A single lantern, its wick turned low, hung from one of the posts.  Prescott did not trust himself to lie down, for his eyes, despite his efforts to keep awake, were heavy, and he did not want to sleep for some time yet.

Within ten minutes Darrin alone had his eyes open, and even he was making a valiant struggle against sleep.  At last, however, he yielded, and soon settled into sound slumber.

“They’re off in another world,” smiled Dick, as he listened to the deep breathing of his chums; then he slipped away from his cot.

From under a box in one corner of the tent he took out a large cup of coffee that he had hidden some time earlier.  It was still warm and he drank it with relish, though his main purpose in using the beverage was to make sure of keeping himself awake.

His next move was to extinguish the lantern.  Now he made his way to the bucket of water and basin.  Dashing the cold water into his face, and wetting his eyes well with it, Prescott took a few deep breaths.  He now felt equal to keeping awake for some time.

Outside, by this time, all was darkness, save where a few embers of the recent camp fire glowed dully.

Dick threw himself down, resting his head on his elbows, in the doorway of the tent.

“Now, don’t you dare go to sleep!” he ordered himself, repeating the command frequently as a means of aiding himself to keep his eyelids from closing.

“You keep awake!” he half snorted, as he felt drowsiness getting nearer.  He pinched himself, inflicting more than a little pain.

At last, however, the young leader of Dick & Co. found that his drowsiness had passed for the time being, like the sentinel in war time.

“Now, I think I can keep awake until daylight, if I have to,” muttered young Prescott to himself.  “At daylight it won’t be so very mean to wake one of the other fellows and let him take my place.”

Yet, after an hour had passed, Dick was almost doomed to discover that nature had some rights and knew how to assert them.

His eyes had just closed when he awoke with a start.

Someone was treading lightly past the wall of the tent, coming toward the door.  Dick had barely time to glide back behind the flap of the tent when the unknown someone stopped at the doorway.

It was too dark to make out anything distinctly under the canvas, but the stranger listened to the combined snorings of five of the six boys, then chuckled softly.

“Oh!  Funny, is it, to think that we’re all asleep, and that you may help yourself at will to the food that cost us so much money!” thought Dick wrathfully.  The stranger hearing no sound from the apparently sleeping camp soon passed on in the direction of the fire.

Here much of the provisions had been stacked in the packing case cupboards, for the reason that to store food in the tent would seriously curtail the space that the boys wanted for comfort.