the lower limb by his hands, and then drop lightly to
the ground.

He waited only a minute to recover his breath, for after all the coming
down had been more of a task than the mounting upward. Then he started
for the shore of the lake, and the little beach that had witnessed both
landings of the invading parties of scouts.

Twice now had that same beach afforded a surprise as unwelcome as it was
unexpected, when the boat had vanished so strangely. Thad hoped history
would not feel bound to repeat itself. True, they no longer had a boat
to lose, since it had already disappeared; but then, there was Smithy!

As he drew near the beach, he tried to discover the form of his comrade
somewhere in the open, but without success. Still, Thad knew that the
tenderfoot would doubtless consider it the part of wisdom to hide, while
waiting for his comrade to finish his work aloft, and join him.

Thinking thus, and yet with an uneasiness that he could hardly
understand, Thad kept on, until presently he had broken through the last
line of bushes, and stepped out on the little sandy stretch of beach.

Certainly Smithy was not in sight. He turned in both directions, and
swept the half circle of brush with an anxious gaze.

Then he called in a low tone, but which might easily have been heard by
any one chancing to be hiding behind that fringe of bushes:

"Smithy, hello!"

There was no answer to his summons. The loon laughed again out on the
lake, as though mocking his anxiety; a squirrel ran down a tree, and
frisked about its base; but the tenderfoot scout seemed to have vanished
as utterly as though the earth had opened and swallowed him up.

CHAPTER XXVIII.

THE TRAIL AMONG THE ROCKS.

Of course the scout-master was given a shock when he realized that
Smithy could not be where he had told him to wait until relieved. All
sorts of dire things commenced to flash through his head.

"Here, this won't do at all," he presently muttered, starting to get a
firm grip on himself; "I've myself alone to depend on, to find out the
truth about Smithy, and to do that I must keep my head level. Now, I
wonder have I made a mistake about the calibre of Smithy, and could he
have wandered off in a careless way?"

Somehow he did not find himself taking any great amount of stock in this
theory. Why, had it been easy-going Bumpus now, or even rather careless
Step-hen, Thad fancied that there might have been more or less truth
back of the