These words were uttered in a tone of command, and Bob thought it best to obey.  He snatched up the bags, and with Lester by his side made his way down the lane with all possible haste.  When they were safe in the road, Bob drew a long breath and remarked: 

“That’s the end of that scrape.”

“I don’t see it,” returned Lester.  “It is only the beginning of it.  Everybody in the settlement will know it before night.”

“Who cares if they do?” cried Bob, who began to feel like himself, now that he was on solid ground once more.  “They can’t prove that we went there to steal the quails, and we’ll not confess it.”

“No, sir,” replied Lester, emphatically.  “You’re a sharp one, Bob, to make up such a plausible story on the spur of the moment, but I know the General did not believe a word of it.”

“So do I, but what’s the odds?  Let’s see him prove that I didn’t tell him the truth.  Now the next thing is something else; we must make up a story to tell my folks when we get home.”

“Can’t we run back to the house and go to bed before any of the family are up?”

“I am afraid to try it.  A better plan would be to go back in the woods and build a fire and get warm.  Then we’ll go home, and if anybody asks us where we have been, we’ll say we couldn’t sleep, and so we got up and went ’coon-hunting.”

“I wish we had one or two ’coons to back up the story,” said Lester.

“O, that wouldn’t help us any.  People often go hunting and return empty-handed, you know.”

Leaving Bob and his friend to get out of their difficulties as best they can, we will go back to Godfrey’s cabin and see what the two boys who live there are doing.  The day of rest, which Don said would work such wonders in David, did not seem to be of much benefit to him after all.  He had been somewhat encouraged by Bert’s cheering words and the knowledge that influential friends were working for him, and, like Bob Owens, he had indulged in some rosy dreams of the future; but that short interview with the young horsemen who met him in the road below the General’s house, reminded him that he had active enemies, who would not hesitate to injure him by every means in their power.  He thought about his father all day, and wondered if there was anything he could do that would bring him back home where he belonged, and make a respectable man of him.  He had ample leisure to turn this problem over in his mind, for he was alone the most of the day.  As soon as he reached the cabin, Dan, who acted as if he did not want to be in his brother’s company, shouldered his rifle and went off by himself; and it was while he was roaming through the woods that he made a discovery which did much to bring about some of the events we have already described.