ight--all right," they heard him say. "Ah, the old mill looks
poor, but there's some men dress just like it, and have money in their
pockets."

Then he passed on and up a flight of stairs leading to the third and
highest floor of the mill. He did not remain long, however, but came
down, still talking to himself. And when he kept on and descended to the
main floor, he was repeating that it was "all right," and "all safe;"
and so, finally, they heard him blow out the light, hang the lantern on
a hook and pass out through the door. The sound of the wagon wheels told
them that he was driving away.

Quickly they scrambled out from their hiding place, descended the stairs
and crouched by the fire.

"Well, what now?" asked Harvey. "Guess we'll turn in, eh?"

But Henry Burns was already snuggling in among the meal-bags.

"I'm going to sleep, Jack," he said. "Didn't you hear old Ellison say
everything was 'all right'?"

"Yes. I wonder what he meant," said Harvey.

"Oh, he said that just to please us," chuckled Henry Burns. "Good
night."

The bright sun of a clearing day awoke them early the next morning, and
they lost no time in quitting the mill.

"Jack," said Henry Burns, as he followed his companion across the
planking of the flume, "you look like an underdone buckwheat cake.
There's enough flour on your back for breakfast."

"I'd like to eat it," exclaimed Harvey. "I'm hungry enough. Let's get
the canoe and streak it for Benton."

They were drawing their canoe up the bank, a few moments later, to carry
it around the dam, when something away up along shore attracted their
notice. There, perched in a birch tree, in the topmost branches, with
her weight bending it over till it nearly touched the water, they espied
a girl, swinging. Then, as they looked, she waved a hand to them.

"Hello," exclaimed Henry Burns. "It's Bess What's-her-name. She's not
afraid of getting drowned. That's sure."

The boys swung their caps to her, and she stood upright amid the
branches and waved farewell to them, as they started for Benton.

CHAPTER IV

THE TROUT POOL

The brook that flowed into Mill Stream, just above the old mill, itself,
came down from some heavily wooded hills a few miles to the northeast,
and its waters were ever cold, even in hottest summer, save in one or
two open places in the intervening meadows. It was called "Cold Brook"
by some of the farmers. Henry Burns and Harvey and Bess Thornton had
crosse