, kind of serious, "Let me go ashore, Uncle Jeb. Some of
you row over to the cave. Here, some of you boys, come along with me.
Who wants to volunteer to go back through the mountains? George," he
said (he's in a Boston troop, that fellow George), "you row across and
get some lanterns--quick. You go with him, Harry; get your fists on
those oars--hurry up. Bring some rope and an aid kit. You stay with
Uncle Jeb, Roy."

Gee, I can hardly tell you how things happened. The next second fellows
were hurrying back and forth, getting in and out of boats, while the
one boat skimmed across to the camp landing.

In a half a minute Mr. Elting and about a dozen scouts were standing on
the cove shore, waiting for the boat to come back, and meanwhile we
rowed down along the south shore to where the cave is. It's about half
way down to the outlet. You can see about where it is. Several other
boats went down there with us. Westy was in one of them and I made him
come in our boat, because now that Bert was gone, maybe dead, and
Skinny, too, I just felt as if I'd like to have one of my patrol near
me--I just felt that way. Besides, Westy was my special chum and after
all I liked him best of any. When you're feeling kind of shaky, that's
the time you like to have one of your own patrol with you--you bet.

Soon we heard the boat coming back and could see the lanterns bobbing.
"Pull hard," I heard Mr. Elting call from the shore. It sounded awful
clear in the night. The fellows in the boat rowed straight for us and
gave us an aid kit and a couple of lanterns.

"That you, Blakeley?" I heard a fellow say. It was young Mr. Winter;
he's Mr. Temple's secretary, and he always spends his vacations at
Temple Camp. "Who's there?" he asked.

"Uncle Jeb and Westy and I," I said; "I don't know who's in the other
boats; everybody, I guess."

They didn't stop but a second and they pulled for where Mr. Elting and
the fellows were waiting. I could hear their voices and see the
lanterns rocking, as they hiked up the side of the mountains.

"Maybe I ought to have gone with them," I said.

"They'll find the place, I reckon," Uncle Jeb said. "Naow let's pull
ashore and root around."

The fellows in the other boats waited, just rowing around close to
shore, while Uncle Jeb and Westy and I climbed up to the cave. It was
higher above the lake than it was before, on account of the water
escaping and we had to scramble up through a lot of mud.

I was so ex