Frank Roscoe's Secret Part 18

They waited about an hour and then began firing again. Between the shots they listened for a hail, but none came.

"If he heard us he'd fire an answering shot," remarked Ned, when, for a time, they had again desisted from their signaling.

"He couldn't," Fenn answered. "He left his gun in the tent."

"That's queer," Bart spoke. "If he knew he would be away after dark I'm sure he'd have taken his gun, though there's nothing worse than skunks in these woods."

"We'll fire some more, in about an hour," said Ned. "Then, if he doesn't come, we'll have to wait until morning and make a search. It's mighty strange, that's what it is."

"Probably he'll laugh at us for being worried," suggested Bart, with an attempt at a laugh that was rather mirthless. "Maybe he's night-fis.h.i.+ng, or something like that."

"He didn't take any tackle with him," said Fenn. "All his things are in the tent. He just slipped out without a thing with him except his pocket knife."

Bart himself had not believed the suggestion about night-fis.h.i.+ng, but he did not know what other explanation to make of Frank's absence.

Once more, toward midnight, the boys fired other signaling shots, but without avail. Then, with hopelessness, and something very much like fear in their hearts, they went back to the tent.

"We'll go to sleep, and make a good search in the morning," said Bart.

"Why this is nothing after all. We've been in worse situations than this, a good deal worse. Look at the time we were hunting for Ned."

"But I was in a big city and Frank is in the big woods," put in Ned.

"I don't know but what the woods are safer than the city," observed Fenn.

The boys did not sleep much. They tried to, but every now and then one of them would awaken and, sitting up on his cot, would listen intently. He thought he had heard someone approaching through the bushes, but each time it was a false alarm. The fire was kept going brightly, in the hope Frank might happen to see it from a distance.

Morning came at last, and, with the first pale streaks of dawn filtering through the trees, the boys were up. They made a hasty breakfast, and then, taking their guns, and putting up a light lunch, they started off to search for Frank.

"Which way had we better go?" asked Fenn. "Shall we try separate ways, or all keep together?"

"Better keep together," replied Bart. "We have a compa.s.s, and can find our way back, but if we straggle off alone some of us may get lost, and none of us knows these woods well enough to chance that."

"But which way are we to go?" asked Ned. "There's no such thing as finding Frank's trail in these woods."

"I have it!" cried Fenn.

"What do you mean?"

"The telephone line! You remember how interested Frank was in that! Well, maybe he's following it up. Let's find that and maybe we'll find Frank!"

"Go ahead! It's a good suggestion!" exclaimed Bart.

CHAPTER XVI

WHERE FRANK WENT

No sooner had Frank entered the tent that afternoon when Fenn started to fix his gun, than he had slipped out under the rear canvas wall. He waited a moment after emerging, brushed the dirt from his clothes, and then started off through the woods.

"I guess I can get back before they miss me," he said to himself. "I must see where that line runs. It may be nothing, but I suspect it is one of the clues I am searching for."

He went forward at a rapid pace, and, in a little while, came to where the telephone wire was strung through the woods. Then he came to a halt and considered.

"Which way had I better go?" he thought. "Let me see, if I am right in my theory this line runs to Darewell and from there--That's what I have to find out. With the Darewell end I'm not concerned at present, but I must find where the other end is. Darewell is off to the left. To the right lies the unknown. I must go to the right."

With that he set off through the woods, following the telephone line. It was hard work, for the wire led through the thickest part of the forest, as though those who had strung it wanted to discourage curiosity seekers.

Now it would cross some bog or swamp, and Frank had to make a wide circuit in order to avoid getting over his knees in water. Again it would wind in and out among the trees, as if the persons who put it up wanted to confuse any one who sought to trace where the wire ended.

But Frank was determined to solve the mystery, and he kept doggedly on.

Several times he slipped and fell, and once he struck a stone that inflicted quite a cut on his forehead.

"If Alice Keene was here now," he murmured as he wiped the blood off, "she would get some of the practice she is so fond of. As it is I've got to doctor myself."

He washed the cut in a stream of water, and after resting himself kept on. Farther and farther he penetrated into the woods. He had a general idea of the direction in which he was going, and knew he could easily find his way back again, as he had but to follow the wire until he got to the point where he could strike back to camp.

"Maybe, after all my work, I'll find it leads to no place but a house in the woods where some rich man has come to spend the summer," Frank thought, but, even while he said this to himself, he did not believe it.

He hoped the wire would lead him to something that would help him solve the secret that was so puzzling.

On and on he kept. It began to grow dusk, as the sun sank lower behind the trees, and the forest was quite dark. He could hardly see the wire now, and he was a bit worried. If he did not come to the end of it soon it meant he would have to stay in the forest all night, as he could not possibly find his way back after dark, for the wire would be invisible.

It was, therefore, with a somewhat anxious heart that Frank watched the shadows lengthening and saw the wire becoming more and more faint to his view. Then, when he was about to give up, and look for a place where he might spend the night, though he doubted if there was one in the woods, he saw, through the trees, a large building. His heart gave a great thump, for, as he went on a little further he saw that the telephone wire ran to this building almost obscured from view.

"I have found it!" Frank exclaimed, half aloud. "Now to see what it is!"

He came to the edge of a clearing in which the building stood. He was about to press on, when he caught sight of a notice painted on a board and set up just at the beginning of the grounds. It read:

_CLIFFSIDE SANITARIUM. PRIVATE GROUNDS_.

"Sanitarium!" exclaimed Frank, as the memory of the conversation of the two men, of which Ned had told him, came to his mind. "I wonder if this can be the place. Sanitarium! Probably a place for mildly insane persons.

That would be it. It says 'private grounds' and that likely means no trespa.s.sing; but what am I to do? I've got to stay somewhere to-night, and I can't possibly get back to camp. I'll make a circuit around the place and see how it looks."

Keeping in the shadow of the woods, Frank made a wide circle around the sanitarium. Then he came to a stop, when he was near the front, for he had come to the edge of a high cliff, on which the building stood.

"That's where the name comes in," thought the boy. "It's on the cliff.

Well, I think I'll ask if I can stay all night. I hope they don't take me for a lunatic, and perhaps some of the doctors or nurses can tell me what I want to know."

Frank was about to advance toward the front of the inst.i.tution, up a path that led from the edge of the woods where he stood, when he saw a line of men leave the sanitarium, and start to walk around the paths about the building. At the first glance Frank knew what they were.

"They are the patients out for exercise," he decided. "I must get closer.

They're coming this way. I'll hide in the woods," and, getting behind a big oak, the boy awaited the oncoming of the line of sad-faced men.

Slowly the patients filed past. They all seemed to be suffering from some ailment, mental or physical, and all had an unhealthful pallor.

Walking ahead, in the rear, and on both sides, were men dressed in dark blue uniforms.

"Attendants," mused Frank, "though none of the patients look as though they were violent."