"Tell you what we'll do," said Rob, "we'll take the ropes off the packs and join them together. Then we can knot one end to one of the staves and haul Tubby up."

"That's a good idea," called the stout youth, who had overheard, "and hurry up, too."

"Gracious, it needs an elephant to haul your fat carca.s.s out of there,"

scoffed Merritt. "I guess we'll take our time over it."

"Take as long as you like, so long as you get me out," parried Tubby, "you always were slow, anyhow, as the fellow said when he threw his dollar watch into the creek."

It did not take long to rig up an extemporized life-line with the pack ropes. This done, one end was made fast to the staves, and the other lowered to Tubby. At Rob's orders the rope was pa.s.sed round a tree trunk, and when Tubby had adjusted the rope under his arm pits the young Scouts began to haul. As Merritt had said, Tubby was no lightweight. Once they had to stop, and the rope ran back quite a way. A yell from Tubby ensued.

"Hey! Keep on hauling there!" he roared, "what do you think I am, a sack of potatoes?"

"You feel like a sack of sash weights!" shouted Rob, "keep still now, and we'll have you out in a jiffy."

A few minutes later Tubby's fat face, very red, appeared above the edge of the rift over which he had taken his abrupt plunge. Rob seized him by the shoulders and dragged him into safety.

"There now, for goodness sake don't fall in again," he said.

"As if you aren't always telling me to fall in," scoffed Tubby.

"When, pray?"

"Every time we drill," said the stout youth solemnly, flicking some dust off his uniform with elaborate care.

Owing to the length of time occupied by extricating Tubby from his difficulties, the canoe bearers had become apprehensive of harm to the following body and had halted. Of course questions ensued when the rear guard came up.

"What happened?" demanded the major, noting the suppressed amus.e.m.e.nt on the lads' faces.

"Oh, Tubby fell in again," answered Merritt.

"Fell in?" asked the professor in an astonished tone.

"I went hunting for botanical specimens at the bottom of a ravine, professor," said Tubby gravely.

"For botanical specimens? Most interesting. Pray did you find any?"

"Nothing but a b.u.mpibus Immenseibus," replied Tubby with perfect gravity.

The other boys had to turn aside and stuff their fists in their mouths to keep from laughing outright.

Even the major's lip quivered. But the professor displayed immense interest. As for Jumbo, he was lost in admiration.

"Dat suttinly am de mos' persuasive word I've done hearn in a long time,"

he exclaimed. "Blumpibusibus Commenceibus. What am dat, fish, flesh or des corned beef?"

"It's a pain," rejoined Tubby, "and usually follows a fall. But not a fall in temperature, or----"

"Ah, Hopkins, I fear you are making merry at my expense," exclaimed the professor, good-naturedly.

"Well, I took a tumble, anyhow," said Tubby.

"About time you did," came in Merritt's voice.

In the chase that ensued a wave of merriment burst loose. But time pressed, and the march was speedily resumed, with but a short interruption for lunch.

Late that afternoon they emerged on the sh.o.r.es of the other lake. It was a beautiful sheet of water, narrow and hemmed in by high hills which shot up abruptly on every side. At the far end could be seen a series of three peaks, jagged and sharp against the sky. The major turned to the professor, and both consulted the map and the translation of the cipher.

"When the ruby mound masks the Three Brothers take a course by the great dead pine. Four hundred to the west, three hundred to the north, and below the man of stone."

Such were the words which the major read aloud from the professor's translation.

"How do you interpret that, professor?" he asked.

"Why, plainly enough: the three brothers referred to are those three similar peaks," said the professor; "the map indicates them. The ruby mound is not quite so clear. But I don't doubt that we shall stumble across its meaning, and also that of 'the man of stone,' which, I confess, I cannot make out."

"May be it's some ma.s.s of rock that looks like a man," volunteered Rob, who, like the others, had listened with eager attention while the major read.

"An excellent idea, my boy. That is possibly the correct meaning, although the old buccaneer may have spoken in riddles. Such men frequently did. However, we are at the gateway of our venture. To-morrow we shall know if it meets with success or failure."

"To-morrow!" echoed the Boy Scouts.

"Ef ah could cotch dat five-hundred-dollah-pusson to-morrow dat would be all de treasure ah'd want," mumbled Jumbo as he set down his canoe. He had kept it on his back up to now, like a sh.e.l.l on a black turtle.

"Ah don' lak dis business ob interfussin' wid a dead man's belongin's. No good ain't gwine ter come uv it."

"What are you mumbling about, Jumbo?" asked the major, overhearing some of this last.

"Why, majah, I was jes' a communicatin' to myself mah pussonal convictions on de subjec' ob dead men's gold."

"Why, Jumbo, are you superst.i.tious?" inquired the professor.

"No, sah. Ah's bin vaccinated an' am glad to say it _took_. We ain't neber had no supposishishness in our fam'bly. But dis yar meddlin' an monkeyin' wid what belongs to dem as is daid and buried is bad bis'nis, sah--bad bis'nis."

"I thought that you had more courage than that," said the professor seriously.

"Ah got lots ob dat commodity, too, sah. Ah da.s.say dat ah is de bravest man in de--Oh! fo' de law's sake, wha' dat? Oh, golly umptions! Majah!

You Boy Scrouts, help!"

Jumbo suddenly cast himself down on the ground and began rolling over and over, trying to seize the major's feet in his paroxysm of real alarm.

"Get up!" ordered the major curtly, "get up at once, you cowardly creature. What's the matter?"

"Oh, mah goodness, majah, you didn't see it. You had yo' back to der bushes. So did de odders. But ah seed it."

"Saw what, sir?"

"Oh, golly gumptions! De ugliest lilly face wid black whiskers an' eyes dat I ebber seed. It was lookin' frough de bushes an' listening to you alls."

"Where? Show me the place at once."