Chapter XIII: The Kidnapers

Phil, it appeared, was the only one to think out two reasons why there was little necessity for being exact about measurements. Coster had drawn his rough diagram on the envelope probably from memory. It was, according to Coster, somewhere near a half mile from the tavern to the split hemlock. The main thing was to keep the proper direction, if anything like strict obedience was due to the pencilled chart. Therefore he took upon himself the sole task of going south, and when he had convinced himself that he was somewhere in the neighborhood of that half mile, he began to look about for the big split hemlock.

None could he then see. There were other hemlocks, but all of a younger, second-growth variety. So he ranged to and fro, but no such tree could he find. The undergrowth was not thick, yet it prevented clear vision of anything more than a few yards away. He was about to give up, feeling a first sense of coming despair, when he caught sight of a high bulge upward through the tops of some clumps of bushes. He sprang on a nearby log and his pulse thrilled a bit when he saw that what was in view was the rounded top of a big rock.

Impetuously he leaped on through the bushes, but when nearly there he stumbled and fell over a tree root. Following the fallen trunk he noted an enormous split, extending from where the trunk divided halfway down towards the upturned root.

"By hokey! Can this be it?"

Plunging through the thick bushes, he reached the place where the branches spread out over the ground, first noticing that the withered leaves, like needles, still sharp and pointed, were undoubtedly of the hemlock variety. Moreover, the big rock which had first caught his attention seemed to be about the proper distance from where the roots showed the hemlock must have stood before the storm, or whatever caused it to fall, had done its work.

About this time he heard calls from his partners, for Phil was yet hidden from them by intervening bushes. Moreover, he was some distance away, which confirmed one of two facts. Either the two lads had measured or counted wrong in their advance with the tapeline or, as Phil concluded, the distance was only approximate. A prisoner, trusting largely to memory, Coster could not be exact, unless by sheer accident.

"Hullo! Here I am, boys! Come this way!"

They came, Phil assisting their progress by calling out now and then. When they arrived, no hemlock being in sight, the boys stared first at Phil seated on the trunk of an upturned tree, then at the boulder close by.

"How'd you get way out here?" demanded Paul.

"Followed my nose! How would you think?" Phil looked amused. "What's that you got--a tapeline?"

"Yep," replied Dave. "Wanted to be exact as possible."

Phil laughed. Said he:

"Do you reckon Coster was very exact when he drew that map--from memory?"

"Oh--stuff! I don't see any big split hemlock."

"You're looking at it, stupid! I'm sitting on the butt of it, and right there is the rock, I think."

At first inclined to scoff, both lads now saw Phil's side of it at once. Dave looked about again.

"It's a thick place here," he ventured. "You were lucky to stumble on it this way, Phil."

"Didn't stumble on it. I was particular about keeping my compass right. When I got where I thought I might have gone half a mile or so I began to look round a bit. I couldn't see any big split hemlock, but I did manage to find this big rock. After that it was easy to find the tree, even though it had been blown down."

After some further talk it was agreed that the first step would be to return to the car. Then they would decide upon what to do next.

"I think we should visit that old tavern while we are here," remarked Paul. "No knowing what we might find there. If there's an old shovel or anything, we might come back and dig under that rock for a starter."

Phil and Dave also had their theories as to what should next be in order, but nothing conclusive was determined on. Meanwhile the three, threading the trail Phil had first followed and which Dave and Paul had made more distinct, they finally reached the clump of shade trees where they had left Billy on guard over the Big Six.

But in the place of the glistening car with Billy Worth still on guard there was only a vacant place. No glimpse of either was anywhere to be seen.

"Look here--on the ground," exclaimed Paul, pointing here and there. "Somebody else has been here! Looks as if there had been a scuffle!"

Where Paul was pointing there were signs of many footsteps, inextricably intermingled, with sundry deep gouges in the loose soil as if those who made them were in a struggle of some kind.

"Look here, boys!" Dave was holding up a soiled handkerchief that he had found underneath a jumble of twigs and leaves evidently kicked together by those engaged in the scuffling, signs of which were more than plentiful. "By jimminy! That's Billy's handkerchief or I'm blind!"

Sure enough, it was Billy's, for in one corner were his initials which the boys had often seen on many of his belongings.

Phil meanwhile had been taking a comprehensive survey of the whole scene. Presently he noted that while the struggles had gone on mostly in one spot, there were, at one side, clear markings of the car wheels as it was steered in a semicircle towards the very road along which the boys had traveled not more than an hour or so before.

"Boys," said he, "I hate to acknowledge it, but Billy must have been surprised by somebody. Probably outnumbered, too. These tracks show that Billy must have put up a good fight; but they were too many for him, whoever they were. Come on! We've no time to lose!" And straightway he began following the tracks through the straggly undergrowth until he reached the road.

The others, catching the significance of Phil's suspicions, plodded after, taking in as they went where the car, avoiding the more open spaces, had plunged through the thicker growth. Evidently those on board were bent on gaining the road by the nearest route, and at a point somewhat beyond where the car had turned off when the boys first reached that place.

To the right was the old tavern, and at one spot the car had stopped where there were signs that a path had been crushed out in traveling through the brush towards the tavern.

"Look here," said Phil. "What does this mean?"

The signs were plain that something or someone had been half dragged or carried along towards the old Ghost Tavern.

"What had we better do?" exclaimed Dave. "Follow the car or take a look into that old ramshackle building?"

"Gee! Why, Billy may have been carried there--hark!"

At this from Paul all listened intently. There were certainly queer sounds to be heard somewhere ahead. Phil dashed boldly forward, calling:

"Dave, you go back and see which way that car went! Then come back to Paul and me. Get a hustle on now!"

Paul, dashing on after Phil, heard Dave grunt a dubious acquiescence as he turned back towards the road. They could trust Dave. He was often doubtful, even dubious, but he had sharp eyes and good judgment in the main.

A minute or so later Phil, followed closely by Jones, reached a more open space, though overgrown with straggly weeds and grass.

"This must be the yard of the old inn," remarked Phil. "Look, Paul!"

He was pointing where the woods trail on entering the yard showed distinct signs where some hard objects had been half dragged. It was as if boot-heels had dented the soft places in a steady imprint.

Just then came sounds from inside the house that might have been grunts or groans of pain. Without a halt Phil dashed over the porch, where heavier weights had partially crushed the rotten flooring. Avoiding these places, the two boys--Phil still in the lead--entered a short hallway, where was a doorless opening that led into what once had doubtless been the tavern office.

On the floor of the porch and hallway were fresh tracks, with the trail of shoe or boot-heels dragging along. The office room looked dark inside, though a couple of sashless windows let in some light which was, however, little more than shadowy gloom from the overhanging branches of the trees without. While they stared, listening, something stirred and scraped the dusty floor in a far corner, where a short counter toppled outward as if in danger of falling over.

"What's that?" echoed Phil. "Is it anybody?"

Muffled, jerky noises issued from the recess under the half tumbling counter. With an exclamation Paul darted forward, reached under the counter and felt an object that at once electrified the boy.

"Let's pull it out, Phil!" he urged. "It may be--"

Aided by Phil, Paul dragged forth a bound form, tied hand and foot with improvised shreds of cloth, the mouth tightly gagged with a couple of kerchiefs--in a word, Billy!

"Why, Billy, you poor boy!" exclaimed Phil, whipping out his knife and in another minute releasing the cords that bound him and cutting loose the cruel gag that had been so tightly forced into the lad's mouth that the corners of his lips were bleeding.

They bore him out of the porch to a grassy place, where with a sudden wriggle Billy sat upright, twisted his neck about, gulped a time or two, then stared at his comrades as if astonished.

"D-didn't you hear me holler?" he asked. "But of course you didn't. Before I was half awake they had me down out of that car trying to gag and bind me."

"Who, Billy? Just what do you mean?"

"I mean those two chaps that caught me fast asleep under Paul's rug on the back seat, taking forty winks when I ought to have kept wide awake."

"Two men?" Instantly Phil's thoughts ran back to the two strangers they had seen at Feeney's who seemed so anxious to get away as soon as the boys arrived with Nan.

"Would you know them if you saw them? Were they the two strangers we saw at Feeney's? Think hard, Billy!"

"Confound 'em--they had on handkerchiefs that covered their faces, so I could hardly tell. I didn't get more'n a glimpse or two along at first. Then they pulled something over my head after gagging me so tight it hurt. My mouth is sore now." Billy dubiously fingered the corners of his mouth. "One thing I'm sure of. One of the men we saw at Feeney's had on a visored gray cap and gray clothes. The other wore something darker. I feel sure the gray-clad man was one of 'em. Of course I never got half a glimpse of their faces."

"Recognize these handkerchiefs?" asked Phil, showing the ones used in binding and gagging. "Two of 'em are bandanas: the others of a soiled, nondescript variety that might have belonged to tramps of any sort."

By this time Billy was more himself, being pretty well recovered from his recent manhandling. He was the first to think again of the Big Six.

"I'm all right now, fellows. Let's see what went with the car. They stopped with me some distance from this old rookery. Gosh! If it wasn't for the car, I'd like to take a look around!"

But, like Worth, whom they were most glad to have with them again, all hated to feel that the pride of their hearts, their new car, was gone. But where?

At this juncture they were joined by MacLester, who after greeting Billy very effusively for one who had seen him just two hours before, turned to the others, interrupting Worth's brief recital of what had happened to him.

"Boys," Dave began, "I followed those tracks about thirty yards or so; then they turned towards the railroad; right through the woods, too. Rough going for a car like ours. I bet she's all scratched up by now, if nothing worse happens to her."

"Did you go any further, Dave?" This from Paul eagerly.

"Why, yes! Presently the car struck another old trail that led towards the road, and I picked up this."

Mac held out the visored cap Worth had mentioned to Paul and Phil. At sight of it Billy grabbed it and turned it over in his hands as he said:

"That's the one the chap in gray wore, I'm sure."

"Must 'a' got knocked off going through the woods," said Dave. "I think they were in a hurry or they'd never have plunged along the way they did over such rough places."

"Well, if we're through here, let's get on." Thus spoke Phil, ever mindful of the lost car. "I took a look into a back room of the old tavern, and I saw a queer outfit--looked as if they'd been camping and working there. Saw tools, and what looked like a sort of forge or fireplace. But we've no time now for anything but to look after the car. Come on!"

Rapidly now the four lads pushed through the woods along the old road, then into the woods again along the open trail that led recklessly over rocks, through thick undergrowth and over fallen saplings, with here and there uneven rifts and rises, showing that nothing but superior motor power could have propelled the machine thus far.

"Bust their dirty hides!" said Paul wrathfully. "Those two ain't fit to drive cattle to water! Hello! What's that?"

Jones, being in the lead, was pointing at a tumbled mass of their own outfit that had been dumped overboard during a rapid downward course, the end of which was not in sight owing to the thicker screen of bushes beyond, which the partially denuded car somehow had crashed through.

Paul and Billy paused to gather up the suitcases, bags of bedding, and the wicker hamper containing their present supply of food, while Dave and Phil hurried ahead, their route roughly descending now until, reaching the thick screen where the car had crashed through, they came unexpectedly to a low embankment. At the bottom was the dry bed of a small brooklet, with a further shore that sloped gradually up into second-growth timber again.

But this was not all. Right below the two boys was the Big Six; not upright, but lying on its side, two wheels in the air, yet apparently uninjured. Uttering a shout of joy at sight of the beloved car, Dave jumped down the declivity, the irregular projections of which had doubtless caused the Six to turn over under the reckless driving it had been subjected to ever since it had been seized.