never once glanced
back. How about you, Owen?" asked Cuthbert, turning to the new comrade.

He knew the other had seen the smoke even before Owen spoke, because
something like a flash spread over his swarthy face, though his eyes
looked straight at Cuthbert without a sign of flinching.

"Yes, I saw it--in fact, I had turned my head a dozen times in the last
half-hour, expecting something of the sort," he remarked, composedly.

"It wasn't a forest fire--not near dense enough for that; and yet it
looked queer for a campfire--as near as I could make out there were
several of 'em, all in a row, and climbing straight up like columns,"
declared Eli, wagging his head mysteriously.

"Just three," added Owen, gloomily, and yet with a gritting of his teeth
that excited Cuthbert's curiosity more than a little.

"Three smokes in a row--I declare, that sounds like a signal; the
Indians down in Florida always communicate in that way, and have a
regular code, so that they can send long messages across the swamps and
pine forests," he remarked.

"That's just what it was, a smoke signal; and the Cree Indian we met on
the river sent it to others of his race upstream," observed the young
Canadian.

Cuthbert immediately remembered that he had seen the lone paddler turn a
look that was a mingling of surprise and displeasure upon Owen when the
canoes passed in midstream, and his former thought that these two had
met before, and that the husky lad might even have had to do with the
mournful black eye of the aborigine, came back with added force just
now; still, he was not the one to ask questions, and unless the other
chose to take his new friends fully into his confidence, whatever the
mystery that lay in his past must always remain so.

"Yes," went on Owen, bitterly, "it was meant to give notice to one who
is interested in my movements that I had apparently changed my mind, and
did not intend to leave the neighborhood as speedily as had been
expected--that's all."

CHAPTER V.

THE FALSE CHART OF DUBOIS.

No more was said just then; but naturally enough both Cuthbert and Eli
could not get the matter out of their minds. The duties of the hour had
occupied their attention upon first landing--the pitching of the
waterproof tent, gathering of fuel, and kindred occupations incident to
getting things ready for the coming night, so that now they could take
things easy.

Cuthbert had some sort of rude map of the region, which