Show jj adventurers CLUB CLU HEADLINES S FROM THE I 1 LIVES OF PEOPLE LIKE YOURSELF forest death trap OU know when you go hunting you more or less expect yi to meet up with adventures of a certain sort you might reasonably expect to be treed by a bear or hopped on by a wildcat or maybe bogged down in a mess of quicksand or socked on the coco by a falling tree you might expect almost anything BUT the sort of mystifying experience that fell to the lot of georgia george S of brooklyn N Y on a hunting trip near kingston N Y in the middle of january 1929 the best adventures are like that it what you eap exp expect act but what you DONT eap exp expect act that gives you the big thrill you remember all down through the years george and his friend martin ross went hunting they might have expected to run across bears wildcats quicksand or falling trees but heres what actually did happen they started out from the little village of accord N Y started out into the woods and along about evening after trying for two or three hours to find their way back baal c decided that they must be lost som something ething else a hunter might easily expect and certainly it did happen but they dont count that as an adventure it was only the beginning of 0 a train of circumstances that led to a strange terrifying night when everything was against them and nothing seemed to make sense night had c come me on and still they were walking in birc circles les trying to find their way out odthe of the woods they were looking tor for a place to sleep when martin ross saw a light in the distance H hunters discover house it seemed to be a flare bare of some gome sort the two men started walking toward it the flare bare died out before they had gone two steps but moving in its direction they came to an old i frame house standing in the middle of a clearing there was no light in the house but they approached and knocked on the tha doors door there was no answer but george tried the latch and the door opened they went inside into a big empty room there was a fl fireplace replace in the comer and some wood beside it they started to build a fire but they never got it lighted from that moment on z o 0 terrified now the two lads picked up their rifles and began beg an shooting at the door events crowded on the heels of events so rapidly that they had no time to think of anything else first came a crash outside it sounded near the door george and martin ran to it and found it locked someone had fastened it from the out outside sidel then it was they noticed that the big hi dim room had no windows do ws what kind of a house was that they noticed too that the he door was a heavy one made of solid oak two or three times as thick and strong as any mere dwelling door had any business to be there was something mighty strange about that wl aln dowless dwelling A disquieting fear crept into the hearts of both of them what sort of place had bad they stumbled into peculiar odor permeates the building shouting brought them no answer then they began to hear v voices 0 ices outside whoever it was out there was ignoring their cries they h heard eard sounds of a heavy object being drawn somewhere A peculiar odor faint at first began to permeate the whole building the two lads ladi lay down in a corner but not to sleep they lay huddled together trapped like rats wondering what their mysterious captors would finally do with them they lay there silent while the hours went by then suddenly they were aroused by the sound of an explosion and the thud thud of running feet the smell of sm smoke 0 ke began to fill the room ro omand and in another few minutes the room was thick with the smoke itself black acrid choking it billowed up from somewhere below them filled their lungs and set them to coughing terrified now the two lads picked up their rifles and began shooting at the door but the door was too thick to yield eld even to rifle bullets and it if the men outside heard the shots they gave no sign of it the room was getting hot now they could hear flames crackling beneath them the smoke was so thick that they could hardly breathe they were vere running around in panic aimlessly dashing from one side of that strange room to another flame was creeping through the cracks in the floorboards licking the sides of the wall with its myriad red tongues time was passing but they conscious of it all ali they knew was the terrible fear of being burned alive in the mysterious trap they had fallen into seek a place to escape intense heat then they were beginning to drop from exhaustion and lack of air first george then martin they were on their knees groping for a spot where the intense heat beat would not sear their skin when they heard a hammering on the door they were too weak then to care much what was happening through a daze they watched the door splinter and fall fail to pieces they saw raw it broken down bell felt a merciful breath of fresh air roll in through the smoke saw dim foggy figures come dashing in through the doorway then hands were lifting them dragging them out into the gray dawn of a january morning and george saw that he was in the arms of a state trooper and being lifted into the front a squad car in another moment martin was in the car with him and they were rolling along a backwoods road toward kingston still wondering at the meaning of the ordeal they had been put through the whole answer come until other troopers brought in two men they had captured in the neighborhood of the house of mystery the truth was that martin and george had stumbled on a backwoods moonshine plant the moon shiners taking them tor for revenue agents had locked them in III and left them to die when a few hours later their still exploded and set the house bouse afire but someone who saw the blaze phoned the troopers otherwise two lads who had gone a hunting might have ended their day of sport in a night of tragedy released by western newspaper union |