"Why, hello! Langdon, just dropped in to see me, eh? Rather nice of you,
too, considering how little we got together in college!"
Fredericks, as he said this, made a movement with his hand toward the
young fellow who had ushered Frank and Bluff into the cabin of the big
and commodious power houseboat; and immediately the grind of a key in
the lock told that he had seen to it that the way of escape was cut off.
They were four to two, a rather top-heavy arrangement, Frank thought, as
he backed a little, so as to keep any of the fellows from getting behind
him.
Outwardly he seemed fairly calm, though his eyes were flashing with the
spirit of defiance that moved his soul.
"You know as well as anything, Fredericks," he said, coldly, "that if
I'd had any idea this was your boat, nothing could have tempted me to
come in here, or bother you at all. But your friend told us it was his
boat, and that he was traveling all alone, except for the man who was
mending the engine out there."
"Oh! well, Benedict only did what I asked him to do, when I saw that it
was your crazy old tub coming in to tie up here," replied the other,
with a careless shrug of his shoulders. "Looked as if fortune wanted to
just play the whole thing right into my hands; for I was hoping this
very afternoon you'd happen along, as things began to seem dull."
"Well, what are we to believe about this; is it a sort of trap, and do
you expect to jump on us, now you've got us in here?" asked Frank.
Apparently the other was surprised to see him take it so coolly. Perhaps
he had even hoped to hear Frank Langdon beg to be let off without any
trouble.
"Well, you see, the chance to even up old scores is a fine one, since
we're two to your one," the other remarked, bitterly.
"So far as I know, there are no scores to settle," said Frank. "I never
knowingly wronged you, or tried to interfere with your business when in
college. In fact, on several occasions, I've even left a group of
fellows when you came along, because I didn't want to have any trouble."
"Yes, and that's one of the things I've got against you, Langdon,"
declared Oswald, with a scowl. "It looked as if you felt a contempt for
me, and couldn't even bear to be seen in my company. Some of the fellows
said as much, and told me I was foolish to stand for it."
"But you surely knew yourself that it was never intended that way,
Fredericks. I wanted to be left alone to go my own way, and I knew that
some fellows had made up their minds to bring us to blows. Now, fighting
isn't at all to my taste, though I'm sorry to say I've had to do my
share of it in my day. Just forget that there's such a fellow as Frank
Langdon alive, and I'm sure you'll never know otherwise for all of me."
"He's squealing, Ossie!" exclaimed Duke Fletcher.
"Yes," broke in the second college chum, Raymond Ellis, "because we've
got him penned up here, where we can give him what he ought to have
gotten long ago, he sets up a whine that he looks on fighting as a moral
sin, and doesn't want to indulge in it."
Frank laughed in the face of this chap.
"Depend on it, Ellis," he said, with cutting coldness, "that if ever I
am forced into fighting in a crowd where you figure, I've got something
to give you that's been hanging fire a long time; in fact, ever since
you knocked down that half-witted Bailey boy, and bruised his face
because he said something you didn't just like. When I heard of it I
said to myself that some fine day, if the chance comes, I'm going to pay
that debt back. If you think that time has come now, all right. Bluff,
you oughtn't to be in this game, because you've never done anything to
irritate his lordship. They may let you out, perhaps."
"Let me out!" roared the impulsive Bluff; "and leave you here alone with
the whole bunch of cowards? I'd like to see them do it, that's all! And
what's more, right now I want to give solemn warning that the first move
any fellow makes toward laying so much as the tip of his finger on you,
Frank, bang goes this gun!"
Bluff looked the part to the life. He was mad clear through, and the way
he swung that menacing weapon of his, first toward Oswald, who ducked,
and then covering one of the others, who turned as white as a sheet,
told the story.
Frank, who knew that the gun was quite destitute of a single charge,
since Bluff had been even then on the way to have it mended, could
hardly keep from laughing outright. But then, how were those fellows to
know anything like that?
"Here, hold on with that blunderbuss!" exclaimed Oswald; and small
wonder that there was a suspicious quiver to his voice, for Bluff
certainly looked equal to doing all he threatened so wildly.
"It was all a joke, see!" cried Ellis; and then as the gun swung again
so that it began to point toward him, unable to stand the strain any
longer, he dropped on his hands and knees, and crawled under the table.
Frank knew that nothing was to be feared any longer.
"I'll trouble you to unlock that door," he said, wheeling on the
astonished young man from St. Paul, who had been witnessing these
things, without having a word to say, the smile dying out of his face.
"Oh! sure, just as you say," mumbled the other, hastening to comply;
"queer how some people don't seem able to take a joke at all."
"Yes, it looks like that, perhaps," returned Frank, severely; "but only
for my chum here happening to bring his gun along, we might be having a
parrot and monkey time of it right now. Step to one side, or I might rub
up against you in passing. Come on, Bluff, you did it for them that
time, sure enough."
With that Frank stepped outside, and Bluff quickly followed. Hardly had
the latter gotten free from the cabin than he turned, and "broke" his
gun, to show the disgusted conspirators it was quite empty, and that
they had been hoodwinked by his quick wit.
Still, none of them seemed to feel like rushing out after the retreating
pair. Frank, accompanied by his chum, walked to the shantyboat where the
sign of the locksmith hung. After a look at the pump-gun, the man said
he could fix it in ten minutes, so that it would work all right.
Accordingly the two boys sat down to wait until the job was completed.
It was getting quite dusky when they were ready to leave; and Bluff,
after a look outside, seeing that it would be necessary for them to pass
the pleasure boat of Fredericks again, bought half a dozen loaded shells
from the man.
"Now," said Bluff, after he had injected one of these into the firing
chamber, "I feel safe in passing that boat. If they make any sort of a
move against us, I'll let fly a load in the air first to warn 'em that
the repeater isn't on the shelf any longer, but ready to do business at
the same old stand."
"Well, be careful what you do, that's all," warned Frank, determined to
keep in close touch with his hot-headed comrade, so that in an emergency
he could snatch the gun away, if Bluff seemed disposed to use it the
wrong way.
But they were not molested at all. The big young chap who had been
tinkering with the engine, grinned as they passed by, and Frank thought
he nodded to them in a sort of friendly way, as though to say he
understood what had happened, and considered it a good joke on his
employer.
"Engine broke down?" asked Bluff, in a friendly manner, as he passed.
"Just what she has," replied the other; "and if we send back to St. Paul
for a casting we may be stuck right here several days."
"Hope it is a whole month," muttered Bluff, as he trotted along at the
heels of his leader; and Frank, for that matter, echoed the wish, since
it would save them from more or less anxiety.
When they got aboard the _Pot Luck_ it was to find that supper was well
under way, and that the two who ran the house were quite ignorant of
what had been going on.
And as Bluff, in his impatient style, started to exclaim how he only
wished that Oswald had run up against Frank's fist, both Will and Jerry
jumped to their feet, demanding that they hear the story.
Their indignation was justifiable when told of the trap Fredericks and
his set had laid for Frank. And Bluff was only too proud when he heard
Frank admit that if it had not been for his having his "terrible weapon"
along at the time, the chances were that when they two came back to the
boat, they would be bearing some of the marks of a fiercely contested
battle on their faces.
"And I want to serve notice here and now," continued Bluff, as he
affectionately patted his pump-gun, and held it up to the gaze of the
others; "that after this there's going to be no sort of sport made of
this noble weapon. Today it saved Frank and myself a mauling. When they
saw what it was, they cringed like a pack of cowards. Why, would you
believe it? that Ellis just crawled under the table! Shows the kind of
fellow he is. And, boys, the gun was empty and out of commission all the
while, remember."
"Hurrah! bully for Bluff. He's got the right name!" shouted Jerry, in
his enthusiasm, pretending to wave the hat he was not wearing at the
time.
"Promise me to never more sneer at a pump-gun, as long as I carry this
prize cannon along!" continued Bluff, seriously, but with a sparkle in
his eye.
"We solemnly promise!" said Will, holding up his right hand.
"I'll try and control my indignation whenever I can, Bluff," said Jerry.
"But all the same I'm thinking it was the fellow behind the gun, and not
that weapon itself, that deserves the praise. What's the matter, Will;
you look as if you felt bad because you didn't have a hand in it, too?"
"Oh! it's the hardest luck ever," said the other, in deep disgust. "Just
to think what a noble picture that would have made, with our chum
holding the crowd at bay with his gun; Frank ready to sail in and help;
and Ellis crawling under the table! I'm the most unfortunate fellow you
ever heard tell of, to miss such glorious chances. I wish you'd only
tell me when you think there's anything going to happen, so I could jump
in, and immortalize you all. But some fine day I'll be along when one of
these things happens; see if I don't!"