The last thing that Frank Hardy knew for a while was that a large fist was about to make contact with his face. The next thing he knew was that he was lying on the front porch of an old wooden shack with a cold, damp rag on his head. As he opened his eyes, the first thing he saw were three blurry figures leaning over him. As he began to focus, he could make out the faces of Biff Hooper, Jerry Gilroy, and Chet Morton.

"What was that?" asked the disorientated lad.

"I believe it was a right-cross," replied Jerry.

"That’s not what I meant," huffed Frank. "Did Black Jack Pepper ambush me?"

Chet and Jerry turned and glanced at Biff, who had a look of embarrassment on his face.

"You’re close," replied Chet, with a twinkle in his eyes. "It wasn’t pepper. It was Hooper. Black Jack Hooper, the notorious amateur boxer!"

"Huh?" asked Frank. "What are you talking about?"

"I’m sorry, pal," Biff quickly apologized to his friend as he helped him to his feet. "I didn’t realize it was you until it was too late."

Frank rubbed his aching jaw as he replied, "You sure pack a wallop in those fists of yours!" He then half smiled. "If that’s the way you treat a guest when they come for a visit, I don’t think I’ll ever pay a call on you again!"

After the boys had a good laugh, they decided to have a look around the cabin.

"I don’t think those men are coming back, " remarked Jerry, as they broadened their search to the surrounding woods.

"I’ve found their trail!" Biff called out to the others. Racing over to where the muscular lad stood, they spotted a fresh trail heading towards the base of the mountain about three hundred yards away. It appeared to head straight up and over the rockiest part of the mountain.

"No wonder they left Chet’s horse," remarked Frank. "We’ll never be able to track them over that!"

"What do we do now?" asked Chet, as he patted his stomach, which had already started to make noises. "You know, Black Pepper and his men made off with all of our supplies," he complained.

"They only left one canteen of water," added Jerry. "And we used that for your head."

Chet grinned as he reached into his hip pocket, "They didn’t take my science book."

"That’s great, we can eat that!" replied Jerry, sarcastically.

"I guess we could hike back to camp and catch some trout for our dinner tonight," suggested Biff, as he plopped down on a nearby rock.

"That will take us forever," argued the plump lad. "And I’m hungry now."

"It’ll do you good, Chet," laughed Jerry. "Just think of all the exercise you’ve gotten on this trip. You might even drop a couple of pounds."

"A couple of pounds?" huffed Chet. "Considering all of the situations I’ve been through because of Frank and Joe Hardy, it’s a wonder I’m not skin and bones!"

"By the way, where is Joe, Frank?" asked Biff, as he suddenly noticed the absence of the youngest Hardy boy.

"I’ll tell you where he is while we give that cabin one last look. Those crooks might have left some valuable clue lying around that we overlooked." The dark haired youth then reached up and slapped Chet on the back. "Come on, Skinny!" he laughed. "That is, if you think you’ve got enough strength to make it inside."

"Cut it out!" grinned Chet. "Or I’ll sit on you!"

Immediately Frank silenced himself. He figured after a threat like that, only a fool would keep on talking.

As the boys once again looked over the sparsely furnished cabin over from one end to the other, Frank began to explain to them where his brother had gone.

"For a while there it looked as though we would never get Aunt Gertrude to go for the idea of leaving me out there," he paused to once again rub on his aching jaw. "She predicted this. She said I would get knocked out, but I never thought it would have been by you!" He glanced at Biff.

Before the other youth could respond, Jerry Gilroy shouted, "I’ve found something!"

He held up a small piece of paper that he had found in the trashcan. It looked as though somebody had intentionally tried to burn it, because the edges were charred black. Also, it looked as though it had come from a much larger piece of paper, but there was only a small part of it left now. There were only a few handwritten words that were distinguishable on the spoiled paper.

"the thirty year porch"

"What could it mean?" asked Jerry.

"Hey, I know! This cabin has a front porch," Biff spoke up. "Maybe it could be talking about that."

"Yeah, maybe something’s hidden out there!" added Jerry.

Without saying another word, all four boys raced outside the cabin. Could something of great value be hidden somewhere on the old rotted porch? Could the scribbled writing be referring to something else? Or could it just not mean anything at all?

They examined the old structure from top to bottom, but they couldn’t find anything at all. Biff was the one that crawled underneath and looked around, but the only things that he could find was three large spiders. He wisely chose to stay clear of them, though.

"I don’t think it’s referring to this porch," remarked Frank. "This porch looks like it’s over a hundred years old."

"You’re right," Biff spoke up. "Those words probably don’t even mean anything at all."

"They must mean something," argued Jerry. "They wouldn’t have tried to destroy it if it was nothing, right, Frank?"

"I’m sure it means something," he replied glancing at the sky. "But we’ll have to puzzle over it later, because by the time we make it back to camp, it will be well after dark. Besides, Joe will be looking for us and he’ll never be able to find his way across that trail in the dark."

The boys all agreed and immediately started in the direction of camp. They each took turns riding Chet’s horse. The plump lad however took the most turns. The young sleuths had only been on the trail for about fifteen minutes when a most distressing noise was heard coming from behind them. It sounded like a wounded animal.

"The poor creature!" shuddered Jerry. "What is that?"

Biff replied by nudging his head towards the plump lad in the saddle.

"Home, home on the range!" The noise they heard was coming from Chet Morton. He was singing…or at least attempting to. "Where the deer and the antelope…" He paused to glance around him. All the others had stopped walking and were staring at him with broad grins on their faces.

"What is it?" he asked, slightly embarrassed.

"Nothing," replied Frank. "It’s just that we thought you might want to hold it down a bit before you have every wild animal in these woods on us, thinking we’re a wounded elk."

Everyone, including Chet Morton, howled with laughter. "All right, I can take a hint."

The boys trudged on over steep hills and deep valleys, only stopping twice to rest. After three hours of the roughest terrain that they had ever seen, they finally managed to catch sight of their camp. It was a good thing too, because the sun was just beginning to set over the horizon.

"We’ve made it just in time," Frank breathed heavily as the others stopped by the stream. Since it was hot summer time, they decided to have a quick swim in order to cool themselves off. Some time later, Chet Morton was the first to get out of the water. He found his fishing pole where he had left it and walked down stream. He had decided to catch some trout for dinner.

About an hour after this, the others had also decided that they had had enough swimming. Frank waked over to his saddlebag where he had thrown it over a log by the tent, before he had started searching for the others. He reached inside and produced the flare gun from earlier. "Its good thing that Aunt Gertrude will never know that I forgot to take this with me," he thought to himself. Raising it above his head, he fired a shot into the night air. Immediately, a brilliant flash of red light illuminated the night sky.

"Hey Frank, have you seen my shoes? I took them off before we… what are you doing?" asked Biff, as he and Jerry came rushing up.

Frank explained that he was sending up a signal for Joe to see, so that if he was nearby he could find his way to them. "I just hope it doesn’t signal to anyone else that we’re here," he remarked. "We don’t want just everyone knowing where we’re at. If Pepper or any of his men…"

Frank was suddenly interrupted by the shouts of Chet Morton who was screaming for help. Without speaking a word to each other, the boys leaped to their feet and ran off in the direction they had last seen Chet go.

Bursting through the woods, they came upon the sight of the plump youth entangled in a desperate fight with his fishing pole. "Help me reel this in," he pleaded. "It feels like a whale!"

Jerry grabbed up the net that was lying beside him and waded out into the water. Within moments, he had scooped up the object on the other end of Chet’s fishing line. He then turned and waded back to shore.

"Here’s your whale!" he laughed, as held up a pair of gym shoes that had their laces tied together. "Would you like me to take your picture with this prize catch?" he teased.

"Aw, cut it out!" Chet grinned as he grabbed up the shoes and started to throw them back into the water.

Before he could do this, Biff grabbed his arm. "Wait a minute!" he ordered as he took the catch from Chet’s grasp. "These are my shoes!" he stated in disbelief. "I don’t know how they got down here. I left them sitting on the bank up stream from here!"

"They must have fallen in," surmised Frank. "Then the current swept them here."

"Chet," Jerry suddenly stopped laughing and took on a serous tone, "where’s the other fish that you caught?"

"That was it," Chet pointed towards Biff. "But I don’t think they’ll make much of a meal."

"You mean to say that’s all you’ve caught?" Jerry uttered in total disbelief.

Chet shrugged his shoulders and replied, "They just weren’t biting tonight!"

"It’s all right," Frank spoke up. "We’ll just have to wait about eating until we hike into town tomorrow."

"You mean we’re going to have to go all night without food?" groaned Chet.

"Don’t worry," replied Jerry, with a mock tone of sincerity. "Just hang in there, we’ll help you get through this whole ordeal together." Then he burst out laughing.

Just as the boys had started back to camp, the entire area was suddenly illuminated by two bright lights. The sound of a loud engine could be heard coming towards them at an accelerated speed. As it came nearer, the boys could make out the distinct image of an old army jeep that was heading straight at them!