” Jack declared, adding: “Seems to me we’re always locking the door after the horse is stolen.”

“You can’t think of everything,” Rex consoled.

“It beats me why he didn’t smash it all to pieces while he was about it,” Bob mused.

“Perhaps he intended to, but didn’t have time,” Rex suggested.

“I think you hit it,” Jack told them. “See. Here’s the big cut and right back of it is a little one. Looks as though he had just started on the second one when he saw us and had to beat it. I’ll bet he intended to cut it all up, so that it would be impossible to fix it.”

“That heap right,” Kernertok said sadly. “Him start to spoil boat.”

“Well, we can thank our lucky stars that we didn’t stay back there any longer,” Bob said.

“And we mustn’t let this canoe out of our sight for a single minute after this,” Jack added.

“We won’t,” Bob assured him.
137

They lifted the canoe from the water and carried it up the bank, where they placed it bottom up. Kernertok at once went off in search of bark and pitch, and, as there seemed nothing else to do, the boys threw themselves on the ground to await his return.

“Guess we might as well get some trout for supper while we’re waiting,” Jack said after a while.

“I’ll go with you if Bob don’t mind staying alone,” Rex said.

“Sure. Go ahead. I’ll watch the canoe and things,” Bob assured them.

Kernertok was gone longer than Bob expected and he was beginning to get a bit uneasy when the Indian returned.

“Pitch heap few,” he explained his long absence. “Have to go heap long ways before find.”

“Didn’t see any sign of anyone, did you?”

“No sign,” the Indian replied, as he set about the work of repairing the canoe.

He had it nearly completed when Rex and Jack returned with a dozen fair-sized trout.

“She be right in mornin’,” he assured them.

“Another half day lost,” Bob sighed............