Our trio had nearly reached what they judged to be the scene of the latest explosion when Dick suddenly gave a low, sharp “hist,” at the same time bending over to the ground while still peering ahead.

Palpitating with excitement, Tom and Greg halted, also looking.

Out of the shadow ahead emerged something only vaguely outlined in the dark.  Whether wild animal or human being it would be hard to say there in the darkness.  Indeed, the slight sound caused by its progress close to the road had more to do with warning Dick and his friends than anything their eyes saw at first.

“Come on!” whispered Dick, heading suddenly for the road.  In a jiffy Tom and Greg were also in hot pursuit, though young Prescott managed to keep somewhat in the lead.

But the object of their pursuit took alarm, too, and gaining the road, flew like the wind.

“Hold on there, you!” challenged Dick.  “We want a little conversation with you at once.”

At that vocal warning the fugitive put on an even better burst of speed.

“It must be a man!” exclaimed Dick.  “He evidently understood me.”

“No use for you to try to get away!” shouted Reade.  “We intend to get you if we have to chase you all the way to the seaboard.”

That was enough to make the fugitive veer suddenly and dart in under the trees.  Tom vented an exclamation of disappointment, for he knew the chances were easy for escape in the deep shadows of the forest.

At that instant Dick raised his right hand.  In it he held a small stone that he had picked up at the first instant of discovering the presence of the stranger.

Now Dick threw the stone, with the best judgment that he could command in the darkness.

Ahead there went up a cry, as though of pain.  Then all three pursuers distinctly heard an angry voice say!

“Hang him!  He hit me in the heel!”

If there were any reply to this from a confederate of the injured fugitive neither Dick nor his chums heard it.

After a minute all three stopped at a low uttered order from young Prescott.

“Hush!” whispered Dick.

“Sh!” confirmed Tom Reade.

As they stood there in the forest not a sound of another human being was audible.

For some five minutes the trio of high school boys stood without stirring from their tracks.

“We’ve lost the trail,” whispered Dick at last.  “We could remain here, of course, waiting for more things to happen, but my belief is that daylight would find us still standing here, like so many foiled dummies.  We might as well return to camp.  What do you think?”

“Yes; we’d better go back to camp,” assented Tom.

“I’m agreeable,” murmured Greg

So back to camp they went, going by the open road as much of the way as served their purpose.

“There’s the camp,” muttered Tom, as they caught sight of a light between the trees.  “Why the fellows have started a campfire.”

“What do you say if we slip up on them and give them something to jump about?” laughed Greg.

“That might work with some people,” negatived Dick, “but Darry is there, and he’s impulsive.  He might half kill us before he discovered his mistake.  O-o-o-h, Dave!”

“Hello!” answered Darrin, coming away from the campfire.  Then he waited until the trio were close at hand before he went on: 

“I judge you didn’t have any luck.”

“We got close to one of the scamps,” muttered Tom, “whom Dick seems to have hit on the heel with a stone, but he slipped away from us under the trees.”

“It’s only half an hour to dawn,” yawned Dave, looking at his watch.  “We can turn in, now, I guess, for the rascals must be about through with the guessing match they’ve put up for us.”

“We could turn in now,” suggested Danny Grin.  “We don’t have to go to sleep, you know, but we could lie in our blankets and talk the time away until dawn.  The campfire will keep going until after daylight comes on.”

That seemed rather a sensible course.  Dick nodded, and all hands, after Darry had thrown a few more sticks on the fire, went into the tent, undressed, donned pajamas and slipped in under a single thickness of blanket apiece, and lay there talking.

Yet it proved to be a case of gape and yawn.  One after another their eyes closed and more regular breathing started.

Dick Prescott was the last one to drop off.  Yet he had barely more than lost himself in slumberland when there came a blast so close at hand that, to the boys, it seemed as though they must have been blown from their cots.

“That was right up toward the road!” panted Dave Darrin, leaping from his cot barefooted and clad only in pajamas.  “Don’t stop to dress.  Come on!  Chase ’em!”

“Go as far as you like!” chuckled Dick, stopping to pull on his shoes and fasten them, as did most of the others.  Hazelton went only to the doorway of the tent, but Danny Grin followed Darrin, keeping at the latter’s heels.

Prescott and Reade were hardly sixty seconds later in heading up the slope toward the road, Greg and Harry remaining at the camp.

As they came out from under the trees and into the road Dick discovered that the first signs of dawn were appearing.  In a few minutes more it would be possible to see clearly over a stretch of road more than half a mile in length.  Already objects were beginning to take shape.  Dave was coming back, followed by Dan.  Both were limping slightly, for neither boy was accustomed to traveling barefoot and both had picked up slight stone bruises in their progress.

“Did you sight anything or anyone?” called Dick.

“No,” grumbled Darrin, in deep disgust.  “The odds are all against us, anyway.  The scoundrels know which way they are going; we can only guess at their course.”

“One thing looks rather certain, at any rate,” yawned Dick, covering his mouth with his hand.  “Whoever the unknowns are, they were trying only to bother us.  Or, if they were trying to injure us, they were rank amateurs at the destructive game.

“But what was it that blew up, anyway?” queried Dave.

“It sounded like a keg of gunpowder each time,” Tom declared.  “Yet to carry around five kegs of gunpowder would call for a lot of muscular work.”

“I’m going back to camp to put on my shoes,” Dave declared.

“So am I,” Danny Grin added.

“We’ll wait here for you,” said Dick.  “When you come back there may be light enough for us to look into matters a little.”

Dave and Dan returned in a little more than five minutes afterwards.  The daylight was now becoming stronger.

“Are Greg and Harry keeping awake?” was Prescott’s first question.

“They are,” nodded Darrin.

“Then they can be trusted to look after the camp,” Dick continued.

“And to look after the canoe,” Reade amended.

“Now, we’ll explore the woods a bit,” Prescott went on.  “We know about where we heard the explosions, and we’ll look for whatever evidence we can find.”

For this purpose each explorer went by himself.  Ten minutes later Dave Darrin set up a loud hello.  This brought the others to him on the run.

“Give us another call,” demanded Dick.

“Here!” called Dave, from the depths of the woods.

Dick went in, followed by Tom and Dan.

“I’ve found this much,” Dave announced, holding up a scorched bit of colored paper.  It was such paper as is used for the outer wrapping of fireworks.

Dick took the fragment of paper, reading therefrom the title, “The Sploderite Pyrotechnic Co.”

“Nothing but fireworks, after all,” ejaculated Danny Grin in great contempt, now that it was broad daylight.

“But I would like to have seen the fireworks before they blew up,” retorted Tom Reade.  “They were surely the loudest I ever heard.  I don’t believe anything but the heaviest cannon could make as much noise.”

“Whoever touched off fireworks like these,” uttered Dave, “didn’t care a hang whether or not he set the woods on fire.”

“There was no fire danger,” Dick rejoined.  “The grass and everything in these forests is as green as can be.  But let’s look about and see if we can’t find evidences of the explosion at this point.”

“There ought to be a good-sized hole in the ground right under where this piece of fireworks exploded,” Tom guessed.  “We ought to find, not far from here, some evidences of what explosives can do in ripping up the ground.”

“Now I remember that one of the explosions in the night sent something whizzing through the air over our heads.”

“Pieces of the pasteboard enclosing the mine, bomb or whatever kind of fireworks it was,” Dick suggested.  “But let’s look for other debris around here.”

That single bit of scorched paper, however, was all that any of them could find.

Tom discovered a spot where he thought the ground had been blackened, but Dave thought the blackened appearance due to humus soil, and so nothing came of the argument.

“I think,” yawned Dick, “this search will lead to the same result that the others did during the night.  About all we can do is to go back to camp.”

The sun was up by the time that all six members of Dick & Co. were once more gathered about the remains of their campfire.

“I don’t know what you fellows are going to do,” yawned Tom Reade.  “As for me, at present a nap looks better than any shower bath or breakfast that was ever invented.  No matter how much objection I hear, I’m going to get an hour or two more of sleep.”

That idea met with rather a hearty reception.  Within three minutes all six high school boys were lying between blankets again, composed for sleep.

No more explosions came to disturb their slumbers, which were deep and broken only when at last Dick Prescott called out: 

“Fellows, we’re regular Rip Van Winkles!  It’s half-past nine o’clock!”

“And we’ve that lake mystery to solve today!” uttered Greg Holmes, leaping up.