Chapter 6. The Log Cabin's Telltale Hearth

________________________________________________
_ CHAPTER VI. THE LOG CABIN'S TELLTALE HEARTH

"Have we got everything?" demanded Tom Reade anxiously.

"I think so," nodded Dick.

"No one ever yet started off on any big jaunt without forgetting something, you know," Greg explained.

"Well, let every fellow take a look around and see if he can find anything that we ought to have, and haven't," suggested Dick.

Six pairs of eyes did some anxious searching.

It was nearly ten o'clock on the morning after Christmas. Dick & Co. stood in Miller's grocery store, having mounted guard over an extensive supply of groceries, meat and personal belongings. What a stack of stuff there was!

Dick and Dave had been delegated to do the buying. Starting with a capital of thirty dollars, they had expended a little more than nineteen dollars with the butcher and grocer. Joe Miller, the grocer's son, had gone to hitch up a pair of horses to a roomy truck wagon. Their conveyance to camp, some twelve miles distant, was to cost them four dollars, and Miller had made a low price at that. Dave, as the treasurer of the outfit, now had nearly seven dollars left, but of this, four would be required to pay Joe Miller for the return trip.

In addition to food supplies, each of the six boys had brought along underclothing, shirts and an extra pair of shoes. These personal belongings were packed in bags.

Then, besides, each boy had a roll of bedding--a pillow, sheets and old blankets and comforters for each. There were also, either in bedding rolls or in bags, some few toilet articles. There was also a box of old kitchen ware. Tom Reade had brought a Rochester lamp; Greg and Dan had contributed lanterns and Dick a dark lantern.

"I see one thing we haven't got, but ought to have," said Harry Hazelton to Dick.

"What's that?" asked the latter.

"A shotgun. Joe Miller has a good one, and I know he'd lend it to us if we asked him."

"We won't ask him," Dick replied.

"Now, why not? We have money enough so we can afford to buy some shells, and----"

"Harry, did you tell your folks you expected there'd be a shotgun along on this trip?"

"'Course not. I didn't know there would be one."

"Do you think your folks would have let you come if they had thought of such a thing?"

"Maybe not. But they didn't say a word against our having one."

"Harry, if our parents were to hear that we had taken a shotgun along they'd be worried to death," said Dick gravely.

"Humph! We're old enough to manage a gun," remonstrated Hazelton.

"Perhaps we are, but it would worry our home folks just the same. Boys are always believed to be careless with firearms. We don't want any shotgun along, and then we won't have any need to be sorry about it afterwards."

"But there'll be rabbits and other game that we might get."

"Dave has brought his air-rifle, and has plenty of 'pills' for it. And Tom brought along his bow and half a dozen arrows. We can take care of the little game we may see."

"That's right," broke in Dave, who had been listening. "If we were fools enough to take along a shotgun it'd be many a day before we'd get leave to go on another camping jaunt."

So better counsel prevailed, and Joe Miller was not asked to loan his shotgun. In due time Joe drove around to the door of the store, and the work of loading began.

"Hey, you fellows, where are you going?" hailed Ben Alvord, stopping and gaping in wonder.

"Camping," replied Dick with an air of importance.

"Whee! Say, take me along?" coaxed Ben.

Dick hated the task of refusing, but Dave came to his rescue.

"Got five dollars, Ben?"

"Quit your kidding," retorted Alvord.

"That's what each fellow paid to get into this outfit," Dave went on. "We couldn't feed any more fellows unless they contributed their share in cash."

"How long you going to be gone?" asked Ben.

"Maybe two weeks."

"Whee!"

"It will depend somewhat on how long it takes us to eat up our table stuff," laughed Dick.

"My, but you fellows are in luck!"

A few more of the Grammar School fellows happened along. There was much envious talk. There were also several pleas to be taken along, but the mention of the five dollar assessment silenced all such requests.

"All ready!" called out Joe Miller at last. "You youngsters jump on lively, for we've got a long way to go."

With a glad whoop Dick & Co. piled aboard the truck, stowing themselves away as comfortably as might be.

"Giddap!" grumbled Joe at the horses.

"Say!" shouted Ben Alvord as the start was made.

"Well?" answered Dan.

"Who's going to do your cookin'?"

"We are."

"Wow! You won't all live to tell the tale, then. Got any medicines with you?"

"There, I knew we'd forgotten something," declared Tom Reade solemnly. "S'posing any of us should get sick?"

"We'll make up our minds that we're not going to," replied Dave. "Fellows camping out in winter haven't any right to get sick."

"Still, we might. Might have colds, especially," remarked Dick thoughtfully. "Oh, I say, Joe! Haul up, quick!"

Dick was standing up, using his arms to signal an automobile that was coming toward them.

"Well, who's sick?" smiled Dr. Bentley, stopping his auto.

"Doctor, I have six free patients here for you," Dick announced solemnly.

"Good!" laughed the physician. "That's the kind I like best. What are you boys up to?"

"We're going camping, doctor, out in the forest, and may be gone a fortnight. Just this minute it struck us that we hadn't a bit of medicine with us in case any of us got sick. We don't expect to be, of course, but----"

"I see," nodded the doctor, smiling pleasantly. "One thing is sure. If you have a few simple remedies along with you you're less likely to be ill than if you had forgotten to make any preparation. In that case worry might do its share. Now, let me see."

Dr. Bentley reached up a drug case from the bottom of his car.

"Here's a bottle of stuff for colds," he went on, selecting a bottle and writing on the label. "There, the directions are straight. Going to cook for yourselves?"

"Certainly."

"Then indigestion is your most likely trouble." Dr. Bentley began to write on the label of a second bottle. "And here's a little vial, in case any of you get a real fever. Be careful to follow the directions closely."

Then Dr. Bentley took out his prescription book and wrote on two leaves.

"Here's a prescription for a liniment, and something else," he added, tearing out the two pages and passing them to Dick. "You'll notice that I've written on these that the druggist is to give you the goods with all discounts off. That'll make the stuff come cheap, for I don't suppose you're overburdened with wealth on this trip."

"And now, doctor, how much for the stuff you've given us?" asked Dick.

"Giddap," retorted Dr. Bentley, giving his machine a start. "I helped introduce four of you boys to this world, so I'm in a measure responsible for you."

"Stop at the drug store, Joe," Dick called out, as the horses were started.

"Say, wasn't that fine of Dr. Bentley?" glowed Dick, as they rode along.

"Sure," nodded Dan, "but our folks will find it somewhere in their bills, between now and summer."

"Dan, for that," warned Prescott, "we'll wash your face in the first snow that falls out in the woods."

"We surely will," confirmed Tom Reade.

The stop at the drug store was made, whereby the cash capital was lowered by eighty cents. Then Dick & Co. were off in earnest.

So late had the start been made that the boys did not expect to reach their log cabin until after two o'clock. Over Christmas most of the snow had disappeared. There was not enough for good sledding, but just enough to make the going on wheels rather difficult.

Before noon, appetite asserted itself. Fortunately the boys had brought along lunches for use on the road. These were devoured with much relish, Joe Miller, of course, being invited to share with them.

By one o'clock the horses headed into the forest. For the first mile or so there was a fair sort of road, but after that it dwindled down to something more like a trail.

"Isn't this grand, Joe?" exclaimed Greg.

"What?" demanded Joe.

"This great old forest, this silence, this grandeur of solitary nature?"

"It ought to do first rate for lunatics, and such like," answered Joe, gazing with disfavor at the bare trees and desolate looking bushes. "What have you boys been doing that you've got to spend a fortnight away from comfortable livin'?"

"Why, we're doing this for pleasure," said Dan Dalzell.

"Humph!" muttered Joe, and there the matter rested.

It was nearly half past two when the horses were finally hauled up before the log cabin. But now the truck was bare of boys. Dick & Co. had leaped overboard the instant they came in sight of the cabin, and had scampered on before for a look at the place.

"Say, this is great!" cried Greg. "The old cabin looks good and solid, too."

"But how do you get in?" queried Dan, bracing his shoulder against the door and pushing hard. "The place seems to be locked."

More boys tried their shoulders against the door, but it did not yield.

"We'll have to try the windows," proposed Dave. "Hurry and see if they're fastened. This one is."

All the windows proved to be fastened.

"We don't want to break any glass," said Tom Reade ruefully. "We might have a big freeze around here, and then we'd appreciate window glass."

Here was a poser, indeed.

"There doesn't seem to be any keyhole, and yet the door is locked," muttered Dick, studying the door. "Hold on! What's this string for?"

He took hold of a cord that appeared to run through the wooden barrier. Giving the cord a hard pull, Dick once more pushed against the door. It yielded and swung open.

"Hurrah!" sounded the chorus.

"We're bright ones," laughed Dick. "Thought we knew a lot about log cabins, and we clean, plumb forgot the latch-string."

"Let's get inside and get warm," begged Dan.

"Let's get warm by tumbling the things off the wagon," dissented Prescott. "I know Joe is in a big hurry to get started back."

So the stuff was bundled off in rapid order, after which Joe backed his team and swung it around.

"I hope you fellows have a real, nice, loony time!" was Joe's parting salute.

"Now, let's get the stuff inside," urged Dave. This was done with speed, if not with order.

"Now, I'll go out and chop firewood," proposed Dave. "Who'll go with me?"

"Let's all go out and take a look around," suggested Dick. "We want to know all of our surroundings before dark, which isn't a great way off."

"We can't have a fire too soon to suit me," grumbled Dan.

Outside one of the first sights that met their eyes, back of the cabin, was a pile of four foot logs that would have measured five or six cords.

"Now, that's what I call bully," gloated Dalzell. "It won't take us long to have a real fire going in that big chimney-place."

"Let's see what this other little shack is," urged Dick, leading the way to a log shanty some eight feet by ten. Again it was necessary to pull a latch-string, after which the door of the shanty yielded.

"Why, there's a cook stove in here, and a table and a couple of chairs," cried Tom. "This must have been the summer cook house."

"We'll use it for our jail to lock up the bad ones in," jested Dick. "There are no bunks here for sleeping."

"What do you say if we get some of those logs and start a fire in the big cabin?" pleaded Dan. "I'm getting chilled."

The idea prevailed. But the youngsters found snow between the logs, which were tightly frozen in place. After a good deal of work and much panting, Dick and Dave succeeded in freeing one log.

"Huh!" grunted Dan, who had not done any of the work. "Getting these logs is going to be harder work than chopping down young trees."

Whistling, Tom Reade had gone around to the cabin. Now, with a whoop of glee he returned, bearing a crowbar.

"Found this in one corner of the cabin," he explained. "Now, we'll pry logs loose in fast order."

His prediction turned out a good one. Within five minutes more than a dozen of the logs had been loosened and Dick & Co. busied themselves in carrying the logs around and into the cabin.

"Now, Danny Coldfeet, we'll soon have your flame red medicine ready," laughed Dave Darrin jovially. "Get one of the coal oil tins, Danny boy. Greg, tear off some of the paper to stuff under the logs. Hurry! Then I'll lay the fire. Tom, you and Harry bring the logs closer."

Some nearly burned bits of log lay in the broad fireplace under the chimney. Dave bent over to lift these charred bits out. Three or four he tossed back of him. Then suddenly he stiffened up, sticking a finger in his mouth.

"Ouch!" he grunted.

"What's the matter?" asked Tom.

"I burned my finger," sighed Dave.

"Burned your finger--in a dead fire?"

But Dick, stirring the burned bits of wood with his shoe, suddenly lay bare some dull red coals.

"Look-a-here, fellows," hailed Dan in the same moment. "Here's meat and bread, and part of a can of tomatoes on the table. The bread ain't old enough to be mouldy."

"Fellows," announced Dick Prescott, moving about, "there's some one living here--some one besides ourselves!" _

Read next: Chapter 7. The Prowler Of The Night

Read previous: Chapter 5. Dick Tries Strategy

Table of content of Grammar School Boys Snowbound or, Dick & Co. at Winter Sports


GO TO TOP OF SCREEN

Post your review
Your review will be placed after the table of content of this book