try I'd say they might be bear dens or the homes of wolves."

All this sort of talk tended to key the anticipations of the boys up to
a point where they were expecting almost anything to happen.

Elmer paid no attention to side issues. There might be a dozen likely
looking hiding places along the route, but they did not interest him an
iota so long as that faintly marked trail continued.

He had about all he cared to do, moving from one spot where a stone had
been freshly dislodged to another point at which the moss and lichen had
been torn from a sloping rock by a foot that accidentally or purposely
slipped.

There were possibly some little indications, which to his mind told that
they might now be drawing near the place where the panic-stricken
Italians were hiding. If so, Elmer did not confide this to his
companions, perhaps because he might not himself be so very sure, but
more probably on account of not wishing to waste more or less precious
time in explaining on what vague grounds he founded his theory.

The trees still grew around them, springing out of spaces between the
rocks. They were more stunted than those in the great forest that
covered the richer bottom lands, but as a rule they served as a canopy
overhead, and only occasional glimpses could be obtained of the country
beyond.

By this time some of the scouts had begun to feel the effect of the
climb, for there is nothing more fatiguing than ascending a steep hill.

Still they proved their grit by keeping on, as if determined to stick it
out.

Even fat Landy Smith, while actually panting for breath, and mopping his
forehead with a damp handkerchief, stubbornly declined to own himself
in the "has been" class, as Red called it.

They were moving along what seemed to be a little plateau, at the end of
which arose a cliff seamed with numerous cracks and scars.

Elmer had smiled when he cast a glance toward the rocky wall, just as if
he could scent the end of the trail close at hand.

But he was already halfway across the level territory, with the scouts
scattered back of him, when without the least warning there suddenly
sounded a shot that seemed to come from somewhere ahead; and the report
gave each scout a strange chill in the region of his heart.

CHAPTER XV.

RESCUED--CONCLUSION.

"Scatter, and hide!"

It was Elmer who shouted this order. He had not heard any sound as of a
bullet passing, and did not know but that the shot had b