uncle's, and Constable Dock is headed that way."

"But my uncle doesn't want me," whined Hen.

"Then why should you think we can endure you, Hen, if your uncle can't?"
demanded Tom Reade, with a short laugh.

"Don't keep the constable waiting, Hen," Dick pressed him. "Get your
motion started."

"Oh, well, if you fellows want to be mean, I suppose I'll have to go,"
faltered Hen. "But I was enjoying myself here."

"You'll enjoy yourself better still with your aunt," Dick urged with a
smile. "Besides, you'll have your aunt's good cooking and a real bed to
sleep in. If the country highways aren't broken out yet, they will be in
a day or two, and then you can get back to Gridley."

"All right, if you fellows bounce me out of camp," sighed Hen ruefully,
as he began to pull on his overcoat. "But I think you're about the
meanest----"

"Save the rest of it, Anvil, if you please, until we're all at home in
Gridley," Dave begged him.

"Say, you stop calling me Anvil," snarled Dutcher. "I don't like that
name."

"Why not?" pursued Dave. "It fits you."

"Tell that boy to hurry up, if he's going with us," bawled Mr. Dock from
a distance.

"Brace, Hen," Tom advised. "There, now you're ready. Good-bye, and come
again when you're grown up."

"Those fellows don't know much about good manners," thought Hen Dutcher
ruefully, as he started to run over the snow crust.

"Now that Hen is gone we'll be able to stay here a day or two longer,"
Dave announced. "We'll have the food to do it with."

"There's one good point about Hen Dutcher, anyway," grimaced Tom Reade.
"He's a good, sincere eater."

"He was eating us out of camp," Dick replied. "Now, fellows, with Hen
and Fits gone, we're all by ourselves--just the crowd that we want. The
snowcrust will bear, and we can move about. We ought to have a jolly
time tramping about through the woods."

"Hunting!" proposed Harry. "We've got the air rifle."

"Fishing," added Tom. "We brought tackle on purpose. We must be able to
find some pond hereabouts."

"But say!" Dick suddenly interjected. "Do you fellows realize that we
haven't been in the old shack since Mr. Fits left it? Queer as it may
seem to some of you, I believe that Fitsey had a hiding place even in
that little room. Let's go in there and see what we can root out in the
way of mystery explained."

All six of the boys trooped around to the smaller structure at the rear
of their camp. The door was still partly open. Dic