"But maybe we'll find out
to-night."
"We ought to have something to hit him with, if we see a rat,"
suggested Harry.
"That's right," Bert agreed. "I'll take the stove poker, and you can
have the fire shovel. Now keep very still."
The two cousins took their places, Bert in the dining-room, and Harry
in the kitchen. It was very still and quiet on the Bluebird. Up on
deck Snap, the dog, could be heard moving about now and then, for he
slept up there.
Bert, who had sat down in a dining-room chair, began to feel sleepy.
He tried to keep open his eyes, but it was hard work. Suddenly he
dozed off, and he was just on the point of falling asleep, when he
heard a noise. It was a squeaking sound, as though a door had been
opened.
"Or," thought Bert, "it might be the squeak of a mouse. I wonder if
Harry heard it?"
He wanted to call out, in a whisper, and ask his cousin in the dining-
room, just beyond the passage. Bert could not see Harry. But Bert
thought if he called, even in a whisper, he might scare the rat, or
whoever, or whatever, it was, that had caused the mystery.
So Bert kept quiet and watched. The squeaking noise of the loose
boards in the floor went on, and then Bert heard a sound, as though
soft footsteps were coming toward him. He wanted to jump up and yell,
but he kept still.
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