CHAPTER X
"PACKED AWAY LIKE SARDINES"
Even in that underground room Ned could hear the shooting outside andthe screams of the aggravated mule. Several weapons seemed to bepouring out lead, and the boy wondered if the outlaws were gettingthe range of his chum.
The firing seemed to grow fainter as he advanced into the room.Either the outlaws were pursuing Frank or the shooters were takingrefuge behind rocks which deadened the sound.
At first the boy kept his eye out for an attack on himself, but thereseemed to be none of the outlaws left in the subterranean place. Thefire was built at one side, and the light from it filled the wholeapartment. Counterfeit dollars lay about, scattered over the floor asif dropped in great haste.
Halting in the center of the room, after closing and baring the outerdoor, Ned put his fingers to his lips and gave out a low whine, oneof the signals used by the boys of the Wolf Patrol. While he listenedfor a response, the firing outside came nearer, or appeared from thesound to do so.
"I'd be in a nice fix if they should seek to retreat to the cave!"Ned thought.
While he listened an answer came to his call--the low, sharp signalof the Wolves!
"That's Jimmie!" Ned muttered. "He's in some of the holes justoutside this room."
"Where are you?" he asked, and the answer came with a giggle.
"We're packed away like sardines! Come get us out! We're only tiedwith ropes, but the ropes know their business! Here! To the right ofthe fire!"
Ned soon found that the wall at the point indicated was of plank,like the door, painted and sanded to imitate rock. He had nodifficulty in finding the opening, and in a short time the boys wererelieved of their bonds. Ned opened his eyes wide at sight of Dode,the fourth boy, and of Oliver, who had been left at the camp.
"What's the shooting outside?" asked Jimmie, stretching his arms,cramped from long confinement. "Who's out there with Uncle Ike? Say,but I was glad to hear the gentle voice of that wicked old mule!"
"And now," Teddy observed, "how about getting out of this? I'mhungry."
"If Frank keeps that racket going," Ned answered, motioning the grouptoward the door by which he had entered, "we may be able to get outwithout being seen. You can tell me how you got caged later on. Nowwe'll try the door."
"Wait!" whispered Jimmie.
"Wait!" said Dode.
Ned turned and faced both boys with enquiring eyes.
"Why wait?" he asked.
"I want my gun!" Jimmie replied. "They searched us and put theplunder in that alcove in the rock on the other side of the fire.We'll need the guns, I take it."
The three boys, Jimmie, Teddy, and Oliver, made a quick rush for thealcove and soon came back with their guns and electrics. The firingoutside was again farther away, and the chances for getting outwithout being attacked appeared to be good.
"What is it?" Ned asked Dode, as he pulled at his sleeve.
"There's another door," the lad explained. "It opens on the slope onthe west side of the ridge we are under. We can go that way withoutbeing seen."
"That's just the thing!" Jimmie exclaimed. "We can get out and joinFrank in the mess outside! Then I reckon we'll put the skids underthe outlaws!"
Dode led the way to the opening indicated, passed, with the others athis heels, through a long passage, and finally came to a plank doorwhich was securely fastened on the inside. From this position theracket outside became only a hum.
The boy unfastened the door and swung it inside. Beyond lay theslope, and, beyond that, the valley and the distant mountains. Theair of the night was sweet and clear after the close atmosphere ofthe underground room.
From the other side of the ridge, which was not very high, came shotsand the vicious shrieks of a pestered mule! Ned turned to the south,from which direction the clamor came, and passed as swiftly aspossible along the slant of the elevation.
"Are you going to attack the outlaws from the rear?" asked Teddy. "Weare taking the wrong course if you want to go back to camp."
"Huh!" Jimmie grunted, trudging along puffing at every breath, "we'vegot to find Frank and Uncle Ike, I guess."
When the party came to the end of the ridge under which thecounterfeiters had been working, they faced the valley, some distanceaway, in which the cabin of Mary Brady stood. Through the moonlightthey could just distinguish the crude stone chimney of the structure.
"Now, Ned," Jimmie explained, "if we turn up the slope here and do alittle shooting when we reach a good elevation, the counterfeiterswill think they are being attacked by a fresh party and duck back tothe cave. Then Frank can come along with that blessed old mule. Didyou ever hear a lop-eared old rascal of the mule tribe make such aracket? I wonder what Frank was doing to him?"
"I know!" Teddy broke in. "He was tickling him with his heels. Thatmakes Uncle Ike half crazy! There goes another yell! Fine old bird,is Uncle Ike!"
It was plain to the boys that the battle was quite a distance to thesouth and leading down into the valley, so they began the ascent ofthe rocky slope and continued up until they were all out of breath.Then they stopped and looked back.
The outlaws came into sight, in a minute, making for their cave. Theyfired an occasional shot as they retreated, and this fact convincedthe boys that Frank had not been wounded by any of the shots whichhad been fired at him.
"We'll quicken their steps a trifle!" Ned said. "You boys go on up tothe next shelf and I'll fire from here. They may charge us, and ifthey do I can cover your retreat. Besides, you will have a longerstart."
"I'm going to stay right here and shoot, too!" Jimmie declared."Those men have several bumps coming from me!"
"Ain't he the great little gunman?" snickered Teddy.
"But I need you up there with the others to protect my retreat,"urged Ned, so Jimmie unwillingly toiled up the acclivity. They cameto a shelf perhaps three hundred feet beyond Ned's stand and croucheddown.
Ned's fire, when it came, had the effect of sending the outlaws on arun toward their cave, so the boy joined the others without facing areturn fire.
"They'll be out again when they see what's been going on at thecave!" Jimmie predicted, but the prophecy was not a good one, for nofigures were seen in the canyon after that, and no more shots werefired from that direction.
"I know what the bogus money-makers will do now," Jimmie snickered."They'll pack up their tools and vanish! They'll be thinking thewhole Secret Service bunch is after them!"
"That's just the trouble," Ned said. "I'm afraid the mountaineerswill also think we are Secret Service operatives and spies and maketrouble for us."
"We'll have to get busy with our cameras, then," Jimmie went on, "andtake pictures of everything in sight. We may be believed if we tellthe truth, that we blundered on their cave and they attacked us. Iwonder why Frank doesn't show up? He may have been killed orwounded!"
"If he has been hurt," Teddy observed, as the sound of hoofs cameFrom the south, "Uncle Ike hasn't, for here he comes, ugly as ever."
Believing that Frank was indeed approaching, the boys fired a numberof shots to direct his course and waited. The hoofbeats, the laboredbreathing of the mule, became more distinct directly, and then Frankcame into sight.
The greeting he received was a warm one, and Uncle Ike was petted andpermitted to search every pocket for sugar!
"I don't see how you escaped being hit," Ned observed. "The outlawsfired enough shots to cripple an army."
"They never saw me," declared Frank. "I kept behind ridges andoutcropping rocks, and in the shadows. They were afraid to come tooclose, for they must have thought a dozen men were attacking them.Whenever I fired I changed my position, and when Uncle Ike yelled Ihustled him along! I reckon a good many of the shots you heard camefrom my gun! When you began shooting that settled it! They will befifty miles from here by tomorrow noon!"
"That's likely, for they won't dare remain here after they have beencaught at their work," Ned admitted. "Moonshiners might remain andfight, but counterfei
ters will get away right soon. I take it theydon't belong to this section anyway."
On the way to the camp, during the brief rests, Jimmie explained howthey had been surprised while in the outer cave and had been takeninside and tied up. The boy Dode was overjoyed at his escape from thegang, and explained that they had captured him not far fromWashington and forced him to accompany them, the idea being to usehim in the future in getting rid of the spurious coins.
"They are making a lot of it," he declared, "and the country will beflooded with their work if the government doesn't catch them."
It may be well to state here that the reasoning of the boys withregard to the future actions of the outlaws was correct, as theydisappeared from that section that night. When the lads visited thecave later on some of the counterfeit coin which had been made wasstill scattered about the subterranean room.
When they first reached the camp Jack was not in sight, but he soonappeared, coming from a hiding place near the summit.
"I thought I'd better not expose myself by remaining in the tent," heexplained, "so ducked away and hid where I could watch the mules andthe provisions without being seen. I had about made up my mind thatthe state militia had been called out, you made such a racket!"
"We're going to give Uncle Ike a medal, also a barrel of sugar, forheroic conduct in the face of the enemy!" Jimmie declared, and themule, for once in his life, found a full pocket when he nosed aboutfor sweet lumps!
While the lads were eating a delayed supper, Jack turned to Oliverwith a mock frown on his face.
"The next time you go away in the night and leave me alone in camp,"he said, "I'm going to break your dial in! I might have been shotwhile asleep. According to the conversation between the outlaws, justrelated by Jimmie, one of the toughs came up here! Don't you ever dothat again, if you want to keep a whole hide."
"I guess Uncle Ike has a larger kick coming than you have!" Jimmieremarked.
When the boys compared notes and thoughts concerning the child, theold lady, and the blonde stranger, they could not agree at all. Someof them insisted that the boy was Mike III., while the othersdeclared that he was the prince!
"If he isn't the grandson," one asked, "why this American slang?"
"And if he is," questioned another, "why this talk about French andother foreign languages? Mike III. wouldn't know a foreign tongue,would he?"
The Boy Scout Camera Club; Or, the Confession of a Photograph Page 10