"And yet Mr. Bliss said his friend's name was Bryce Carpenter," he observed. "I had an idea all along, from the way he called that name, he wasn't used to saying it. Sam came easier to his tongue. Now, we don't know who Sam is, or what he's done, but seems to me there's something crooked about that yarn they set up, of a wager made with that Lenox fellow."
"They never made such a wager," declared Josh, stubbornly; "and right now the only thing they want to do is to get around to Tampa, where they expect to slip aboard a boat bound for Cuba. I heard some more talk before I opened my eyes and spoiled it all. If the one who calls himself Carpenter hadn't got cold feet, their plan was to drop down the keys to Key West, and get across to Havana from there."
"Well, what's that to us?" remarked Jack. "They treated you white, Josh, didn't they?"
"They sure did," answered the other, warmly.
"All right," Jack went on; "then it's no business of ours who and what they are; and we'll just have to forget them. But, listen, wasn't that a shout ahead, there?"
"I heard it, too, Jack!" exclaimed George; but neither of the others seemed to have noticed anything, though in the case of Josh, with his head tied up, this was really not to be wondered at.
"What sort of a sound was it, boys?" demanded the tall one.
"I thought it was a shout of some kind; how about it, George?" Jack replied.
"Same here. But then, perhaps it's only Herb and Nick skylarking. Once in so often Nick gets a streak, and thinks he has to work off his high humor. But see here, Jack, I hope you don't imagine some sort of trouble has dropped in on the two boys we left in camp less than an hour back?"
"Well, I don't know," Jack made answer, in a half-hesitating way. "But somehow it struck me that yell was more along the line of anger or fright than the result of high spirits or kidding."
"But Jack, we don't hear any more of the same sort?" George remonstrated.
"How's that, then?" asked the other, as a plain whoop came faintly to their ears.
"Say, that's Nick, all right," Josh declared, stoutly. "I could tell his shout among a thousand. There never was one like it. I always said a wild Injun from the Crow reservation couldn't begin to hold a candle to Nick, when it came to letting out a whoop."