THE CALAMITOUS CRIPPLES
Jack looked out of the window. Then he gurgled.
"By the Brass-eyed bull!" he exclaimed. "Look here, just cast your
optic in this direction, old fellow. That's all, old man--just a look!"
From the quadrangle below them came the blare of bugles, and the gaps
were filled up by a miscellaneous din emanating from tins, whistles,
combs and paper. Billy hurried over, and the two chums leaned from
their window in astonishment.
"A giddy procession," murmured Billy.
It was; but a procession of the kind rarely seen outside of a circus.
There were about forty boys in the show; and every one of them was
attired as a cripple of the most dilapidated kind. They all looked as
if they had been rolled upon by a steam-roller, and then passed through
a chaff-cutter. Bandages enwrapped their heads, and their arms and legs
appeared to be broken in numerous places. Many carried crutches, and an
odd effect was given by one humorist who elected to appear on stilts,
which were liberally bandaged. Two buglers headed the procession; and
most of the others had instruments of some sort or other. At arranged
intervals they gave vent to sepulchral groans. In the van was a
tattered banner, bearing the words, "The Calamitous Cripples. Break
your leg and join."
"What is it?" asked the mystified Jack. "What's the giddy wheeze?"
Billy Faraday was far too absorbed in watching the amazing spectacle to
answer him, and Jack's question lapsed. The procession drew nearer and
nearer, and the noise was ear-splitting. The Cripples drew themselves
up before the window of Study 9, and Jack was moved to call out,
"Lovely! Is it the National Anthem or Alexander's Ragtime Band? I never
could tell the difference."
His shaft of wit, however, went almost unnoticed in the general uproar,
and Billy Faraday grasped a more cutting form of witticism; he got a
handful of pennies and half-pennies, and threw them one at a time to
the serenading party below.
Cummles, hammering at a tin drum with zest, received one of the coins
full on the bridge of the nose, and it broke short his performance.
He held up his hand, and with a final crash of sound the Cripples
completed their selection.
"Know," roared Cummles at the top of his voice, "that a new Society
has been formed, called the Calamitous Cripples! We let everybody
join--the more the merrier! And our object is--" He turned to his
supporters for the rest.
"--death to the Crees!" roared the crowd, in disconcerting chorus.
So this was the strength of the new society--it was a rival show to
the Crees! Jack realized that Cummles was getting his own back for
his rejection and disgrace at the last Cree meeting, and he whistled
softly. But Cummles was speaking again.
"We therefore begin on the Chief Cree!" he yelled, and as at a given
signal all the Cripples raised their hands, and sent a volley of hard,
tightly-rolled paper balls at Jack and Billy as they stood open-mouthed
at the window.
The fusillade took the two Crees by surprise, and Jack for the moment
did not know what to do; but he soon settled that question, and with
Billy jumped out of the window, and rushed the banner of the Calamitous
Cripples. It was flagrantly against rules to jump out of the window at
all, and soon a free fight was taking place around the banner of the
Cripples.
"To it, Crees!" yelled Jack, wrestling furiously with one of the banner
supporters. Someone had grasped his leg, and he could not keep upright
much longer; sooner or later he would have to go down.
"Ouch!" Down he went, and down went half a dozen others in a panting,
scrambling, tossing mass.
There was wild disorder for lively minutes, but force of numbers
gave victory to the Cripples, who rescued their tattered banner and
scampered away with it. Jack stood looking after them with fire in his
eye.
"Jingo," he observed to Billy Faraday, "but I can see some immense
japes this term, with the Crees and the Cripples. What do you think?"
"We've got to score on them," said Billy emphatically, "and score right
away. Watch us notch ahead."
Jack nodded meaningly; then, as someone touched him on the arm, he
wheeled round. It was Septimus Patch, and the schoolboy detective's
eyes were shining. He was plainly full of some scheme or other.
"Comrades!" he said. "Don't waste your time here--I've got the best
idea out for the discovery of the fellow that's giving Daw a hand."
"What are you going to do--advertise?"
Patch smiled tolerantly. "Daw--Doctor Daw, as you call him--said that
this chap, whoever he is, is keeping an eye on Billy here?"
"That's so."
"Well, why shouldn't we--" he looked around to make certain that they
were not overheard, "--why shouldn't we lead the fellow out on a false
scent?"
"Meaning?"
"Sort of red herring business, you know. The three of us could sneak
out before call-over and make it appear as if we were going to hide the
Star somewhere out in the bush. If there is anyone on the watch, it's
the Commonwealth Bank to a peanut that he'll slink out after us."
"Good word--slink," said Jack approvingly. "Yes, Patchie, the idea's
not so dusty. We've got time. We could lie in ambush for the beggar and
catch him red-handed."
"Better leave him alone--just make certain who he is," warned Septimus,
polishing his great horn-rimmed glasses. "You see, if we just lie low
and say nuffin, like Brer Rabbit, the spy won't know that we're fly to
his little game."
"Good for you, Picklock Holmes," said Jack. "You mean, he'll think that
he's working quite safely, unknown to anyone, and all the time we know,
and are pulling his leg so much that he'll need a boat-hook to take his
boots off."
"Prezactly, comrade," returned Septimus, chaffingly. "Your brain is
bucking up lately, isn't it? We never know what we can do till we try,
do we? However, to the bright, brisk business! You"--turning to Billy
Faraday--"you slip up into the study and pretend to bring something
out with you--we'll watch here."
"We're the giddy conspirators, old boy," said Jack. "Get a move on--we
haven't any too much time."
In a few minutes the three boys had set out from the school, striking
into the thick belt of scrub-lands that lay towards the north. They
pressed forward for a good ten minutes, and at the end of that time
Billy strode on alone, making as much noise as he could, while Jack and
the amateur detective crouched behind the undergrowth, to watch closely
for any follower.
Billy's footsteps died away, and there came only the faint sound of his
passage through the scrub; then that in turn faded till it was almost
inaudible.
"'Fraid we've drawn blank, old boy," said Jack in a low whisper. "Can't
hear anything, can you?"
"Wait," was all that Patch had for answer; he had his head cocked to
one side in a listening attitude, and all at once he raised a finger
for silence.
During a tense ten seconds he listened, Jack scarcely taking breath,
and then the detective nodded as one who had satisfied himself.
"Get down," he whispered; "somebody coming."
Sure enough, almost at once came the sound of footsteps; and Jack,
peering through the interstices of a wall of greenery, could barely
restrain a gasp as he saw a tall, pasty-faced, weedy youth strolling
negligently along the faint path that Billy Faraday had followed, and,
although he wore the college cap of blue and gold, he was smoking an
expensive brand of cigarette.
In dead silence the two watched him pass their field of vision, and
then he, too, was swallowed up in the bush.
Jack turned to Patch with a criss-cross mark of puzzlement creasing his
eyebrows. "Now, what do you make of that?" he asked softly. "That's
Redisham, and the dirty slacker's smoking at that. But is he following
Billy or not?"
"Or is it only coincidence that he comes from Victoria?" asked Septimus
in the same discreet voice. "Very funny, isn't it?"
"Now, you know what sort of a fellow Redisham is," went on Jack. "He's
just the sort that'd have gambling debts, and all that, although his
father's got piles of cash, they say. Question is, is he clever enough
to be used as a tool?"
"Comrade, I don't know," admitted Septimus, slowly shaking his head.
"It's often these foolish-looking fellows that turn out pretty
cunning in the long run. All the same, Redisham--the man's an ass, a
weak-minded ass with an eye for 'loud' dress, and--"
"--and no eye for catching a cricket ball, or any sort of sport,
except betting--if you can call that sport," Jack snorted. "Little
Montague Redisham isn't the sneak in this case, I fancy."
"Well, then, what's he doing?" countered the amateur detective, with
index finger marking his point. "It looks jolly fishy, doesn't it?"
"Might have come out to smoke that rotten cigarette of his."
"I thought of that, but the coincidence of the time, and the direction
of his outing, is hard to get over. Anyhow, we'll find out, we'll find
out--don't worry."
They got out of their cramping positions behind the undergrowth and
stepped out into the little glade. Barely had they done so when there
came a loud cry from some distance ahead--and Jack knew the voice as
well as his own.
It was Billy's voice.
"Help--help!"
Jack jumped about a foot in the air, and shot a sharp glance at
Septimus Patch. "Jiminy!" he said, quickly, "that's old Billy--wonder
what's up? Here--after him."
Symonds and Patch put their heads down and ran. Heedless of the
undergrowth that set traps for their feet and that tore at them in the
shape of thorn-bushes, they charged madly forward, and all at once Jack
stopped and picked something up from the ground.
"Here--look at this!" It was Billy's cap, with the Deepwater College
badge in the front of it; and Patch pulled up and glanced keenly at the
ground with sharp eyes.
"A struggle--see?" he panted, pointing to the way the bracken had been
tossed about and the turf trampled by heavy heels. "A struggle, and
then--then--what happened?"
"Don't say he's been knocked on the head and dragged off," groaned
Jack, looking about him helplessly. "Here, Patchie, have a look at
these marks--what are they?"
"Good--good," observed Patch, scanning them closely. "See, Billy got
away and ran for it--the other chap after him. See how the big, heavy
print is stamped over that other? They were running, the both of
them--and--"
"Come on," said Jack curtly; and the two of them tore off once more,
stopping to pick up the trail every now and then until they were
startled by a loud, frenzied crashing through the brushes.
"Hullo!" exclaimed Patch, stopping; and into their arms, almost, Billy
Faraday staggered, hatless and dishevelled. He was panting heavily, and
seemed almost done; a sharp twig had scratched his cheek badly, for it
was bleeding.
"Billy--you're all right?" demanded his chum, seizing him by the arm.
Before Billy could pant out an answer, another fellow came up at a run,
and halted, half-hidden in the scrub, at the sight of the two who now
reinforced the fugitive. His cap, pulled down over his eyes, hid his
face pretty well; but Jack knew at once that it was Tiger Humbolt who
stood staring at them.
It was Septimus Patch who decided the next move.
"After him--I've got a gun!" he yelled at the top of his voice; and
Humbolt started and then, wheeling about, vanished into the thick bush
at a run. He knew that Billy had fired a revolver at him during his
attempted escape with the handbag, and he was disposed to take Patch's
cry at its face value. As Patch had intended, of course; for he did not
attempt to give chase. Instead, he glanced at his watch.
"Ten minutes to call-over," he said; "we'd better get back."
On the way back to the college Billy explained that he had been
standing in a thicket when Humbolt had jumped on him from behind and
carried him to the ground. After a struggle he had broken free and run
for his life.
"I doubled on my tracks," he concluded, "and came back again, when I
ran into you. That's all--lucky it wasn't worse."
"And did you see Monty Redisham?" asked Patch.
"Redisham--that rich blighter in the Sixth? The prefect?"
"The slacker," said Jack trenchantly. He went on to explain how
Redisham had come into the mystery, and Billy said that the plot was
now thicker than ever.
"I can't make it out," he said, thoughtfully, dabbing his scratched
cheek with his handkerchief. "No, I didn't see the brute at all. He was
following me, you say?"
"Looked like it, comrade," said Patch, "but then we can't say for
certain. I'll have to give the matter some thought," he went on, with a
resumption of his light-hearted manner.
"Another thing requiring some thought," put in Jack, "is, how are we
going to score off those Cripple lunatics? We want to shake them up
pretty suddenly, you know. I think we'll call a special meeting of the
Crees in our study to-night, and we'll think up something really smart."
When the Crees had assembled, managing in some inexplicable manner to
cram themselves into Study 9, Jack was delighted to learn that one of
the fellows was ready with a plan.
"Chief Black Feather," he said, in the approved style of address, "may
I suggest a scheme for the downfall of those scoundrel palefaces--I
mean Cripples?"
"Of course," said Jack at once. "In fact, I was going to ask you
fellows to come to light with some such idea. Spring the giddy wheeze,
mon brave French," he explained grandly, "very hard."
"Well," said the Cree, "the bright idea is this. I happen to have heard
that the Cripples are holding a meeting to-morrow afternoon--they've
got one of the classrooms on the north wing for the purpose. Now, I
happen to know that up in the ceiling over that wing there are several
bags of sawdust--been stored there for ages, and I think the Head's
forgotten all about them. Now, it's a shame to waste them, and there's
a nice big man-hole in the classroom, and--"
"I think we see the rest!" said Jack with a laugh. "Which classroom are
they in?"
"The end one--the drawing-room, next to the extra French set."
"Good--nominations for four fellows to carry out the scheme? I'll make
one myself."
Three others were accordingly chosen to deluge the Cripples' meeting
with sawdust, and on the following afternoon the conspirators gained
access to the space between the ceiling and roof. A busy meeting of the
Cripples, with closed doors and windows, was in progress; and there was
going to be no mistake whatever about the disorder and surprise that
would follow the avalanche of sawdust.
"The jape of the century!" averred Jack Symonds in a low whisper. "What
about the cover for the man-hole? Have you got it?"
"Yes, she lifts pretty easily, but I won't pull her right out, or
they'll be ready for us. Now, how are we going to open fire?"
"Wait a second." Jack took a swift look round at his assistants,
flashing the electric torch that he had brought with him. "I've got
it. We'll each take a bag, and as soon as Martin whips the cover off
the trap, I'll let fly--then you, and you next, and Martin last. See?
That'll give him time to grab his bag after taking the cover off. All
ready?"
"Let her go, Gallagher," murmured the Crees, lifting the big,
open-mouthed bags; and at a word from Jack, Big Martin whisked the
cover off the man-hole. A square of light opened in the dark floor
beneath them, and there came the murmur of voices from the aperture.
That was all that the Crees had time to take in, for the next moment
Jack had tipped the great bag forward, and the sawdust gushed out in a
stream. The two other bags followed, and Martin finished the good work
with his contribution, to the dismay obtaining in the room below.
Jack leaned forward, convulsed with laughter, and cast a glance down
into the room; then his face lost its smile, and his jaw dropped.
"Hokey!" he said. "Now we've done it!"
"Why? What?" asked the others, pressing forward.
"We lifted the wrong trap," murmured Jack in a voice of horror. "That's
Monsieur Anastasie and the extra French set!"