"That was no crow cawing, boys, believe me!" ejaculated K.K.

"Crow! Well, I should say not!" added Horatio instantly. "If you asked
me right to my face I'd mention a donkey braying. Gee! but it was
fierce!"

"But what would a donkey be doing away up here at the old quarry,
where there hasn't been a stroke of work done these many years; tell
me that?" demanded Julius defiantly.

"I don't believe it was a donkey," said Hugh, shaking his head, as
though he, too, found himself exceedingly puzzled; "but I'm not in a
position to explain the thing. That was certainly a queer noise, for
a fact."

"Extraordinary!" assented Thad Stevens.

"Well, I should call it perfectly awful!" Horatio clipped in.

"Horrible would be a better word to describe it," eagerly followed
Julius, who, it must be confessed, was trembling all over; of course,
not with fear, or anything like that, but just because of excitement,
he assured himself.

"And," continued the sensible Hugh, "if that's the sort of noises
these farmer folks have been bearing right along, I don't wonder some
of them have been nearly scared out of their wits. It was bad enough
in broad daylight, with the sun shining; so what must it have seemed