He had no idea of the time, to his great chagrin, for in his haste to obey the forged summons to the flying track he had forgotten to bring his watch. In fact, in his hurry, he had slipped into an old coat, the pockets of which contained nothing more useful to him than a packet of chewing gum. He slipped a wad of this into his mouth to "keep him company" as he expressed it to himself, and grittily went forward.
The wood ended presently, and he found himself in a field with woods on all three sides, except that on which the swamp impinged. Little as he liked the idea of plunging into pathless woods, with nothing to guide him but the stars, as he glimpsed them through the trees, there was no help for it. Go on he must. Crossing the field rapidly he soon reached the border of the tangle and entered its black shadows. Keeping as straight a line as he could he hastened forward, and to his great delight, soon saw that the trees were beginning to thin out, and that beyond lay, apparently, open country.
"Hooray, I'm bound to strike a road before long now," thought Roy gleefully and quickened his pace.
He had not gone more than a few paces, however, when through the trees he heard a strange sound. It was a clinking sound like the rattling of a chain.
The boy was bold enough, but the mysterious sound on the edge of that dark wood caused his pulses to beat a bit quicker. What could it be?
Gradually, as he stood still among the trees, the sound drew closer.
"Ghosts in story books always clank chains," thought Roy, to himself. "Now if I believed in such things, I----"
He stopped short abruptly, as, from behind a clump of brush in the direction from whence the clanking had proceeded, there suddenly emerged a tall form all in white.
"Good gracious!" cried Roy, considerably startled by the sight of this sudden apparition. "I do believe----"
But at the sight of the white form he had involuntarily given a backward step. Without the slightest warning he felt the ground suddenly give way under his feet, and his body shot down through space.
Down, down he shot, a hundred mad thoughts twisting dizzily in his head.
All at once his progress was arrested. Before he could realize what had happened he felt a flood of icy cold water close over his head and a mighty ringing and roaring in his ears.