d such other equipment as they had left out, including three
blankets, which had been overlooked when they hid their belongings, had
been practically destroyed.

A sudden thought occurring to her, Anne ran on fleet feet to the place
where their provisions and equipment had been secreted. She found the
stones torn away from the opening and their supplies scattered about.
The ground about the opening to the hiding place was littered with them.

Her next move was to look for their rifles and ammunition. A moment
later she ran breathlessly into camp.

"The equipment has been scattered, but the rifles and ammunition are as
we left them," panted Anne. "This is a fright."

"There! Why didn't you 'con-centrate,' Emma Dean?" demanded Hippy. "Old
Con-centration is never on the job when he is really needed."

"How could I when I didn't know anything about this?" returned Emma,
with a sweeping gesture that took in the entire camp. "What are we going
to do now? Where are we to sleep, I ask you?"

"Sleep standing up just as the ponies do, my darlin'," suggested Nora.
"Who do you suppose could have done such a thing? Why--"

Washington, who had gone out to tether the horses, set up a howl that
called the Overlanders to him on a run.

"Dey done got de mule! Dey done got de mule!" he wailed. "What Ah gwine
do now? Ah doan like dis nohow. Ah sure gwine took er frenzy spell if
dis doan stop right smart."

"The mule?" gasped Anne. "Why--wha--"

The pack mule that had been left at the camp, they saw laying stretched
out on the ground, its halter still tied to a sapling. Hippy was now
standing over it, peering down at the animal. Stooping over, he examined
it briefly.

"Somebody has done it this time. The mule is dead, folks," he announced,
standing up. "Shot through the head. It seems our _friends_ have not yet
deserted us."

"This is an outrage!" muttered Elfreda.

Grace turned on her lamp and went over the ground about the mule,
examining the dirt for footprints as carefully as possible. Next she
visited the hiding place of their provisions and equipment, there to
make the same careful, painstaking search of the ground.

"Hob-nail boots. I find the imprint of the same boots in both places.
One man apparently did all of this," was her conclusion.

"Such as all these mountaineers wear," added Anne.

"Perhaps, but I do not believe it. These boots had a horseshoe of
hob-nails on each heel. Look at the footprints in the morn