an catch
the late train. Otherwise they'll have to make another try to-morrow.
Personally, I think they'll make good to-day."

"What's the next stunt, Hugh?" asked Alec, his voice more or less
betraying the eagerness and concern he felt.

"Oh, from what I can gather," answered the scout master, smilingly,
"it runs about like this: The forces headed by the hero knight have
carried the outer works of the fortress castle in which the villain
has the fair heroine shut up in that turret room. The invaders, having
made a breach in the walls and swarmed over in various places, will
now pursue the few desperate defenders of the castle through this
passage; and that, with many a desperate hand-to-hand fight. Always
the knight in armor is seen hewing his way steadily through all opposition,
with one object in view. Of course this is to meet the scoundrel,
and finish him, which he eventually does after a dreadful sword fight."

"Whew!" gasped Billy, listening with round eyes to the stirring story.

Alec, too, was deeply interested, but his professional instinct caused
him to remark:

"They'll have to burn heaps and heaps of flashlight powder to get all
those inside effects. Wish they'd let me see just how they manage it,
but it would be apt to queer the value of the picture to have, a modern
Boy Scout appear in it. If I get a good chance, though, I've a notion
to ask Mr. Jefferson."

"You'll never be able to make it, Alec," Hugh told him. "He's the
busiest man on earth. He has to be thinking of fifty things at once."

"Go on, Hugh, and tell us the rest," urged Billy, pawing at the sleeve
of the other, which action he doubtless meant to be an urgent second
to his appeal.

"Every once in a while there will be glimpses shown of Rebecca in her
dungeon, looking out of the little opening, and carrying on as if
nearly frightened to death, for gusts of smoke will be circling around
her, and she is supposed to know that the fire is getting closer all
the time."

"Wow, that must make it a thriller for fair!" exclaimed Monkey Stallings,
who was known to love exciting stories, though his watchful mother
kept a tight rein on his propensity to indulge along those lines, and
censored all books he brought into the house before allowing him to
devour them.

"Of course," remarked Alec, flippantly. "It goes without saying that
eventually knight in shining armor, Ivanhoe, or whoever he may be,
gets to the locked door of the turr