All need of concealment was gone now. Rob's heart leaped to the adventure. Jumbo was half way through the window as the lad reached it.

Rob hastened him with a shove and a quick word. The black held for an instant, clutching the sill, and then he dropped. The next moment Rob had followed him. He fell in a sprawling heap on top of the black. Both were up in a jiffy.

"Which way?" gasped out Jumbo.

"Any way--this!" cried Rob, dashing across a moonlit strip toward a dark belt of woods.

A fusillade of shots rang out behind them. Rob heard the bullets screech as they spun by.

"Law'sy, Ma.r.s.e Rob, dem bullets talk ter me mighty plain," gasped Jumbo as they gained the comparative security of the dark hemlocks.

"What did they say?" asked Rob, breathlessly.

"Dey say Jum-bo, we'se ah lookin' fo' you, chile!"

Whatever Rob's reply might have been it was forestalled the next instant by an entirely unsuspected and startling happening. From the woods _ahead_ of them, came a sudden trampling of feet.

"Quick, Jumbo. Down in here!" exclaimed the Boy Scout, dragging the quaking negro down into a clump of bushes. They were just in time. The next moment half-a-dozen dark figures rushed by them through the woods, going in the direction of the hut they had just vacated so summarily.

"What on earth does this mean?" gasped Rob, half aloud in his utter astonishment. Parting the bushes a bit, he could perceive the dark outlines of the hut and the newcomers deploying across the moonlit strip in front of it.

A loud crash echoed through the sleeping woods as the door of the hut was suddenly slammed shut.

Almost simultaneously, the walls of the hut and the s.p.a.ce in front of it seemed to spit vicious flashes of fire.

"Gee whiz!" cried Rob, excitedly, "they're attacking the hut, Jumbo! What under the sun does this mean?"

"Dunno," said the negro, "but mah hopes is dat dey jes' nachully exterminaccouminicate each other like dem Killarney cats."

"Kilkenny cats, you mean, don't you?"

"It's all de same," retorted Jumbo, "but say, Ma.r.s.e Rob, we'd bettah be clearing out ob here."

"No, let's stay awhile. We're in no danger here. In fact I've an idea that this may all turn out to be a good thing for us."

The attacking party now dropped back a bit.

"They're well armed and desperate," Rob heard one of them say, "better breathe a bit, boys, and then we'll go for 'em again."

"Let's get a log and smash the door down," said a voice.

"Good idea, O'Malley," was the response, "here's an old hemlock trunk.

It's just the thing. Lay hold, boys, and we'll smoke out that nest of rats in a jiffy."

Willing hands laid hold of the big stick of timber, and the next instant they were staggering with it toward the hut. There was a low word of command and a sudden dash. The log was poised for an instant and then:

Smash! crash!

The ma.s.sive door stood for a moment and then toppled inward, falling with a splintering crash. But a dead silence followed the fall of the door. No more pretence of defense was made by the inmates of the hut. Could they be going to give up so tamely?

Then a sudden voice floated through the night. The voice of one of the attacking party.

"Say! There's n.o.body here, boys!"

"Confound them! Have they escaped us again?" came another voice.

"Look's like it. Scatter and find them--back for your lives, all of you!"

The warning cry was followed almost instantly by a deafening explosion. A vivid flash of blue flame occurred simultaneously.

"Gollyation!" gasped Jumbo, "de end ob de worl' am comin'."

The whole hut seemed to burst into flame at once. Lurid, vivid fire seemed to gush from every window and opening in the place. In color it was an intense blue.

"Shades ob Ma.s.sa George Wash basin!" yelled Jumbo, "all de debils in dat pit we see back dar is on de job! Come on, Ma.r.s.e Rob. Let's git out ob here in double quick jig time."

"Nonsense," said Rob sharply, "I see it all, now, Jumbo. That place was a moonshine joint--an illegal distillery. Those men who just attacked it are revenue officers. The explosion was caused by hundreds of gallons of spirits. I guess the moonshiners set it on fire to destroy the evidence."

Each instant the blaze rose higher. The hut, within its four walls, was a ma.s.s of flames. It glowed like a red hot furnace. Rob watched it with fascinated eyes. The whole clearing was bright as day. The dark woods beyond were bathed in a blood-red glare from the flames.

The intense heat fairly blistered the trunks of the nearest hemlocks.

Resin ran from them freely.

"Let's get further back, Jumbo, it's too hot here," said Rob presently.

"Golly goodness! It am dat," declared Jumbo in awed tones, "dat fire dere puts me in mo' fear ob dat bottomless pit dan all de preachifying I ever listened to."

But their retreat into the woods was checked in a strange manner. Rob, who was in advance, recoiled suddenly. A whole section of the woodland floor seemed to uprear itself before his eyes, and a wild figure, with a tangled black beard and shifty, wicked eyes, emerged. Rob realized in a flash that it was a trapdoor cleverly concealed by brush and earth that had just opened. Simultaneously he recognized the figure that was crawling from it as that of Black Bart himself.

The man was too much perturbed to notice their nearness to him. But suddenly his eyes fell on them. With a furious oath he dashed at Rob.

"You young fiend! You're responsible for this!" he yelled in a frenzy.

A knife glittered in his hand, but before he could use it Jumbo's black fist collided with his jaw. Black Bart fell sprawling back upon the trap door which he had just opened.

"Reckon Jack Johnson himself couldn't hev done no bettah!" grinned the negro.

"Oh, no you don't, sah!" he exclaimed the next instant as Black Bart struggled to rise; "ah reckon you can repose yo'self right dar fo' a peahriod ob time."

So saying he pinioned the ruffian's arms to his sides and held him thus.

As he did so, violent knockings began to resound from under the trap-door. Evidently somebody was imprisoned there.

"Hey! Let us out! Let us out!" came sharp cries from below, albeit they were considerably m.u.f.fled by the trap-door.

"Yo' all come an' sit on hyah too, Ma.r.s.e Rob," urged Jumbo. "Ah reckon den dey kain't git dat door open till we am willing dat dey should conmerge inter terrier firmer."

Rob guessed at once what had happened. The moonshiners, following the attack of the revenue officers, had realized that continued resistance would be useless. They had, therefore, made their escape by the secret pa.s.sage, led into by the swinging hearthstone. Its outlet evidently being by the trap door on which they were then stationed. But first, with wicked craft, they had ignited their whole stock of spirituous liquors, hoping in the consequent explosion, that the revenue men would perish.

This much seemed clear. Indeed, it was confirmed afterward, and--but we are antic.i.p.ating.