“No,” admitted Jack; “but I have given the officer the tip, and told him about the shack in the woods where Pepper saw Rae.  They are going to make a raid on it tomorrow, and perhaps they will find some of the stolen property in their possession; then we have the impression of a hand on this paper, and we can get one of Monkey’s hands and see if they aren’t the same.”

“Faith, hunting is wan thing and finding’s anither,” commented Gerald.

Which proved to be quite true in this case, for when the officers reached the cabin in the woods they found it deserted and dismantled.  The occupants had evidently taken alarm and disappeared, leaving no trace, although the boys were destined to meet them again under decidedly unpleasant circumstances.

CHAPTER XXII

THE RACE

The race had been set for 9 o’clock in the morning, but, with the sun, there had come up a strong breeze from the west that had stirred up the water into such a lumpy condition that any kind of time would be impossible, and the advantage would be all on the side of the Altons.  So the race was put off from time to time in the hope that the wind would die down so as to equalize the chances, and it was not until late in the afternoon that the committee decided to have it rowed, although the wind was still blowing and the water rough.

The course, as agreed upon, was a straight-away three miles over a clear stretch of the river from off the Creston landing.

“What have you got there?” asked Dick, as Rand pulled a coin from his pocket and began rubbing it up on his sleeve.

“That’s his mascot,” laughed Jack.  “It’s the coin he found in the road, and he keeps it for luck.”

“Well, I guess it has its work cut out for it, all right,” went on Dick.  “He will have his hands full—­if it is a he—­to keep us in the procession.  Alton has a crew of blacksmiths.”

“So much the more weight to carry,” replied Rand, who made the best of everything.

“Not much chance for us,” put in Jack.

“Oh, I don’t know,” returned Rand.

“‘Stranger things than that have happened,’ as the old woman said when she kissed her cow.”

“You mean as the man said when he married his cook,” corrected Donald.

“Well, there wasn’t anything strange about that,” returned Rand, “if she was a good cook.”

“Or if her cooking was good,” added Jack.

“Are you ready, all?” now called the starter, and each one of the different crews grasped his oar with quickened tension as the coxswains responded:  “Ready!” and there followed the sharp report of the pistol.

As the report rang out the oars of the three crews, all like a piece of accurate machinery, struck the water at the same instant and the boats leaped forward as if shot from a spring.

At the start the weight of the Alton crew told, and their boat darted to the front, only to be hugged a moment later by Highpoint, while the Uncas trailed just behind them.