"You'd better tell, Sammy," said Frank, at last, "you made the find, you know."
"What's this?" asked Mr. Jessup, in some surprise. "Have you boys a secret, too?" and he looked curiously at them, while Maybe frisked about, barking and unable to understand why his master would not take after a rabbit he had driven from its burrow.
"Yes, we did find something strange in the old house," said Sammy. "We discovered a secret room, and in it is an outfit of counterfeiters, Mr. Jessup!"
"And they shot at us!" cried Bob.
"And you ought to have seen the smoke!" added Frank.
The hunter looked from one to another of the boys, as if unable to understand what they were saying. He might have thought they were playing a joke on him, but their faces were too serious for that.
"Secret room!" he murmured. "Counterfeiters! They shot at you!"
"Yes, and we thought the hermit might be the counterfeiter, so we were following him to see if he went to the old house," said Bob.
"Whew! This is getting worse and worse!" exclaimed the hunter. "I guess you'd better begin at the beginning, boys, and tell me all there is to tell. Old Mr. Addison a counterfeiter! I can't believe it."
"This is the way it was," began Sammy, and then he told of the exploration of the old house, after the hunt of the day before, and how, most unexpectedly, he had pressed on the spring that opened the panel or door of the secret room.
"And you should see the things in it!" put in Bob, as by turns the boys described the queer instruments.
"And then that flash and boom!" cried Frank. "It was terrible!"
