About in the center of the lake, Pee-wee saw a small red light. Sometimes there seemed to be two lights, but he thought that one was the reflection of the other in the water. The light seemed very lonely, yet very inviting out there. He supposed it was on a boat. Perhaps some one was fishing.... But in all this surrounding beauty and peacefulness, Pee-wee saw no sign of the murder of any captive maiden. His eagle eye _did_ see where a boat had been drawn up on shore, and if any "shoves" and other cruel and abusive "handling" had been administered by those scoundrels with seventy pistols, it must have been to that poor defenseless boat. Or perhaps they were out in the middle of the lake at that very minute sinking their victim. Anything might happen--in the mind of Scout Harris. CHAPTER XII ENTER THE GENUINE ARTICLE At another time Pee-wee would have delighted to linger in this scout's Utopia. But his chief thought now was to take advantage of his fortunate escape. He had not the faintest idea where he was, more than that he was a full two hour's ride from home. That would be a long and lonely hike, even if he could find his way in the darkness. He tried to recall the names of the various lakes in New Jersey and in the neighboring state of New York, and he recalled a good many, but that did not help him to identify this one. So he started up toward the town in the hope of identifying that. The village petered out toward the lake; there were but a few houses. It was about eleven or twelve o'clock or after and the good people in the straggling cottages thereabout had put out their lights and retired to slumber before that wicked hour. There was a stillness and gloom about these uninviting, dark houses; a cheerlessness not to be found in the densest woods. They made Pee-wee feel lost and lonesome, as the dim, silent wilderness could never do. Soon he reached the town, and there in the center of a spacious lawn was something which, in his loneliness and uncertainty, seemed the picture of gloom. The ruin of a building which had been burned to the ground. What a fire that must have been to witness! Better far than The Bandit of Harrowing Highway! Over a partly fallen arch, under which many reluctant feet had passed, Pee-wee could just make out the graven words: WEST KETCHEM PUBLIC SCHOOL. West Ketchem. So that was where he was. But he had never heard of West Ketchem. The fame of this lakeside metropolis had not penetrated to surging Bridgeboro. At least it had not penetrated to the surging mind of Scout Harris. He tried to recall West Ketchem on the map of New Jersey in his school geography. But evidently West Ketchem had scorned the geography. Or else the geography had scorned West Ketchem. Undecided what to do, Pee-wee lingered a few moments among the mass of charred timbers, and desks ruined and laid low, and broken blackboards, all in an indiscriminate heap.