The next afternoon, as the sun was just sinking down through the trees beyond Harvey’s camp, a band of six boys marched along the shore and through the woods, singing as they went. If they had not known every inch of the way as they did know it, a beacon-light on the shore would have guided them. All afternoon Harvey and his crew had worked, making preparations to receive them. They had gathered wood, lugged water, brought stuff down from the village, brought in the lantern from the yacht to aid in the illumination, and had, indeed, laid themselves out to do honour to their guests. Harvey extended a hand to welcome them, one by one, as they came up. “That was a fine joke you played on us last night,” he said, warmly, as Tom and Bob appeared. “If you fellows keep piling it on, you’ll have me buried under a debt of gratitude that I never can attempt to pay.” “Looks as though you had made a good start at it,” said Bob, pointing to one of the benches, where a huge supply of food lay heaped. “Well,” replied Harvey, “just watch Joe now. He’s going to give us a treat. If any one knows how to broil a chicken over the coals, it’s Joe.” Joe, thus distinguished, had raked over a bed of glowing coals, the product of a heap of ship’s timbers, nearly consumed, and was preparing to lay out the aforesaid chickens, split for broiling, upon a big wire broiler. “There’s half a dozen of them,” said Harvey, “and they’re the best that the island affords. You needn’t be afraid—we didn’t confiscate them, either. We’re all done with that sort of thing.” “Don’t they smell good!” said young Joe, gleefully. Soon they had a great dish of the chickens on the table, flanked by a heaping plate of potatoes, baked in ashes, a pot or two of jelly, several loaves of bread, and coffee that filled the woods with fragrance. Then they fell to and ate like wolves. If young Joe had any the best of it, it was hard to see,—and nobody cared, anyway, for every one did his level best. And then, when they had eaten, they sat and sang, roaring away at the top of their lungs, for it was a fair place for noise and no one to be disturbed; only the fish-hawks high in their nests and the seals away out on the ledges to wonder at the unusual disturbance. Then, as the fire blazed, they told stories of fishing, of hunting, of the search for the strange yacht, and a hundred other things, more than ever fascinating, heard under the stars, in the shadow of the woods, in the sight and sound of the sea, by the firelight. It was a night long to be remembered, although as yet they did not dream of those events soon to happen, which would be far more memorable, and of which this evening by the camp-fire was but the beginning. CHAPTER XVII. THE FIRE