Buoyant and happy, the one eager with expectation, the other less confident but very willing to find himself a poor prophet, the two lads moved steadily, watchfully forward. Billy and Dave had been assigned to all that part of the forest lying to the north of Camp Golden and between the edge of the hillside above the creek and a long since abandoned logging road which penetrated deep into the woods a quarter of a mile to the east. It would keep them very busy to cover the ground at all thoroughly before night. "No, this ain't the great woods, though! Oh, I guess it's hardly any woods at all! Very poor woods! Oh, yes! Very poor day, too!" With this and other similar declarations, equally dignified and polished, Paul Jones expressed the delighted state of his mind at about the same time Dave was mentioning his own pleasure to Worth. Phil Way acquiesced in all of Paul's words, paradoxical as it may appear, for he really denied them. "There never was a grander day; and isn't it a dandy, big woods!" he said. "Just makes a man feel like soaring, though never before so conscious of his littleness and downright insignificance. Why! the creek! these old trees! They were all here and ages old long before we were on earth! They'll be here long after we are gone, too, Paul. But oh! it is fine to be with them--to enjoy them!" The course Way and Jones were taking was to the north through the valley. Between the east bank of the creek and the foot of the hill lay a strip of woods ranging from one hundred to three hundred yards in width. This was to be the field of their searching as they progressed to the extreme northern limits of the forest. Returning, they would traverse carefully the broad, sloping hillside, broken here and there by precipitous ledges. So would they reach camp again, and the more open valley near it. "'Three stones piled one on top of another!' It will be along the hill, I'm thinking, that we'll finally find them," observed Paul thoughtfully to himself. Then, impressed by what he considered the importance of this conclusion, he called out the substance of it to Phil, for the two were keeping some distance apart in order that the least possible bit of ground should escape their scrutiny. "Well, don't forget there's something more than three stones to look for," Way answered. "If you find anything that looks interesting, sing out. I'll do the same." It was a valley of romantic interest the two boys were exploring. Here the creek foamed and bubbled into "suds" over and around obstructing rocks or driftwood. Again it rested in deep, narrow pools. Beyond, in gentle ripples the water gained speed again to go tumbling on and on in miniature falls of a thousand different shapes and sizes, where its course was rough and broken.