rink some more coffee, and then walk
a while, so as to be sure to keep awake."

"I'll take the second trick," nodded Dick.

The schedule for watch tricks was quickly made up. Then all but
Dave hastily sought their cots. Darkness was not an hour old
when Dave was the only member of the camp awake. Had the high
school boys been less healthy and sturdy their hearty suppers
might have summoned the nightmare, but they slept on soundly.

Dick, however, stretched, gaped, then sprang up when Darry called
him. Some of the others, when their turns came, did not respond
as readily, and had to be dragged from their cots and stood upright
before they were thoroughly awake.

It was shortly after one o'clock in the morning when Tom Reade,
then on watch, stepped lightly into the tent, passing through
the round of the cots, shaking each sleeper in turn.

"Those of you who want to listen to something interesting, get
up instantly!" Tom exclaimed in a low voice.

Three boys drowsily rolled over, going immediately back into sound
slumber. Dick and Dave, however, got up, pulling on their shoes.

"What's all that racket across the lake?" was Dick's prompt question
as he stood in the doorway of the tent.

"That comes from the former camp site," chuckled Tom.

"Guns!" cried Dave Darrin in amazement.

"It sounds like a big fusillade," Dick cried, as he stepped out
into the night.

"But surely no one can be trying to attack our camp, thinking
we are still there," Tom protested. "We don't know any people
who are wicked enough to plan an attack upon our camp."

"No," Dick agreed. "But this much is sure. There are those who
dislike us enough to try to spoil our rest night after night."

Dave began to laugh merrily.

"I half believe it's Dodge and Bayliss," he remarked quietly.

"I don't," Reade objected. "Both of them are too lazy to motor
up into the wilderness each night, over such rough roads, all
the way from Gridley. No, no! It's someone else, though who
it is I can't imagine. If it were the man of the lake mystery,
or any of his people, they'd be likely to know that we're on this
side of the lake."

From the edge of the timber line near by came the sound of a crackling
twig, followed by a groan as of a soul in torment.

Wheeling like a flash, Tom Reade produced the pocket flash lamp.

Staring toward the boys, his face outlined between the close-growing
trunks of two spruce trees, were the startling features