Frank was looking around him.  He noticed several little things just then.  Among others was the fact that there were scratches on the bark of the big old oak, as though some one might have scrambled up its trunk recently.  An air-plant lay on the ground, evidently detached during the progress of that party.

“I’m beginning to smell a rat,” Frank said, slowly.

“Then let me in, please.  I’m just devoured with curiosity to know what it all means,” pleaded his chum.

“Listen!  Don’t you hear a strange buzzing up there?” demanded Frank.

“Now that you mention it, I believe I do.  Sounds to me like a hive of bees.”

“That’s just what it is, and Jerry knew it as soon as he heard it.  A hive of bees in this old live-oak, with perhaps a big store of honey laid up.  Bluff, doesn’t that tickle your palate?  Well, it did Jerry’s, for sure.  He climbed up!”

“After he had shot that deer, then?” asked Bluff.

“Undoubtedly.  I remember, now, that honey always appealed to Jerry more than any other sweet stuff.  He was remarking, only the last time we had flapjacks, that it was a beastly blunder we had none of us thought to bring a bottle of honey along.”

“But he isn’t up there, now, for I can see the whole tree.  Still he keeps on chuckling.  I can’t make it out, Frank.  But you know, for I see it in your face!  Where is Jerry?”

Frank deliberately rapped on the trunk of the big oak.

“Hello, Jerry!  Anybody at home in there?” he called.

“Only a stranger and a pilgrim, who wants to get out the worst way, and can’t,” came in a muffled voice.

Bluff gave a roar of amazement.

“Why, he’s inside the tree!” he ejaculated.

“Just what he is.  Stepped on some punky, rotten wood above there, that must have given way under his weight, and our fine chum shot down into the hollow trunk of the big king,” laughed Frank.

“Correct, Frank.  Just how it happened.  I’ve tried again and again to climb up to that hole where I came in, but the plagued walls are too slippery, and I fell back every time.  Please mount the tree, and lower a coat or something for me to get a grip on,” came in muffled tones to their ears.

Both Frank and Bluff rolled upon the ground with shrieks of laughter.  If the sounds of their merriment carried to the ears of Will, he must have been greatly mystified as to the cause of the same.

But Jerry was getting impatient.

“Hurry up, and get to work!  It ain’t over nice in here, I tell you,” he called; and so the two climbed up the tree to effect his rescue.

Bluff had a coat, so they lowered that by a sleeve, stretching down as far as possible.  Jerry managed to scramble up far enough to lay hold on the other sleeve, and was, after one or two efforts, assisted to the opening.  He came out looking a bit dilapidated, yet just as determined as ever to get some of that honey before leaving the vicinity.