A little farther on they came to a road branching off from the one they were traveling, and Harry found on examining his map that it made a loop of a couple of miles and re?ntered the straighter road. “There must be houses along that road,” said Gordon.
“Why?”
“Else what would be the good of the road at all?”
“Well, then,” said Harry, “what’s the use of this one, if you come to that? There are no houses on it so far.”
“Well, if they both lead to the same place, if the other one just forms a loop, it must be to take in some houses, don’t you see?”
“Maybe,” answered Harry.
“And I believe it would be a good thing for me to go along there and see what I can learn. We’ll meet at the other junction. The troop must have gone along one or the other of these roads, unless they went in another direction altogether. And if there are any houses along there, as there must be, why, somebody must have seen them pass.”
“You seem to be more anxious for tips than you were,” said Harry.
“No, only I think they may have started down that road and cut up into the hills before it joins this one again. What’s the use in just marching right past them?”
The idea struck Harry as a good one; so it was agreed that he should keep to the straight road while Gordon covered the loop. They had not traveled to this point, where they were now to part for an hour or so, without keeping a keen watch for any signs of the troop which the roadside might reveal. But an afternoon shower had obliterated any tracks, if such there were, and the road had yielded no hint of those who had gone before. But Harry, still hopeful despite the gathering dusk, now took his way alone, making careful scrutiny of the right-hand border of the road for any intentional signs that might have been left, although he had no reason to anticipate finding any.
The two boys were to meet where the roads again came together, which was at the foot of Dibble Mountain about two miles ahead, their plan being to camp somewhere under the shadow of the mountain and to climb to the summit in the morning for a bird’s-eye view of the surrounding country.
The light was fast fading as Gordon left his companion and started along the loop road. It was instinctive with him to keep his eyes wide open, and his training as a scout, under Harry’s special tutelage, had developed this trait until it was said of him by his friends, and especially by Red Deer, that his habit of finding things, of picking up pennies, collar buttons, and so forth, was little less than uncanny. His pockets were a veritable junk shop of miscellaneous trifles, the trophies and mementos of his pedestrian tours.
Now, he had not gone a hundred yards along this road when something caught his attention and he paused to examine it closely. It was nothing more than an arrow, possibly three inches long, chalked upon a rock at the roadside. As nearly as he could judge in the dusk, the color of the chalk was pink, but the arrow pointed neither up nor down the road, but across it toward the west. So he crossed the road, examining the bordering trees and land, but could find nothing. He sat down on a rock and thought. To the average boy a mark of this kind would have meant nothing. To a scout it might mean many things. But, unlike most of the scout signs, its meaning was not manifest. It was not the good road sign nor the bad road sign, nor was it the sign that a message was secreted near. Yet it pointed a direction; but the direction showed no path nor trail and was fast wrapping itself in darkness.
He rubbed his fingers over the arrow, making a powdery blur upon the rock and causing his fingers to feel smooth and powdery as he rubbed them together.
“This hasn’t been here long,” said he. Then he pondered, for he knew the rule that Dr. Brent was so fond of repeating. Use your brains first, then your hands and feet.
Gordon knew all the signs, Indian and otherwise, that scouts might employ, but he had never seen a scout mark made with chalk before, and it jarred upon his romantic sense to see this schoolroom material used for purposes of woodcraft. Yet there was the arrow, pointing directly across the road, apparently at nothing. He did not know what to make of it. Perhaps it was only a tramp’s mark. Perhaps—perhaps—then, suddenly, a thought came jumping into his head which gave him a thrill of joy. Three nights ago, in the club room, Dr. Brent had sketched Lake Champlain on the blackboard in pink chalk. That settled it. “I’ve found them,” he shouted, which was very much like him, for he was apt in his enthusiasms to anticipate his triumphs.
Leaping across the road, he got down on his hands and knees, lighting match after match, and searched the ground. Presently he noticed a log spanning the little marshy gully at the side of the road. This he had not seen before, for it was well hidden amid the weedy roadside growths. Now he saw that several reeds which had inclined across the path of this rough bridge had been broken, and hung limply over to one side. The log ran into a floor of pine needles, where no sign of footprint showed. But there were the arrow and the ford and the broken reeds, and these meant that somebody had crossed—crossed and flown up in the air, for all that he could discover. Nervous with expectation, he hurried about the grove, felt of the trees, knelt and examined rocks, and avoided kicking the smallest stone until he had observed its position in regard to other stones. Stealthily, silently, alertly, he moved about. His scout instinct was aroused. But he found nothing, and the long summer twilight was now almost at an end. Peeling some bark from a tree and pulling off a quantity of the sticky resiny substance from others, he hastily kindled a small fire. In a few moments this blazed up, showing him an illuminated area with a ground as smooth as a ballroom. There was not a sign of track or trail. He paused a moment, thinking. Then he pulled up his stocking, which was an indication that he meant business—a sort of challenge.
Thus, with all his spirit of adventure and scouting instinct, he stood, baffled but thoughtful, in the vast, strange country, with his eyes fixed on his little fire. For a moment he forgot Harry, forgot everything but the pink arrow, the log ford, and the broken reeds, and stood there, his brown eyes fixed on the dancing flame, his staff stuck in the ground beside him and his duffel bag thrown over it. Presently, he went back to the log, knelt down, and examined the end of it which rested on the bed of pine needles. On the near side of the log was a very slight oval depression in the ground in which the pine needles were rotted, and where a little red lizard lay contentedly in the dampness. On the side of the log nearest this depression several slugs crawled distractedly about. Gordon reached his arm across the log and rolled it back into the depression where it belonged. Then he sat down upon it and thought.
“Some one must have lost his balance in the middle of the log,” said he, aloud, “and in falling pushed it out of place.” And that could not have been long ago, for the slugs were still moving confusedly here and there and had not yet found the under side of the log. Gordon examined the muddy incline which led from the gully up into the grove. The dank, reedy foliage did not seem to have been disturbed, but in the brighter glow of his growing fire he presently noticed a well-defined, muddy imprint upon a flat rock. If he had discovered a diamond he could not have been more elated.
Now he thought to himself that the person who had met with this trifling accident was either not a scout at all or a scout in a great hurry. For such a thing as a scout calmly falling off a log was preposterous, and Gordon would not entertain the thought except on the theory of great haste. But how had both patrols, sixteen boys, gotten through this grove leaving never a sign? For the pink chalk identified the travelers as the Oakwood troop.
He gathered up a few pieces of bark and some leaves, and putting out his fire made his way hastily up through the grove. Presently he stood at its edge and looked across a spacious stretch of meadow land, beyond which were the grim, dark hills. He kindled another fire on a huge, convex piece of bark and, kneeling, crept along the edge of the grove, endeavoring to discover where the trail came out. But he could find no sign. It was now time to pull up his stocking again and take a long “think,” as he called it.
The result of his “think” was that he walked out into the field about one hundred and fifty feet, placed his little portable fire on the ground and enlarged it with a fresh supply of fuel from the grove. He watched it till its volume satisfied him, then returning to the edge of the grove he “shinnied” up a tree, but was careful not to embarrass his vision by looking directly at the fire. He looked about halfway between it and the grove and there, thrown into bold relief by the neighboring fire and his own high position, there ran a little straight trail across the meadow which died away short of the further side. He slid down from the tree, planted his staff in the ground near his fire, and shook a few burning twigs a yard or two from it. Then he carried his fire as best he could, for its bark tray was now ignited, still farther across the field, as far as the point where he thought the trail had become invisible to him from the tree. Returning to the edge of the grove, he climbed up the tree again. Sure enough, there was the trail visible farther on in the glow of the second fire, and entering the thick woods beyond the meadow. It was barely discernible at that point, yet Gordon, from his high position and by concentrating his gaze, could determine the faint, shadowy line, flickering between visibility and invisibility, as it wound into the silent forest. When he took his eyes from it for a moment, he lost it, and picked it out again with difficulty.
The idea of following it was out of the question; so, looking steadily, he picked out a certain tree near which the trail entered, studying as best he could its height, size, and conformation. Climbing down from the tree and keeping this beacon constantly in view, he ran across the field, stamped out the few remaining embers of his first fire, took his staff, and made a bee-line for his beacon. When he reached it he could not, for the life of him, discover the faintest indication of the trail across the field, but there, opening before him, was a well-defined, beaten path up through the forest. He saw it in the glow from his second fire, a few yards back, which was now dying fast. Leaning against the big tree which had guided him across the meadow, he looked back over the trailless space which he had forced to give up its secret. He looked at the tall, black trees of the grove beyond, whose smooth floor of pine needles had tried to baffle and confound him. Then he threw his duffel bag over his shoulder, and feeling his way cautiously with his staff, started up into the thick forest.