are shooting at us! We'll all be killed!" yelled Tad Sobber, who
had come back during the conversation, and again he and Cuffer took to
their heels.

"Mind the warning!" called out Dick, and dropped almost out of sight
behind a rock. At that same moment Tom and Sam appeared from behind a
rock far to the left.

"Mind that warning!" they cried. "Remember, we are ten to four!"

"There are two more of 'em," cried Shelley.

"Confound the luck, what sort of a game is this anyway?" said Sid
Merrick, much chagrined.

"Well, it is more than we expected," answered Shelley. "I, for one,
don't care to risk being shot down. I reckon they have the bulge on
us, if there really are ten of 'em."

"I've seen but five the three ahead and the two over yonder."

"There are two more!" answered Shelley and pointed to another rock, to
which Sam and Tom had just crawled. "That makes seven."

"Go back, I tell you," warned Dick. "We'll give you just two minutes
in which to make up your mind. If you don't go back we'll start to
shoot!"

"Come on back!" cried Tad, from a safe distance. "Don't let them shoot
you, Uncle Sid!"

"We'll go back to our ship," called out Sid Merrick. "But remember,
this thing isn't settled yet."

"If you have any differences with the Stanbopes you can settle with
the folks on the steam yacht which has just arrived," answered Dick,
not knowing what else to say.

The party under Sid Merrick began to retreat, and Dick, Tom and Sam
watched them with interest, until the lights faded in the distance.
Then Tom did a jig in his delight.

"That was easier than I expected," he said.

"Even if we didn't scare them playing ghost," added Sam. "I wonder if
they really thought we were ten in number?"

"Well, they thought we were seven anyway!" answered Dick. "It was a
clever ruse you two played."

What to do next the Rover boys did not know. It was impossible for any
of them to calculate how far they were from the spot where they had
landed or to determine the best way of getting back to Foreshow Bay,
as they had named the locality.

"If we move around very much in this darkness we may become hopelessly
lost in the forest," said Dick.

"Maybe we had better stay right where we are until morning," suggested
his youngest brother.

"I'm agreeable to anything," were Tom's words.

"If we stay here we want to remain on guard," said Dick. "Merrick may
take it into his head to come back."

An hour later found the thr