they got out of sight in the woods, and
I couldn't find 'em," answered the farm hand.

"Around here?" asked Dick.

"No, that was on the edge of the big woods back of Hope Seminary. I was
driving along, with some crates of eggs for the girls' college, when I
see 'em, sitting on a fallen tree, smoking cigarettes. I stopped my
hosses and spoke to 'em, and then they up and run into the woods as fast
as they could go! I looked for 'em, but I couldn't git on their track
nohow."

"What can they be doing up around Hope?" murmured Sam.

"Maybe they are sweet on some of the girls," returned Tom. "I know they
used to go up there, when they attended Brill."

"I hope, if they visit Hope, they don't speak to Dora and the others,"
said Dick, as his face clouded.

"Maybe we better warn the girls," said Sam.

"No, don't do that," said Tom. "You'd only scare them. They know Koswell
and Larkspur well enough. Don't say anything." And so the matter was
dropped.

Two days later came a special delivery letter from home that filled the
three boys with intense interest.

"Josiah Crabtree and Tad Sobber have at last shown their
hand," wrote Mr. Anderson Rover. "They have sent an unsigned
communication to me demanding fifty thousand dollars. They
give me just two weeks in which to get the money together in
cash and place it at a certain spot along the road between
our home and Oak Run. If the money is not forthcoming they
promise to blow up every building on the farm. The
communication says, 'You can pay half of this and get the
other half from your lady friends.' Which means, of course,
the Stanhopes and Lanings."

"Of all the cowardly things!" cried Tom, after listening to the above.
"Why, it's a regular sort of Black Hand communication!"

"So it is," added Sam. "What else does dad say," he went on, and Dick
continued the reading of the letter:

"At first I was inclined to treat the communication lightly
and laugh at it, but then came another letter--a mere scrawl,
stating they would give me a taste of what to expect that
night. I told the detective of this and he came to the house
and remained all night with us. About three o'clock in the
morning there was an explosion outside, and when we dressed
and ran out we found one of the chicken houses blown to
flinders by dynamite or some other explosive. About one
hundred chickens were des