Though they were all damp and chilled and anxious to regain their original camp, the boys kept up a cheerful conversation all the way.
"Funny you fellows didn't see that bird," said Fred.
"There wasn't no bird," twitted Jerry. "You just blinked your eyes when that flash came, and dreamt the rest."
"On the square though, fellows," seriously commented Herb, "Fred may be right, and that old tower may be the very place we're lookin' for."
"It's worth while thinking about," said Hawke. "We'll fly up there anyway, as soon as we get the aeroplane going."
"Seems to me that's too good to be true," reflected Fly. "I never thought, when I was readin' all that stuff about machines, that I was goin' to see a real one, and help build it myself."
His tone was so droll that some of the others laughed. "Give Fly a handkerchief," groaned Tender. "He wants to blubber, he does."
"Don't feel so bad about it, old boy," comforted Jerry. "Maybe the train with the stuff on it'll be wrecked, or Hawke'll change his mind, or we'll find out that it's been Greasers doin' the dirty work."
"Guess I'm kind of a howler," admitted Fly. "But watch me work when we get at that plane."
Just then Carlito picked up a long, thin snake, which had wiggled across the ground in front of him, and, swinging it around and around by its tail, sent it whizzing through space.
"Nothing but a garter snake," he explained, laughing, as Gray unconsciously ducked his head, and Fred gasped with astonishment. "I usually twist their heads off."
"Wonder you don't get your foot in it some time, Carl," declared Fred. "Ain't you afraid of nothin'?"
"No bad luck can happen to me," said Carl confidently, though with a smile. "See this?" He pulled out from under his wet shirt a string to which was fastened a large blue and white streaked stone bead.
"What's that?" asked several of the boys.
"A charm. Taken from the grave of one of my ancestors. There were just two in our tribe, and an old squaw gave it to me before I came to the Fort. Some one else in the family has the other one. She said it was the family charm and nothing could happen to me as long as I wore it."
Hawke smiled at this characteristic explanation, but the boys took it very seriously.