STACY GETS INTO HOT WATER

Tom was followed by the entire Overland party, Lieutenant Wingate sprinting along beside him. As they neared the spot where Stacy had last been seen, frightful howls were heard above the hiss of steam from numerous small geysers close at hand.

“Where is he? Oh, where is he?” cried Nora.

“He has fallen in, of course,” answered Emma.

“Of course he has. Stacy! Oh, Stacy! Where are you?” shouted Hippy.

“He isn’t very badly off or he couldn’t make a noise like that,” averred Tom. “I reckon—” Tom suddenly felt the thin volcanic crust crumble beneath his own feet. He leaped back, but none too soon, for the crust on which he had been running but a moment before had caved in, leaving a narrow, dark opening. The others of the party stopped instantly, and stood gazing in awe at the dark opening.

Hippy ran around the hole, treading on tiptoes, and a few seconds later he was peering into another dark opening, about three feet in diameter, from which a faint cloud of vapor was rising.

“Chunky!” he shouted. “Are you down there?”

“Oh, wow!” wailed the fat boy. “Get me out. I’m boiled alive! Hurry! I’ll be dead in a minute more.”

“How far down are you?” cried Tom, running to the scene.

“A mile. Quick! I’m scalding. Can’t you get me out of this or must I die in this awful hole?”

Grace ran over and peered into the hole, and in the vapor could faintly make out the form of the fat boy.

“Quick, Tom, get him out!” she begged.

Hippy, however, had reached the scene first, fortunately finding firm footing at the edge of the hole.

“Hold up your hands so I can reach them, and stop that howling!” commanded Lieutenant Wingate severely.

“You’re pulling me in two,” wailed Stacy as Hippy got hold of his hands and began dragging the boy out.

“Please don’t pull him in two,” begged Emma. “One Stacy is enough. I am positive that we couldn’t stand two.”

“Emma!” rebuked Nora.

Stacy was hauled out protesting and groaning. Grace and Elfreda sprang forward and took him in charge.

“Where are you the most distressed?” questioned Miss Briggs.

“Feet. They’re scalded.”

“Your feet are a little red like your face, but they are not in the least scalded,” announced Elfreda after they had removed the boy’s shoes and stockings. “Stacy Brown, I believe you are what we, in the army, used to call a malingerer—one who feigns illness. The skin on your feet is not even broken.”

“Too bad,” murmured Emma.

“What’s too bad?” demanded Stacy.

“That you did not stay in until thoroughly done.”

“I—I don’t expect to get any sympathy,” complained Chunky, drawing on his stockings and shoes with many grunts and groans.

“Why, it isn’t even as severe as a Turkish bath,” declared Tom, who had been leaning over the opening into which Stacy had fallen.

“Come, little broiler. We are going back now. Perhaps you may have better luck next time and get done to a turn,” comforted Emma.

“It will require something hotter than Turkish bath temperature to do that,” declared Lieutenant Wingate.

Nora linked arms with Stacy and assisted him down the terraces to the ponies, Stacy limping all the way, which all knew was assumed for the sake of gaining sympathy from his companions, of which, however, the fat boy got little. A few moments later they were riding slowly down towards their camp at the base of the mountains. Reaching there, a brief explanation to Jim Badger brought a nod of understanding from the guide.

“They do fall in once in a while,” he observed dryly, which remark brought a laugh from the Overland Riders and a scowl from Stacy.

“This one always does,” answered Emma snappily.

The Overlanders, deciding that they had had their fill of exploration for that day, rested in camp, the girls doing some much-needed mending, and the men discussing Electric Peak, and the stories they had heard about that strange towering mountain. They learned from the guide that there was little information on the subject available, excepting that it was said that persons who had attempted to reach the peak had met with strange experiences.

“Are—are we going to try to make it?” questioned Nora apprehensively.

“Of course we are,” replied Grace.

“Stacy can’t go on account of his feet,” reminded Emma.

“You don’t think I’m going without them, do you?” retorted Stacy. “Those feet have been with me all my life, and I don’t propose to be separated from them now,” he added amid much merriment.

“Be quiet, little boy,” admonished Emma.

Electric Peak towered above them, white and ghostly in the moonlight that evening, and they pondered over the strange tales told of the mountain’s top. The ascent of that peak meant a difficult climb, but this did not disturb the Overlanders, who were accustomed to roughing it.

That evening, final plans for the ascent of Electric Peak were made, the guide furnishing them with such information as he possessed, regarding the best route to the top, though he admitted that his information was based wholly on hearsay.

It was decided that the party should take their ponies with them as far as possible, so that they might carry their belongings and establish a camp on the mountain-side. Full of their plans for the coming day, the party turned in early and slept soundly.

The campfire finally died down and the stillness of the night was broken only by the moaning of a faint breeze at intervals, the occasional hoof-thud of a restless pony or the wild cry of a night bird. Then suddenly a sharper note was injected into the peaceful night.

A rattling fire of revolver shots, followed by shouts from Stacy Brown, brought the Overland Riders bounding from their beds in alarm.

“My ‘pants’! My ‘pants’!” yelled the fat boy. “Somebody’s stolen my ‘pants’!”