Jack smiled at the earnest manner of the other. "That would be too cruel, Toby," he assured him. "If I thought it necessary that Miss Haydock should know what we've learned, why, I'd go myself and tell her, leaving you fellows here to keep camp while I was gone." Thereupon the cloud gathering on Toby's face was suddenly dissipated, and he grinned happily again. "Oh! I hope you won't even have to think of doing that, Jack," Steve remarked. "I don't see any necessity just yet," Jack decided, "and unless some new and very important developments come along I think I can hold off until we all go back home. Besides, I hope to do a little more looking around, and perhaps take more pictures while I'm up here." "I get you, Jack!" cried the alert Toby. "Chances are that you're making up your mind to drop in and see what they're doing over where those blasts came from. How about that for a guess, Jack?" "You hit the bull's-eye plum centre that time, Steve," laughed Jack; "because while my plans are not exactly complete, I have that in mind. But we'll talk it over again. There's no particular hurry, you see, if we expect to stay here ten or twelve days longer. The more time we take to enjoy ourselves the better it would look, in case a spy was hovering about, trying to learn just what we wanted up here." "One thing sure, Jack, I hardly think we'll be able to do much tomorrow, because all the signs point to our having wet weather," Steve went on to say, with the air of a prophet who could read the signs about as well as the head of the weather bureau at Washington. "There is a feeling in the air that way," admitted Jack. "I've noticed it myself even if I didn't say anything about it. So I'm glad, Steve, that you proved a good provider while at home today, laying in a fine stock of firewood that ought to last us through a couple of days. It'll come in handy in case we're shut in by the rain." "Oh! we're well fixed for anything like that, Jack," chuckled the other. "There's that dandy camp stove we fetched along, and haven't had a chance yet to try out. I made a place in the tent for it, and Mr. Whitlatch has an asbestos collar to use so that the pipe can't set fire to the canvas, no matter how red-hot it gets. Why, it would be well worth enduring a rainy spell just to see how the thing works." "And I haven't forgotten either, Steve," spoke up Toby, "that you promised to make a fine batch of biscuits in the oven of that same camp stove the first chance you got. I want to open that bottle of honey, and have been keeping it to go on hot biscuits--of course providing they're a success." "Now don't you worry about that," said Steve, boldly. "I took lessons from our hired girl, and she said my biscuits were mighty near as good as hers. Why, at the table they were sure enough surprised when she told Mom I'd made the bunch." And so they chatted and laughed until it was time to turn in again. CHAPTER XVI STORM-BOUND