WERNER'S ATTACK
"Hold on, Bill Glutts!" cried Randy, as he ran after the youth whom he
had not seen since the Winter before.
"You leave me alone!" returned Glutts, and then, in order to run faster,
he dropped the bundle he was carrying.
"Don't let him get away!" burst out Fred, and made a wild dash over some
low bushes in Glutts's direction. In a moment more he had caught Glutts
by the arm.
"Let go of me!" screamed the former cadet, and in alarm he tried to push
Fred away. But the youngest Rover boy clung fast, and then Glutts aimed
a blow with his fist at Fred's face.
Had the blow landed as intended, it would have hurt severely; but the
youngest Rover ducked, and then hit Glutts a stinging blow on the chin.
By this time Randy and Gif were coming up, and almost before he knew it
Bill Glutts was surrounded. Gif caught the former bully of the Hall by
the shoulder.
"This is a nice way to act, Glutts," he said sternly. "What business had
you to touch our lunch?"
"How did I know it belonged to you?" whined Glutts, much crestfallen
over the sudden turn affairs had taken. "We found the stuff on the
rocks."
"You can't play the innocent that way," broke in Randy. "You and Gabe
Werner must have followed us to this island. Gee!" he added quickly,
"where is Werner?"
"Jack went after him," answered Fred; "and so did Andy and Spouter."
"We didn't follow you at all," answered Bill Glutts. "We have as much
right on this island as anybody. We ran across that lunch by accident.
We didn't know that anybody was coming back to get it," he added lamely.
In the meanwhile Jack was hurrying after Gabe Werner, and, strange as it
may seem, Ruth followed close behind him, at the same time calling to
the others for help. She remembered the anonymous note which had been
delivered, and she was afraid that Gabe Werner might try to do the young
captain serious injury.
Gabe Werner was legging it among the trees. He was trying to reach the
shore of Bluebell Island, but became confused among the rocks and bushes
and presently had to swing around in something of a semicircle, and this
soon brought him face to face with Ruth.
"Oh!" cried the girl, in increased alarm. "Don't you dare touch me, Gabe
Werner! Don't you dare!"
"Get out of my way!" roared the bully, and then, as he heard Jack
crashing through the brushwood directly behind him, he brushed Ruth
rudely to one side.
"Jack! Jack! Here he is!" the girl screamed.
The young captain did not need to be told this, for he saw Gabe Werner
just ahead of him. He made a flying leap forward, and was barely able to
catch Werner by the tail of his coat.
"You can't get away! You might as well give it up," he said, and as the
bully kicked out savagely, he caught Werner by the foot and sent him
headlong.
"Oh, Jack! Jack! Do be careful!" cried Ruth in increasing alarm, and
then she set up a call for assistance.
"I'm not afraid of Gabe Werner, and he knows it," answered the young
captain.
"I'll fix you for this!" roared Werner. "I owe you a lot for the way
you've been treating me." And with these words he scrambled to his feet
and aimed a blow at Jack's face.
The young captain moved to one side so that the blow struck him on the
shoulder. He came back quickly with one on Werner's right ear, and
followed this up with another on the bully's nose, which made that organ
bleed profusely.
By this time there was more noise in the under-brush, and Andy and
Spouter could be heard calling.
"This way! This way!" answered Ruth.
While she was calling, and while Andy and Spouter were doing their best
to brush aside some thorny bushes which held them back, the struggle
between Jack and Werner continued. The bully landed on Jack's shoulder
again and then on his chest, and in return received a crack on the chin
which all but keeled him over.
"I said I'd get you, Jack Rover, and I will!" spluttered Werner, after
this last attack. And then, as Jack made a move as if to strike him
again, the bully stepped around to one side, bringing himself once more
close to Ruth. His right hand had gone down into his coat pocket, and
now he brought out something in a small paper bag.
"I said I'd fix you, and this is how I'm going to do it! Look there, if
you dare!" called out Werner, and pointed to a tree limb just over their
heads.
Fearing some trick, Jack gave only the faintest of glances upward, but
Ruth, more innocent, gazed wide-eyed at the limb pointed out. As he
spoke, Werner broke open the paper bag and hurled its contents forward.
"There! Take that, Jack Rover!" he shouted triumphantly. "Take that, and
see how you like it!"
It was a package of pepper which Gabe Werner had carried. As it was
thrown forward a small portion of it went in Jack's face, but the most
of it was sent in a spray over the young captain's shoulder and hit poor
Ruth.
"Oh! Oh!" screamed the girl. "Oh, I am blinded! He threw pepper in my
eyes!"
"You hound, you!" exclaimed Jack, and even though his eyes smarted not a
little from the few grains of pepper that had entered, he managed to
leap upon the bully and give him a swinging crack in the jaw. But then
Werner threw the young captain backward over a rock, and just as Andy
and Spouter put in an appearance he dodged in among some heavy brushwood
and quickly disappeared.
"What did he do?" demanded Spouter.
"He threw something in our eyes. Ruth got the worst of it," answered
Jack. "Go on after him; we'll have to attend to our eyes."
Jack's eyes were bad enough, but Ruth's were much worse. The girl could
hardly keep from screaming with pain, and Jack was just then in no
condition to assist her. Seeing this, Andy and Spouter set up a yell for
some of the others to go after Werner, and then did what they could to
relieve the sufferers.
"Come on down to the lake," advised Spouter. "I guess water will be
about the best thing you can use. Anyhow, you can wash out the pepper if
there is any left."
Both cadets assisted Ruth to the water's edge, and Jack stumbled after
them. Here the eyes, which had already begun to inflame, were washed out
carefully, and then, as Ruth continued to complain of the pain, they
bound up her eyes with their handkerchiefs.
"I think mine will be all right after a while," said Jack. "They smart a
little, but that's all."
"Don't you think Ruth had better see a doctor?" suggested Spouter.
"By all means. We'll get back to town just as soon as we possibly can.
He can probably give her some sort of ointment that will relieve the
pain and take away the inflammation."
By this time the others were coming up. The news that Ruth had received
a dose of pepper in her eyes excited everybody.
"Gabe Werner ought to be put in jail for this," said Martha.
"Isn't it the most dreadful thing you ever heard of!" came from May.
The excitement was so intense that for the time being the boys forgot
all about Bill Glutts. As a consequence when they turned to where they
had left that unworthy, Glutts had disappeared.
"Well, he got a good beating, anyhow," said Randy. "I think that will
teach him to leave our stuff alone after this."
At first some of the boys were inclined to make another hunt for Werner
and Glutts. They knew the bullies must have come to the island in some
kind of a boat.
"If we can find their boat we can take it with us," said Spouter. "Then
they can either stay on the island or try to swim ashore."
"We can't waste any more time," declared Jack. "We must get Ruth to a
doctor. And I'd like to see a doctor myself. My eyes feel terribly
scratchy."
"Yes, yes! I want to see a doctor at once," said Ruth. "My eyes hurt
dreadfully."
Some of the boys gathered up what was left of the lunch, and all made
their way to the water's edge, where the rowboats had been left. As they
did this they heard the sudden put-put of a motor-boat, and a few
seconds later they saw the craft shoot out of a tiny cove at the upper
end of the island and head for the eastern shore of Clearwater Lake.
"There they go! There are Glutts and Werner!" exclaimed Gif.
"And in a motor-boat, too!" added Randy. "Too bad! If they were in a
rowboat we might be able to catch them."
"Oh, let them go," said Mary hastily. "I am more worried about Ruth's
eyes than anything else."
"We're all worried about that," answered her brother. "Come on, we'll
get over to Haven Point just as fast as we can. I only hope we find one
of the doctors at home."
They tumbled into the boats, the girls leading Ruth, who still had her
eyes bandaged.
"Do you think you can row, Jack?" questioned Fred.
"Of course I can," replied the young captain. He was not going to admit
that the injury to his eyes was making him feel sick all over.
May sat beside Ruth and did what she could for the sufferer. All of the
boys bent to their oars and a straight course was taken for the town.
"Wouldn't it be dreadful if Ruth was blinded for life?" remarked Alice
Strobell on the way.
"Oh, Alice! don't suggest such a thing as that," came from Annie Larkins
in horror.
"Well, people have been blinded in that way more than once," remarked
Randy. "It all depends on how bad a dose she got."
"Jack said the pepper must have been intended for him," came from Andy.
"I can't imagine that Werner would be wicked enough to try to injure
Ruth that way."
"Maybe he didn't intend to do it when he started," returned his brother.
"But when Werner gets mad he's liable to do almost anything. You know
that as well as I do."
"That's true. When he gets into a rage he goes almost insane."
"What an ending to our outing!" sighed Alice.
"And we didn't eat a mouthful of the lunch!" added Annie. She had spent
over an hour in fixing some fancy sandwiches.
"Was that pepper from some you brought along?" questioned Randy quickly.
"As far as I know we didn't bring any pepper along. We had a saltcellar,
and that's all," answered Alice.
"Then it must have been a deliberate attempt on Werner's part to blind
Jack!" cried Andy. "Oh, what a pity we didn't catch him! Then we could
have handed him over to the authorities."
When the boys and girls reached one of the docks at Haven Point Andy and
Randy ran on ahead and speedily procured a taxicab. Into this Ruth and
Jack were hustled, and then Randy, sitting beside the driver, directed
him to take the sufferers to the nearest doctor.
At the first physician's house they learned that the doctor was away for
the afternoon. Then they hurried to another part of the town, and there
found Doctor Borden, an older man who had occasionally come to both the
girls' school and the military academy.
"Pepper in your eyes! Is it possible!" said the old physician. "Come
into my office at once. Sometimes that sort of thing is very serious."
"You wait on the lady first, Doctor," said Jack. "She is by far the
worse off."
"Very well," said the doctor. "Come this way," and he led Ruth into his
private office.