Aleck gave a low cry of rapture. "It's here, just as he said it would be, in this map I carry!" he exclaimed, as he clutched the arm of the scoutmaster. "I hope I'm not dreaming all this, Thad; tell me I'm not, please, that's a good fellow." "Well," replied the other, laughing gently so as to convince Aleck that he was perfectly cool and collected, and ought to know what he talked about; "so far as it goes, your map is absolutely correct, Chum Aleck; and I don't see any reason to doubt the rest of the story. In my opinion we're going to discover something fine before a great many minutes go past." "What shall we do, Thad; you see, I'm so upset with it all, that somehow I look to you to arrange things. Perhaps if I was alone, and just _had_ to depend on myself, I'd do better; but it's so kind of you to help me out, and you're so capable of doing it all. Please fix it up as you think best." "All right, then," returned Thad, readily. "First of all, I'll light our little glim here; for if we're going to poke along into that black hole, I reckon we'll be wanting some sort of light to see by. Don't think I'd like to take a tumble down some precipice, myself; not to speak of running across a wild beast." "What makes you say that last, Thad?" demanded the other, quickly; "do you get a scent of it, too?" "I had an idea I did, and somehow it made me think of a menagerie. Hold up just a minute, and we'll be able to see something." As he spoke Thad struck a match, which he applied to the wick of the lantern. It was a good type of its kind, and as soon as the wick had been properly adjusted no one could reasonably complain about the quality of the illumination produced. This done, the patrol leader hastened to lower the lantern so that he could examine the ground close to the bottom of the fissure in the rock. "Plenty of tracks, all right," was his first comment. "Can you make them out, and is it a bear?" asked Aleck, almost unconsciously swinging his gun a little further to the front, while his fingers sought the lock. "Well, no; the marks differ very much from the tracks of a bear, either a black or a cinnamon. They look more like made by a dog's paws," Thad replied. "But a dog wouldn't be up here; you must mean it's a wolf, that's what, Thad," Aleck hastened to observe. "If that was a guess, you hit the nail square on the head, Aleck," chuckled the scoutmaster. "A wolf has been using this hole in the rock for a den; and from all I can make out, the tracks seem pretty fresh, too." "Then you think the old chap is in there now, do you?" asked the other. "I wouldn't like to say;" replied Thad; "but there's just one thing we've got to do, and that is, believe it to be so. A wolf caught in a trap is some dangerous, they tell me; and in case this happens to be a mother wolf, with a litter of whelps, she'd fight like everything, believe me."