"Especially in that one spot where he says the path is hidden under the ooze, and that if once you lose it you're apt to get in deeper and deeper, until there's danger of being sucked down over your head."

"It's a terrible thing to think of," declared Tom; "worse even than being caught in a quicksand in a creek, as I once found myself."

"How did you get out?" asked Carl. "I never heard you say anything about it before, Tom?"

"Oh! in my case it didn't amount to much," was the answer, "because I realized my danger by the time the sand was half way to my knees. I suppose if I'd tried to draw one foot out the other would have only gone down deeper, for that's the way they keep sinking, you know."

"But tell me how you escaped?" insisted Carl.

"I happened to know something about quicksands," responded the other, modestly, "and as soon as I saw what a fix I was in I threw myself flat, so as to present as wide a surface as I could, and crawled and rolled until I got ash.o.r.e. Of course I was soaked, but that meant very little compared with the prospect of being smothered there in that shallow creek."

"But the chances are Tony and those other fellows know nothing at all about the best ways to escape from a sucking bog," ventured Carl.

"Yes, and I can see that Mr. Henderson is really worried about it. He is straining his ears all the while, and I think he must be listening in hope of hearing calls for help."

"But none of us have heard anything like that!" said the other.

"No, not a shout that I could mention," Tom admitted. "There are those noisy crows keeping up a chatter in the tree-tops where they are holding a caucus, and some scolding bluejays over here, but nothing that sounds like a human cry."

"It looks bad, and makes me feel shivery," continued Carl.

"Oh! we mustn't let ourselves think that all of them could have been caught," the patrol leader hastened to say, meaning to cheer his chum up. "They may have been smarter than Mr. Henderson thinks, and managed to get through the bog without getting stuck."

Perhaps Carl was comforted by these words on the part of his chum; but nevertheless the anxious look did not leave his face.

They had by this time fully entered the bog. It was of a peculiar formation, and not at all of a nature to cause alarm in the beginning.

Indeed it seemed as though any person with common sense could go through on those crooked trails that ran this way and that.

The old naturalist had taken the lead at this point, and they could see that he kept watching the trail in front of him. From time to time he would speak, and the one who came just behind pa.s.sed the word along, so in turn every scout knew that positive marks betrayed the fact of Tony's crowd having really come that way.

By slow degrees the nature of the bog changed. One might not notice that his surroundings had become less promising, and that the surface of the ooze, green though it was, would prove a delusion and a snare if stepped on, allowing the foot to sink many inches in the sticky ma.s.s.

In numerous places they could see where the boys ahead of them had missed the trail, though always managing to regain the more solid ground.

"It's getting a whole lot spooky in here, let me tell you!" admitted Felix, after they had been progressing for some time.

"But it's entirely different from a real swamp, you see," remarked Josh; "I've been in a big one and I know."

"How about that, Josh; wouldn't you call a bog a swamp, too?" asked George.

"Not much I wouldn't," was the reply. "A swamp is always where there are dense trees, hanging vines and water. It's a terribly gloomy place even in the middle of the day, and you're apt to run across snakes, and all sorts of things like that."

"Well, we haven't seen a single snake so far," admitted Horace. "I'm glad, too, because I never did like the things. This isn't so very gloomy, when you come to look around you, but I'd call it just desolate, and let it go at that."

"Black mud everywhere, though it's nearly always covered with a deceptive green sc.u.m," remarked Josh, "with here and there puddles of water where the frogs live and squawk the live-long day."

"I wonder how deep that mud is anyhow?" speculated George.

"Suppose you get a pole and try while we're resting here," suggested Josh, with a wink at the scout next to him.

George thereupon looked around, and seeing a pole which Mr. Henderson may have placed there at some previous time he started to push it into the bog.

"What d'ye think of that, fellows?" he exclaimed, in dismay when he had rammed the seven foot pole down until three fourths of its length had vanished in the unfathomable depths of soft muck.

"Why, seems as if there wasn't any bottom at all to the thing," said Felix.

"Of course there is a bottom," remarked the naturalist, who had been watching the boys curiously; "but in some places I've been unable to reach it with the longest pole I could manage."

"Have we pa.s.sed that dangerous place you were telling us about, sir?"

asked Mr. Witherspoon.

"No, it is still some little distance ahead," came the reply.

"If it's much worse than right here I wouldn't give five cents for their chances," declared George.

"Hark!" exclaimed Tom just then.

"What did you hear?" cried Carl.

"It sounded like voices to me, though some distance off, and coming from further along the trail," the patrol leader a.s.serted.

"They may be stuck in the mire and trying every way they can to get out," observed the naturalist. "Let us give them a shout, boys. Now, all together!"

As they all joined in, the volume of sound must have been heard a mile away. Hardly had the echoes died out than from beyond came loud calls, and plainly they heard the words "Help, help! Oh! come quick, somebody!

Help!"

CHAPTER XXIV

RETURNING GOOD FOR EVIL

When that wailing cry reached their ears it thrilled the scouts through and through, for now they knew that the worst must have happened to the wretched Tony Pollock and his three cronies, adrift in the treacherous muck bog.

"Forward, but be very careful to keep in my tracks all the time!"

called out the naturalist as he started off.

They wound around this way and that. There were times when Rob, who came directly on the heels of the pilot, could not see the slightest trace of a trail; but he realized that from long a.s.sociation and investigation Mr. Henderson knew exactly where to set his feet, and thus avoid unpleasant consequences.

They now and then sent out rea.s.suring calls, for those unseen parties ahead continued to make fervent appeals, as though a terrible fear a.s.sailed them that the rescuers might go astray and miss them.

By degrees the shouts sounded closer, though becoming exceedingly hoa.r.s.e. Presently Felix called out that he believed he had glimpsed the unfortunate boys.

"Oh! they're all in the mud, and up to their waists at that!" he cried.

"No, you're wrong there, Felix," said Josh. "Three of them seem to be stuck fast, but there's one up in that tree nearly over them. He must have managed to pull himself up there, somehow or other."