Having fully determined to get rid of his tremendous secret at once and forever, Dan went deeply into all the details, and did not omit a single thing that had the least bearing upon his story.

He could not give a very connected account of the finding of the letter, for that was a matter that Silas had touched upon very lightly. The letter was found in the wood-pile, because his father said so, and that was all that Dan knew about it.

He had read the document very carefully after it came into his possession, and some portions of it were so firmly fixed in his memory that he repeated them word for word.

Then the muscles around the corners of Joe's mouth began to twitch, and when Dan told, in a frightened whisper, how the man who pushed his "partner" into the gorge had been obliged to jump into the lake in order to free himself from the presence of the "hant," which followed him day and night—when Joe heard about that, he couldn't stand it any longer. He threw himself flat upon the ground, and laughed so loudly that he awoke the echoes far and near.

Dan, who had not looked for anything like this, was not only overwhelmed with astonishment, but he was fighting mad in an instant.

"Whoop!" he yelled, jumping up and knocking his heels together. "Hold me on the ground, somebody, or I'll larrup this Joe of our'n till I put a little more sense into him nor he's got now. What you laughing at, you big fool?"

"Sit down and behave yourself," replied Joe, who was not at all alarmed by these hostile demonstrations. "Let me ask you a few questions, and then we'll find out who is the biggest fool, you or I."

"No, I won't," said Dan, shortly, "'cause why I know that already."

"All right," replied Joe; "then I'll get the watch and go back to my work."

"But you haven't heared all of my story yet," exclaimed Dan. "Wait till I tell you, and I'll bet that you won't never go back there no more."

"There are a few things about the story that I don't quite understand," began Joe.

"No more do I," interrupted Dan.

"But if you will answer a question or two I have in mind, I think we can get at the bottom of the matter."

"You needn't ask 'em, cause you'll laugh at me again."

"No, I won't," protested Joe; and he kept his promise, although he sometimes found it hard to do so. "The first question is this: Did the letter that father took from his wood-pile look faded and soiled, as if it had been rained and snowed on?"

"Not a bit of it, that I could see. It was as spick and span as you please."

"That's one point gained," said Joe. "Did the writer say anything about cutting a hole through the ice, so that he could jump into the lake to get away from the 'hant'?"

"Nary word."

"Did you find the rope that led down to the cave, when you went up there this morning?"

"We didn't look for it. We went up the beach till we struck the brook that comes out of the gulf, and we follered that till—till—"

"You found the cave?" suggested Joe.

"Till we come purty nigh to where the cave is," corrected Dan. "We didn't see the cave, 'cause we run against something that wouldn't let us go no furder."

"What was it?"

"The hant I was telling you about."

"What did it look like? Now go on with your story, and I won't say a word till you get through. What did you see up there in the gulf that frightened you so badly?"

These words drove away Dan's anger, and called up all his old fears again; but he sat down and resumed his narrative.

It related to a few things which the reader ought to know in order to understand what happened afterward; but Dan told it in such a rambling way, and made so many impossible statements, which he insisted should be received as absolute facts, that Joe found it hard to follow him, and we will not attempt it.

His narrative, stripped of all the monstrous exaggerations that his excitement and terror led him to put into it, ran about in this way:

When Silas and Dan shouldered their guns that morning and set out to find the robbers' cave, and the treasure that they firmly believed was concealed in it, they told each other that no matter what happened they would not come back until they had accomplished their object. The former, as we know, was not as eager to brave the terrors of the gorge as he pretended to be, but Dan was thoroughly in earnest, and he built so many gorgeous air-castles, and talked in such glowing language about the fine things they could have for their own as soon as the money was found, that finally Silas became worked up to the highest pitch of excitement and impatience, and showed it by striding ahead at such a rate that Dan had to exert himself to keep pace with him.

"You needn't be in such a hurry, pap," said Dan, when he found that he was growing short of breath. "It'll keep till we get there, 'cause there ain't nobody else that knows about it, seeing that you got the first grab at the letter."

"I know it," was the ferryman's reply, "but I'm powerful oneasy to get a hold of that grip-sack that's got the false bottom into it. We don't care if they do put a bridge down there to our house and bust up the ferrying business, do we, Dannie? And anybody that wants that old scow for their own can have it, can't they?"

"I don't care what becomes of it, or where it goes to," said Dan, spitefully. "It ain't a going to bring me no more backaches, I bet you."

"Course not," assented Silas. "You'll be a gentleman directly, and then you can buy a nice boat, if you want it."

"I don't care so much for boats as I do for breech-loading bird-guns and j'inted fish-poles," observed Dan. "Them's the things that make a feller look nobby when summer comes. Say, pap, what be we follering the beach for? The rope that leads to the cave is way up there in the hills."

"Look a-here, Dannie," said Silas, stopping short, and bestowing a very knowing wink upon the boy at his side. "We ain't nobody's fools, if we be poor and ragged. As I told you yesterday, we don't want to slide down that there rope, 'cause why, it'll dump us right down in front of that hant, and he'll bounce us before we can get our guns ready. See the p'int? If we go up the gorge, easy like, and keep our eyes open all the time, we shall see him as soon as he sees us. Understand? But I don't reckon he's up here. I'm a thinking that he's down the road somewhere, watching for the feller that finds that letter."

"I hope he is," said Dan, "for then we won't have no trouble in getting hold of the money. Looks powerful dark and lonesome in there; it does for a fact."

They had now reached the brook, and were standing in full view of the mouth of the gorge. It did, indeed, look dark and lonely in there; so much so, in fact, that if Dan had shown the least sign of fear, Silas would have faced about at once, and made the best of his way back to the cabin, leaving the treasure to stay where it was until the mildew and rust had eaten it up.

"Them thick bushes shuts out all the light of the sun, don't they?" said Silas. "And it's so ridiculous crooked, that we might run right on to the hant in going around some sharp bend, and never see him till we was clost to him. The brook is plumb full of rocks and such, and the cave must be as much as five miles away, I reckon—mebbe more. It'll be hard work to go up there after that money."

"But it would be harder to get it by chopping wood for it," said Dan; "so here goes, hant or no hant."

"You're the most amazing gritty feller I ever seen," declared Silas, who was really astonished at the boy's hardihood. "You go on ahead, for you ain't as old as I be, and your eyes are sharper, and I'll stick clost to your heels."

For a wonder, Dan did not object to this arrangement.

"I know well enough that pap's afeard," said he to himself; "but that don't scare me none. If we have to run to save ourselves from the grip of that hant, the hindermost feller is the one who will be in the place of danger, and that'll be pap. With two or three jumps I can put myself so far ahead of him, that he won't never see me again till I get ready to stop and wait for him to come up."

With these thoughts to comfort and encourage him, Dan did not hesitate to lead the way into the gulf.

The traveling was bad enough at the start, and the farther they went into the gorge, the worse it became.

A dozen times or more, in going the first quarter of a mile, were they obliged to climb over or crawl under immense logs which had fallen into the stream from the bluffs above; and when these obstructions had been left behind, foaming cascades, some of them forty feet in height, and which they surmounted by scaling the steep face of the cliffs, took their places.

It was a bad location for a surprise and a retreat, in which the hant would have every advantage of them. Beyond a doubt, he could skip from one boulder to another, and plunge headlong over all the falls that came in his way with perfect immunity. But how would it be with them? Dan asked himself.

It was a wonder that he did not get disheartened, and declare that he would not go any farther.

Silas hoped he would, for he was growing weary, and, in spite of all he could do to prevent it, the disagreeable thought would now and then force itself upon him, that perhaps there wasn't any money up there, after all, and that they were destined to return as empty-handed as they came.

Dan also had some misgivings, but he would not allow them a place in his mind. The belief that there was a fortune of six thousand dollars almost within his grasp, had taken full possession of him; and even if he had not been sure of it, his pride would not permit him to say the first discouraging word.

He was determined that it should come from his father, so that if their expedition failed he could blame him for it. He pressed steadily and patiently onward, without saying a word, and his father followed silently at his heels.

They were now between four and five miles from the lake, and the cliffs on each side were so high, and the bushes and trees that covered them from base to summit were so thick, that twilight always reigned at the bottom of the gorge, let the sun shine never so brightly.

On a cloudy day it must have been as dark as a pocket down there. Silas couldn't think of anything that would have induced him to stay alone in that gloomy place for five minutes.

"Say, pap," whispered Dan, so suddenly, that his father started and almost dropped his gun, "how long before we'll be abreast of that wood-pile of our'n?"

Silas raised his head long enough to look about him and take a glance at the cliffs above, and then the blood all fled from his face, leaving it as pale as death itself.

"Laws a massy, Danny," he managed to articulate, "we're abreast of it now."

There was something so unnatural in the tones of his father's voice, and in the face he turned on him, that Dan felt the cold chills creeping over him, and it was all he could do to refrain from crying out with terror.