"I'll sweep around in a circle and make for that road leading to
Cedarville," he concluded, and trudged on rapidly, for the woods
were dark and lonely and not particularly to his liking.
Tom had covered the best part of half a mile: when he saw a light
ahead. At first he thought it must shine from the window of some
farmhouse, but soon made it out to be from a campfire, situated in
something of a hollow and not far from a spring.
"Hullo! Tramps or charcoal burners," he thought. "I wonder if
they would be friendly?"
He slackened his pace and approached cautiously until within ten
yards of where two men sat in earnest conversation. One man was
tall and thin and had a scar on his chin. The other fellow was
the thief who had robbed Dick of his watch.
At first Tom was not inclined to believe the evidence of his
eyesight.
"Perhaps I'm mistaken," he mused.
He resolved to draw nearer and hear if possible what the two men
were saying.
A clump of bushes grew close to the spring before mentioned, and
he crawled up behind this, thus getting within fifteen feet of the
campfire.
"You are certain you saw the boys, Buddy?" he heard the tall man
with the scar say.
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