Then the larger boy dived into a thicket. He did not appear again.

Master of every hidden path in these forests, he seemed likely enough to get away without leaving a trace of a trail.

d.i.c.k halted, brought to his senses by the realization that he had deserted the three high school girls who had been entrusted to his escort. He turned about. At the spot where Tag had tripped he bent over to pick up the abandoned revolver.

One glance into the cylinder was enough. There wasn't a cartridge in the weapon.

"Just as I thought," laughed d.i.c.k triumphantly. "Tag had no notion of shooting anyone. For fear he might do so, if too closely cornered, he threw away the ammunition. He relied on the bad reputation of the Moshers to make officers hesitate if they encountered him with firearms in his hands."

Then Prescott called for the girls, whom he quickly rejoined.

"You didn't catch him?" asked Laura.

"Not I," laughed d.i.c.k. "He knows every trail in these woods and in a sprint, Tag Mosher could leave me hitched to a tree."

"I'm thankful you didn't catch him," quivered Miss Bentley. "He's a terrible fellow."

"Is he?" laughed Prescott good-humoredly. "As a bad man Tag Mosher, or young Page, as he really ought to be called, is about the biggest bluff that I've ever heard of. Look at these weapons. Both unloaded.

Yet, when Tag broke jail, he carried away ammunition enough to hold a company of militia at bay. Tag doesn't want to shoot anyone.

All he wants to do is to scare pursuers."

"He's a ruffian, anyway," Belle declared.

"Why? Was he very rough with you?" d.i.c.k inquired. "Did he tear your rings off recklessly, and hurt your hands?"

"No; but be held my hand so firmly that I simply couldn't pull it out of his clutch," Belle replied. "Then he took off my rings as easily and in as matter-of-fact way as though they were his own property."

"He really didn't mean to hurt you," d.i.c.k explained. "He has been trained, from babyhood, to make his living by appropriating other people's belongings, and he was only obeying his training.

The officers are after him, and Tag, not wishing to be caught, wants to put considerable distance between himself and these woods.

Yet no matter what he does, or where he goes, the officers will finally find him. Law is supreme, and triumphs in the end. No man may defy the police and courts of a nation and get away with it for any great length of time."

"Would you have tried to catch him, if we hadn't been with you?"

asked Laura.

"Yes," d.i.c.k admitted. "Though under the circ.u.mstances I had no right to do anything but stay here with you and try to protect you. Shall we go on with the collecting?"

"If the other girls want to do so," agree Susie Sharp.

"If we want to?" Laura echoed. "After the fright we've had?

All that we want to do is to-----"

"Get back to camp?" smiled d.i.c.k. "I'm wholly agreeable. Truth to tell, I've had such a fright that my nerves are shattered."

"Your nerves shattered?" echoed Belle scornfully. "Tell that to someone who never lived in Gridley, d.i.c.k Prescott! You flew at that fellow like a tiger."

"But look at the magnificent help I had!" smiled d.i.c.k.

CHAPTER XXI

THE MEDICAL EXAMINER TALKS TRAINING

"Do you want a suggestion, Prescott?" inquired Dr. Bentley.

The physician and his party had been over at the high school boys'

camp for something like twenty minutes, that same afternoon, watching the training work that the young athletes were undergoing.

"Yes, sir," d.i.c.k answered promptly. Then a sudden thought striking him, he added:

"Perhaps I can make a suggestion, doctor, that is even more immediate in its nature than yours."

"Then I shall be glad to have it," smiled Laura's father.

"Did you leave that chauffeur to watch your camp?"

"No; he has gone to Five Corners to post the young women's numerous letters. But the camp doesn't need a guard, does it?"

"It does, as long as Tag Mosher is at large, sir. Harry, won't you go over to the doctor's camp and stay there until the chauffeur returns?"

"Yes," agreed Hazelton.

"If you sight Tag, or any other doubtful-looking characters, just give a yell, and we'll all come over."

"Would that young scamp bother our camp, really?" inquired the physician.

"Certainly he would," d.i.c.k went on promptly. "Mosher, Page, or whoever he really is, is just as natural an anarchist as the world ever saw. He has never had anything of his own, and whenever he sees anyone else's property that will serve him, he just says, 'Tag, you're It!' That's the way he got his nickname."

"I believe I'll go over with Harry and see if anything is missing,"

declared Dr. Bentley. "In the meantime, Prescott, suppose you and your squad rest until I return. Just make yourselves agreeable to the girls. I'll endeavor to be back promptly. When I come back I shall be prepared to offer you some training suggestions that may be of value to you."

So the flushed young athletes rested, except Harry, who departed with the physician.

In fifteen minutes Dr. Bentley returned.

"Your warning came too late, Prescott," announced Laura's father cheerily. "Our camp has been visited."

"Tag Mosher?" gasped Prescott.

"Impossible to say," was the smiling answer. "The caller forgot to leave a card. But someone has cleaned us out of about a dozen tins of food and some packages of biscuit. It must have been quite a little load. Just by chance I also happened to think to look at my medicine case. One vial is missing therefrom."

"What medicine did he take, did you say, sir?" asked Dave Darrin much interested.

"I believe I didn't say," replied Dr. Bentley. "Perhaps later on I shall tell you."

"If the thief took only a dozen tins," said Mrs. Bentley, "there is food enough left so that we needn't worry about immediate famine.

And we have two cars, either one of which may be despatched to bring further supplies."