He was aware of a voice at his elbow. “Looking for something?” It was Sherlock Jones, who had followed him from the lodge.
“Jerry! He’s gone!” Jake blurted. “He must have crawled out the window again, and gone off somewhere. Why didn’t he tell me?”
“Look for clues—that’s the thing to do in a case like this,” advised Sherlock with a business-like air. “He must have climbed down the ladder. Come on.” The two boys ran around to the steps, and presently Sherlock snapped on his flashlight at the base of the ladder.
“No footprints can show up on this rocky ground,” observed the detective. Jake glanced wildly at the surrounding trees and bushes, as if determined to make them give up their secret.
“Jerry!” he shouted desperately. “_Jerry!_”
There was no answer. Sherlock flickered his electric torch here and there about the scene of action. “No, sir, not a thing—— Wait, though! What’s this?” He caught the glint of metal about fifty yards in the direction of the tents, and ran toward it.
“This” proved to be a large-size can of tomatoes. A few paces down the hill was a similar can, and another of beans. Sherlock held them up for inspection.
“Clues! Jake, do you know where these came from?”
Jake groaned. It was as he feared. Even now Jerry might be wrestling in the darkness with a deadly foe, or lying senseless in the woods, struck down by a blow from behind——
“Come on!” he cried. “We’ve got to find him! Hurry!”
Above them, from the lighted lodge, streamed out a blare of music from the Lenape band. Pale stars glimmered overhead in the warm summer night.
Jake made no answer, but stumbled down the hillside, making to the left, where he remembered he had lost sight of his antagonist the night of the raid on Tent Fifteen. Then, the man had headed for the lake, and it was probable that under the same conditions he would again do likewise. It was a slim chance, but——
Their footsteps guided by the yellow splash of brightness from the flashlight, the two boys broke through the campus and into the stretch of woods beyond. It seemed to Jake, as he raced through the night, that hours had passed since he was released from the box to find Jerry missing.
“Not much chance—find anybody in these woods,” panted Sherlock, holding his side. “Stop a second, Jake—give me time to get my breath——”