Felix; they're coming across the pasture!" he whispered in his
ear.

That was quite enough for Felix. He seemed to grasp the situation at
once, and only muttering the one significant word, "Gosh!" he
immediately sat up.

Andy, moving as little as possible, pointed to where moving figures
could just be detected advancing in a bent-over attitude.

"How many?" whispered the farm hand.

"I counted four," replied the other.

"Whee! bully for that!" chuckled Felix, no doubt tickled because the
promised circus would be a double-ring affair, instead of the ordinary
kind, and therefore quite up to date.

Both of them lay there watching intently.

They could see how the intruders were crawling along, anxious apparently
only to avoid being seen from the direction of the farmhouse, the roof
of which showed dimly in the moonlight over on the other side of the
little ridge.

As the creepers drew closer, the watchers saw that they had adopted the
method spoken of by the farmer in connection with the bank thieves,
keeping their identity secret--they all seemed to have handkerchiefs
tied across their faces, and kept their hats pulled well down, so that
they could easily have passed close to an acquaintance without much risk
of discovery.

Of course Andy could tell that they were boys, and not men; and it was
an easy task for him to guess who two of the party at least must be.

The preparations he and Felix had made were about as simple as anything
could be. The farm hand possessed an old musket that had been used in
the Civil war, and which, muzzleloader that it was, had probably brought
down many a plump rabbit when held in the hands of the owner, as well as
black ducks in the marshes along the shore of Lake Sunrise.

Besides this, the farmer had loaned Andy his double-barrel Marlin
shotgun, an old model when compared with the up-to-date hammerless and
the repeaters, but no doubt a good, serviceable weapon.

Of course they had no idea of trying to pepper the marauders, though it
would seem as though they richly deserved to be punctured with a few
small bird shot, because of the meanness of their contemplated action.

To give them a good fright would satisfy Andy, and he had made the eager
farm hand promise to fire up in the air also because he was afraid lest
Felix allow his indignation to have full swing, when he saw what the
four boys meant to do.

They were skulking very close to where the aeroplane lay now, and th