st out into a laugh, or look sorrowful.

"Yes, and it happens that he's stuck there in such a way he can't go
down any further, and isn't able to climb up. You hold on to me, both of
you, while I lean in and see if I can get hold of his hands."

"Tell us when to yo-heave-o, will you, Phil?"

"Something'll have to come; only I hope we don't pull his arms off!"
chuckled Ethan, beginning to see the humor of the situation, now that it
looked as though Lub was not hurt in any way, only "discommoded," as he
afterwards called it.

So while Phil leaned over, and thrust himself part-way down into the
gaping aperture, his two comrades, seizing hold of his lower
extremities, prepared to pull with might and main.

"Now, get busy!" they heard a half-muffled voice say, and at that X-Ray
and Ethan began to tug.

There was heard considerable groaning and puffing, but they were not to
be denied. Slowly but surely Phil's body was coming upward, until
finally the head of Lub appeared above the top of the slab-and-hard-mud
chimney.

"I know it's a tough joke on me, boys," he said, humbly enough, after he
had clambered on to the roof, and rubbed some of his scraped joints with
more or less feeling; "but after all it was an accident."

"How was that, Lub?" asked X-Ray, examining a number of stout stakes
which apparently had been cut to certain lengths, and were intended to
be fastened crossways in the chimney, being pounded into position with
the hatchet.

"Why, I had one of those prison bars in position, and unfortunately
leaned too hard on the same," Lub explained.

"The pesky thing betrayed your confidence, did it?" demanded Ethan.

"Just about how it happened," the other continued, frankly. "I must have
tried to save myself, more through intuition than because I had time to
think about it. Anyway I got doubled up somehow; and that's the reason I
stuck in the flue. One thing I'm glad of, and that is you fellows were
close by, and could hear me yelp. If you'd gone off I might have had to
stay there all afternoon; and let me tell you it would have been no
joke."

"Ready to give it up as a bad job, are you, Lub?" questioned X-Ray.

"What, me quit for a little thing like that?" burst out the other; "I
should hope I was a better stayer than that, boys. It only makes me
clinch my teeth, and resolve to conquer or die."

"Well, please don't die in our chimney flue," begged Ethan; "because you
know we need it to keep our fire goin