In arranging his retreat, he had left undisturbed the wagon-tongue, since removing it from the end of the floor for a more secure barricade; it had stood with several of the sideboards against the wall, as if Brick meditated using them for a special purpose. Such was indeed his plan, and it added some zest to his present employment to think of what he meant to do next; this was nothing less than to make a dugout in the cove. To this enterprise he was prompted not only by a desire to vary his monotonous days, but to insure safety from possible foes. Should a skulking savage, or, what would be worse, a stray member of the robber band catch sight of him among the hills, the spy would spread the news among his fellows. A relentless search would be instituted, and even if Willock succeeded in escaping, the band would not rest till it had discovered his hiding-place. If they came on the dugout, their search would terminate, and his home in the crevice would escape investigation; but if there was no dugout to satisfy curiosity, the crevice would most probably be explored. "Two homes ain't too many for a character like me, nohow," remarked Brick, as he set the wagon-tongue and long boards on end to be drawn up through the crevice. "Cold weather will be coming on in due time--say three or four months--and what's that to me? a mere handful of time! Well, I don't never expect to make a fire in my cave, I'll set my smoke out in the open where it can be traced without danger to my pantry shelves." He was even slower about building the dugout than he had been in arranging the miscellaneous objects in the cavern on top of the mountain. Transporting the timbers across a mile of ridges and granite troughs was no light work; and when his tools and material were in the cove, the digging of the dugout was protracted because of the closeness of water to the surface. At last he succeeded in excavating the cellar at a spot within a few yards of the mountain, without penetrating moistened sand. He leveled down the walls till he had a chamber about twelve feet square. Over this he placed the wagon-tongue, converting it into the ridge-pole, which he set upon forks cut from the near-by cedars. Having trimmed branches of the trees in the grove, he laid them as close together as possible, slanting from the ridge-pole to the ground, and over these laid the bushy cedar branches. This substantial roof he next covered with dirt, heaping it up till no glimpse of wood was visible tinder the hard-packed dome. The end of the dugout was closed up in the same way except for a hole near the top fitted closely to the stovepipe and packed with mud.