IN WHICH WE LEARN THE SECRET CODE OF THE "TIGERS"
For over two weeks after Professor O'Reilley had gathered up his
properties and gone in quest of juvenile dimes in other neighborhoods,
John waited at the corner of the school yard for Louise, gravely added
her books to his own under his arm, and walked slowly home with her. His
roommates were at first loud in their jeers, but gradually the primitive
jests grew less and less frequent until the daily meeting became a part
of the unnoticed routine of the school.
As for his friends, Silvey, after a few caustic remarks, forbore
comment. Sid DuPree made the condescending admission that she wasn't
half-bad after all. And the "Tigers" found it a distinct addition to
their prestige to have a feminine rooter who danced around on the
sidelines and exhorted them to even greater deeds of valor as they
ground chance opponents into the cinders of the big lot.
Then it was, one Friday afternoon, that Miss Brown stacked her record
books neatly in a little pile at one corner of the desk, placed the
unmarked homework papers in one of the drawers, and made an innocent
announcement which roused thoughts lying dormant in each boy's brain to
instant life.
"Halloween is only a week from Saturday. I want each member of the class
taking part in the exercises to have the lines learned perfectly. We'll
rehearse Monday afternoon."
The rest of the speech fell on deaf ears with John. Halloween but a
short seven days away? Why, it seemed scarcely three mornings ago that
he had started on the fishing trip which nearly landed the big carp. The
gang should be a big one, this time. Silvey and Sid, the Harrison kids,
Mosher, Perry, and Red Brown were certainties, to say nothing of smaller
groups which might join on that final night. He drew three solitary
pennies from his pocket, arranged them, heads up, in a row on the top of
his desk, and stared at them until the bell rang for dismissal.
With the coins in his hand, he swung back the door of the little school
store, and hastened eagerly up to the proprietress. She greeted him with
a smile, for the episode of the lemon drops was still fresh in her
memory.
"Pea shooters in yet?" he queried anxiously.
They had arrived that very noon.
"Is there wood on the ends to keep the tin from cutting your mouth?"
She nodded. The door swung back again as Sid DuPree and Silvey stamped
noisily in. It developed that they were on a similar errand, and
presently Miss Thomas cut the cord around the big, blue bundle and gave
them their weapons. The trio left in high spirits, puffing through the
empty tubes, making imaginary shots at open windows, and blustering
loudly about past performances, as they sauntered along. Silvey halted
when the first of the grocery shops near the home corner was reached.
"Got any peas at your house, Sid?"
Sid shook his head. His family dined at a near-by hotel most of the
time, and a reserve stock of any kind of food was a rarity. John
mentioned a big jar of beans on his mother's pantry shelf.
"They're no good," said Silvey scornfully. "Get stuck in the pea shooter
and jam it all up. Got any money, Sid?"
Sid had a penny. It was the day before the generous allowance from Mr.
DuPree was due, and his finances verged upon bankruptcy. Silvey had
another, and John contributed the remainder of his little hoard. That
brought the total to four cents.
"S'pose he'll sell us that little?" asked John, as they gazed at the
tempting array of vegetables in the store window. They opened the door
timidly. The rotund proprietor stepped forward as he stammered his
request.
"Of course!" He beamed on the trio good-naturedly. "What kind do you
want, boys?"
"Split's the cheapest," said Silvey thoughtfully.
"But they don't go as far, and it's harder to hit anything with them."
They ordered the more expensive projectiles and divided them equally
before they left the store. At the corner, the pharmacy was bombarded
persistently until the drug apprentice sprang through the doorway and
sent the boys flying down the street.
The pursuit slackened at last and the white coated youth turned to go
back. Silvey halted to pant a defiant "Ya-a-a, ya-a-a. Can't catch us.
Can't catch us."
John pulled his chum's arm impatiently and pointed to the vacant house
just three lots south of Silvey's home.
"Look," he whispered, suddenly cautious. "Some one's forgotten to close
the front door tight. We can lock it from the inside and go up to the
attic. Nobody can get in to chase us, and we won't do a thing with our
pea shooters, oh, no!"
"Maybe the folks haven't left. You can't tell."
"We can run, then. 'Sides, they won't do anything."
They crossed the street and tiptoed up the dusty, rain-spotted veranda
steps. John peered into the bleak, dirty parlor and reported the coast
clear. Nevertheless, they hesitated on the very threshold.
"You go first," said Sid to Silvey.
"All right," Silvey nodded apathetically. He peered in at the window.
"You don't think there's anyone inside, do you, fellows?"
The trio listened intently. "Might be someone upstairs," suggested Sid.
"Tramps or something."
"Shucks," broke in John impatiently. "You're all 'fraid cats, that's
what you are."
"Go on in, yourself," Bill retorted quickly.
He drew a nervous breath, and swung the door swiftly back, as if afraid
that his courage would ooze away before he reached the stairway. Sid and
Silvey followed very cautiously over the scratched hardwood floor.
"Shall I shut the door?" asked Bill as he took hold of the knob.
"N-no, we may have to run, yet."
They explored the main floor. No one was in the library, no one in the
narrow, badly lighted dining-room, and no one in the dingy kitchen. All
seemed quiet upstairs. Silvey bolted the basement door that they might
not be pursued from that quarter, and Sid, as they returned to the
hallway, cut off the avenue of escape to the street. John led the way up
the winding, uncarpeted stairs. Silvey followed close at his heels and
DuPree lagged in the rear.
"Boo-oo!" Sid shouted when they had ascended half the distance.
John's pea shooter clattered to the landing. Silvey turned angrily on
the miscreant, his face still pale from the fright.
"I've a' mind to punch your nose for that! 'S'pose there was really
somebody!"
At last they reached their goal. Tales of wandering vagrants with lairs
in the attics of vacant houses proved untrue in this instance, and John
swung back the hinged window in the gable with a sigh of relief.
"Jiminy!" he exclaimed as he looked down upon the bright, reassuring
play of light and shadow on the lawn and macadam below. "Isn't this
great?"
The boys stuffed their mouths so full of peas that conversation was
impossible and waited for the first victim. A low, heavily laden lumber
wagon, drawn by straining horses, creaked down the street. They
concentrated their fire upon the driver by tacit consent, for each of
the marksmen had had an aversion to causing runaways drilled into him by
the hair brush or corset steel method.
The teamster, bewildered by the steady rain of missiles, could see no
one and departed in an atmosphere of heated profanity. Came delivery
boys, wagons, an occasional carriage, and now and then an unprotected
pedestrian. Only Louise, as she passed on the way to the grocery, was
exempt from assault.
The shadows of the house tops and the lindens spread across the street
and shut off gradually the flood of sunlight through the attic window.
The Mosher four-year-old trotted past, just out of range, on his way
towards home and an early supper. John wasted a few ineffectual peas on
a pair of sparrows who began a pitched battle on one of the roof
gutters. Sport lagged for a few minutes. Then came a great, heavy hulk
of a man in overalls, with a battered tin pail swinging from his side,
whose lurching step bespoke a violent temper. Silvey raised his pea
shooter.
"Better leave him alone," Sid cautioned.
"Can't do anything to us," John scoffed. "Doors are all locked. And
how's he going to tell our mothers when he doesn't know who we are?"
He filled his mouth anew, took aim with the long tin tube, and let fly.
Bill seconded him nobly. The quarry halted, looked upwards, and received
Sid's volley full in his face.
"He's coming up the steps," yelled John, who was watching the effect of
the attack. "Jiggers, fellows, he's coming up the steps."
They turned to fly to safety. But where was a haven of refuge to be
found? They could hear his angry footsteps tramping up and down on the
porch.
"Were those front windows locked?" Sid asked.
John shrugged his shoulders miserably. An angry pounding echoed through
the deserted hall and bare, cheerless rooms. They stole silently down to
the second floor.
"There's more closets to hide in, here," said John hopefully. He glanced
from a rear window to the little pantry gable which stood but a story's
height from the back yard. "If he gets in, we can climb out and drop. It
won't hurt much."
Their enemy tried the door again. Once a window rattled ominously. Sid's
face regained a little of its color. "They were locked after all.
Jiggers, there he is around the back!"
They drew hastily away from the opening as a purple, distorted face
glared up into theirs. A moment later, he was kicking at the back door.
"That's bolted, too," said Silvey thankfully. "I guess we're safe."
At last he left and went around to the front. They listened for a second
attack from that quarter. Not a sound in the house, save the dripping of
a leaky faucet in the bathroom.
"Come on, fellows." John led the way to the stairs. "We'll open the back
door and run like everything!"
The rapidly deepening dusk cast weird shadows through the empty rooms as
they tiptoed tensely to the first floor. Once Sid imagined that he saw
the fat man hiding in a nook in the hall where the evening gloom lay
deepest, and they raised eery echoes through the house in their
panic-stricken flight back to the top of the stairway. Past the fearsome
corner again, through the stuffy kitchen where a ray of gas-light from
the next house fell upon the tall, cylindrical water boiler and gave
them a second fright, and out into the blessed freedom of the back yard.
There they broke for the railroad tracks and home.
Mr. Fletcher had already arrived from the office, and was in the
kitchen, talking, as Mrs. Fletcher prepared supper. That meant that it
was long after six, and John was under strict orders to report upon his
immediate arrival from school! But as he came in, still panting, the
shining rod caught her eye, and his sin of omission was forgotten.
"Pea shooter! Give it here, John. One night of Halloween pranks is
enough, let alone a whole week of it."
He surrendered the weapon reluctantly. "Now mind," she added as the bit
of tin was dropped into the top drawer of the kitchen bureau, "you're
not to buy another one, either."
Mothers were peculiarly unsympathetic about premature pranks; take
Fourth of July, no matter how many firecrackers a fellow owned, he had
to sneak off to the big lot to light them if he wanted to celebrate on
even the day before.
So there was little left to do but look longingly forward to the great
night. On Monday, as he dressed, John found himself repeating, "Only
four more days." His last thought on Tuesday was, "That makes just
three." Thursday afternoon at school, as he chanted a silent refrain,
"Day after tomorrow's Halloween, day after tomorrow's Halloween," the
boy in the seat just behind tapped him stealthily on the shoulder and
passed over a bit of folded paper.
He glanced up at Miss Brown. She was filling out the monthly report
cards and was not likely to detect him, but he held the note underneath
his desk as he opened it, nevertheless. It was from Silvey and ran in
nearly illegible figures:
17-12-19-13. 14-22-22-7 26-7 7-19-22 8-19-26-24-16
26-21-7-22-9 8-24-19-12-12-15 7-12-23-26-2 26-15-15
7-19-22 7-18-20-22-9-8 7-19-22-9-22. 25-18-15-15.
He ran his hand back of the untidy jumble of school books and pads and
drew out an oft creased, finger marked sheet, the secret code of the
"Tigers":
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S
26 25 24 23 22 21 20 19 18 17 16 15 14 13 12 11 10 9 8
T U V W X Y Z
7 6 5 4 3 2 1
He began deciphering the message with a concentration never meted out to
his school work. Five minutes of effort resulted in:
John. Meet at the shack after school today all the Tigers there.
Bill.
He caught Silvey's gaze upon him and nodded to show that he had received
the note. The pair would have met on the way home from school, anyway,
but what was the use of a secret code unless it was used at every
possible opportunity?
The shack was a rickety, frame affair, built during the long summer
vacation when time hung heavy on the boys' hands, and the tribal desire
for a stronghold waxed too strong to be denied. Three of the walls were
formed of odd planks scavenged from neighboring woodpiles and fences,
eked out, here and there, with a few pantry shelves taken from vacant
houses. The fourth was nothing but the picket fence, but as Silvey
expressed it when viewing their handiwork, "It doesn't rain much from
the north, anyway." Door for the low entrance there was not, and the
roof, whose shingles were purchased by an arduously earned half-dollar,
became a veritable sieve when the raindrops were pounded through by a
driving gale from the lake.
The furnishings consisted of a chair, which had long since parted with
its back, and a small, shaky desk which had in some way survived the
interval between its Christmas presentation and the fall school term. In
the one drawer were kept the original of the "Tigers'" secret code, a
twenty-five cent rubber stamp outfit which had been used to print the
set of membership rules, beginning, "I. No swearing," and two sadly
battered, springless, and rusty revolvers. Where they had originated, no
one could remember, but there they lay, unsuspected by parental
authorities, to be used as a possible defense against the incursions of
the "Jefferson Toughs," who ruled the district to the immediate north,
or to be dragged forth, as in the present case, to lend an air of
solemnity to the many plots hatched between the four cramped walls.
Red Brown descended the side steps into the yard, in answer to the
summons of the clan, and found John in his rôle of master-at-arms,
strutting back and forth before the doorway. Silvey, as befitted the
holder of the exalted office of president, was sitting inside on the
crippled chair. John whipped the more formidable of the two weapons from
his back pocket and pointed it at the breast of the intruder.
"Halt!" Brown obeyed.
"Who goes there?" The formula had been borrowed from a thrilling Civil
War story.
"Friend," came the prompt reply.
"Advance, friend, and give the countersign."
Red opened his mouth doubtfully, then hesitated.
"Hurry up."
"I've forgotten it."
"Aw, think--_hard_."
John jabbed the muzzle of the revolver into his ribs with a steadily
increasing pressure. Brown thought--hard. Finally he broke out,
"It's easy enough for you to remember. You made it up."
Which was true, for the master-at-arms, who was also the secretary, had
drafted the rules and was responsible for the initiation ceremonies and
passwords of the organization.
"Go on. I'll help you."
"Can't," hopelessly. "It's clean out of my head."
"Have to stay away from the meeting, then."
"Aw, John, quit your fooling. It doesn't matter."
"Here's the start. 'Oppy.'"
"Oppy--"
"What's the rest of it?"
"'Nother 'Oppy,' wasn't there?"
"No, it was 'Oppy-poppy--'"
"'Oppy-poppy--'"
"'Oppy-poppy-oppy-nox.' Let's hear you say it all."
Red repeated it triumphantly.
"Right. Pass friend to the meeting of the 'Tigers.'"
All the other members had trouble with the tongue twister. Either they
left out the distinguishing "p" in the third syllable, or forgot the
final "oppy" and had to have their memories refreshed in much the same
manner as that of the first arrival. This was precisely what John had
intended. What was the use of being both secretary and master-at-arms of
a club if you couldn't have some fun at the expense of your fellow
members?
Inside, Silvey's glance took in the prostrate figures of Sid, Red Brown,
and Perry Alford, who were packed so closely together in the enclosure
that they could scarcely move, then roamed listlessly past John with his
insignia of office, out to the sunlit fence and railroad tracks. Red
yawned wearily.
"Hurry up and do something, Sil."
"Where's Skinny?" asked the president.
"Down town with Mrs. Mosher," Sid volunteered. "She wanted him to help
her carry packages home."
"Gee," commented Perry, sympathetically. "If I had her for a mother, I'd
run away. Honest, I would!"
"And the Harrison kids?"
"Both sick in bed. Too many pork chops again."
"Master-at-arms and secretary," Silvey raised his voice. "Come on in."
John squatted in the doorway and gazed meaningly at his superior. They
had walked home from school together that afternoon, and instructions
upon the proper way of opening a meeting had been profuse. Silvey grew
palpably nervous.
"This here meeting," he blurted at last.
"That isn't the way I told you." John shook the revolver in disapproval.
"Meeting will now come to order."
"Meeting will now come to order," Silvey repeated mechanically.
"Secretary call the roll."
John snapped his fingers in disgust. He had been so busy looking after
Silvey's duties that he'd forgotten his own. There was an interchange of
glances between the two before the president spoke up scornfully,
"We'll have to let that go. Who'll be in the gang this year?"
Each member present raised a hand. The two leaders in the affair beamed.
Everything augured for a successful night of sport.
"What'll we do?"
"Let's go outside where there's room," Sid suggested. "My leg's gone to
sleep."
"Now," said John a few minutes later, as the five boys stretched
themselves out on the soft grass beside the shack, "there's the garbage
cans on the flats' back porches. They're never, taken in on Halloween."
Silvey nodded. "'Member the chase the janitor gave us last year before
we had half of 'em spilled?"
"That was because we started at the bottom and worked up," explained the
master strategist. "This time we'll begin at the top and spill 'em out
as we go down. We'll be off before the janitor learns about it."
Red chewed on a blade of grass thoughtfully. "Leave milk bottles alone
this time. 'Specially old lady Boyer's."
The members nodded approval. On the Halloween preceding, Sid had
discovered a solitary container on a window near the flat entrance and
dashed it to the cement walk amid exultant yells. Hardly had the noise
subsided when a wrinkled, gray-haired head made a distracted appearance
at the opening, with a cry of, "I want my milk! I want my milk!"
Returning a moment later from panic-stricken flight, the full meaning of
the act dawned upon the boys and remorse overcame them. A hasty search
for coin of the realm, a moment of consultation, and Silvey, boosted
high on his comrades' shoulders, had rapped on the window ledge. "It
ain't much, ma'am, but it's all we got, and we didn't know the bottle
was yours," he had murmured; and, all unwitting of the sardonic humor of
the act, had passed in a check good for a drink at a near-by saloon.
There were moments of reflective silence. "Isn't there something new we
can do this year?" Silvey appealed to his fellow members. "Garbage cans
and doormats and ringing electric bells are fun, but isn't there a trick
we've never worked before?"
"Get some grease and spread it over a porch before you ring the bell,"
suggested Sid. "My big brother, who's away at college, used to do it.
Told me so, himself."
"I tried that once," Red broke in scornfully. "Nearly broke my back
getting away. Besides the fellow never steps where he ought to."
John spat with sudden deliberation at a chip of wood on the turf. "Who
can get a lot of tomato cans without any holes in them?"
Silvey mentioned a city dump just north of the park, where cans of all
sizes and conditions were to be found. His chum nodded approvingly.
"Sid, you and Perry go over there Saturday morning and bring back as
many middling-sized ones as you can carry. You other fellows cut up
pieces of string about as long as you are."
"S'posing the trick don't work after all that trouble?" asked Sid
irritably. John was always giving him jobs to do.
"I'll bring a hose key Halloween night," went on John, ignoring the
interruption. "We'll tie a string to a tin, fill it up with water from
the hose pipe on the front lawn, and tie it to the doorknob. Door jerks
open when the bell rings--you know how mad a fellow is then--and the
water goes flying into the hall, ker-splash! Bet you that'll make some
fun!"
The others regarded the inventor in silent admiration. "How about the
cop?" asked one of them finally.
"Never got mad last year, did he? He's all right. Besides, he's too fat
to run very fast."
The back door in the Silvey home squeaked disturbingly as Mrs. Silvey
appeared. A dusting cap was jammed determinedly over one eye, and in one
hand was a broom.
"Bill, you come in here right away. I want you to help me move the hall
rug."
Silvey drawled a response. "Jes' wait until we get through talking. It
won't be a minute." He turned to the rest of the "Tigers." "Everybody
got pea shooters?" They had, or would have before the eventful day
arrived.
"I bought a peachy false-face," Perry boasted in the lull of the
conversation which followed. "You ought to see it; looks just like a
circus clown."
"Leave it at home," said John brusquely. "You can't see out of 'em when
you're running away, and they get all sticky, anyway. They're for kids,
not for fellows like us."
"Bill!" scolded the maternal voice again. "Come in the house this
minute, before I tell your pa on you when he gets home."
There was that final note of exhausted patience in Mrs. Silvey's voice
which commanded instant obedience. He rose with alacrity. As he mounted
the steps, the boys still at liberty scampered away in the fast
gathering dusk for a game of "Run, sheep, run," down the tracks and over
the grass plots and back yards on the street.
It was nearly six when John came panting into the kitchen.
"What have you been doing, son?" asked his mother as she half turned
from the gas stove to smile down at him.
"Oh, talking about Halloween, and what we're going to do, and lots of
things. It's going to be peachy."
"Mind, you're not to destroy property or anything like that. Otherwise,
you'll have to stay in the house Saturday night."
He yawned with elaborate carelessness. "Just going to blow beans and
ring doorbells, same as we did last year. Isn't it supper time? I'm
hungry."
"We'll eat as soon as your father gets home, son." She turned to give
the creamed potatoes a stir lest they stick to the pan. "Oh, I nearly
forgot! There's a letter at your place on the dining-room table. It came
in the afternoon mail."
"For me?" Surprise made his voice rise to a funny squeak. "Who from?"
"A young lady, I think."
He dashed into the dining-room and opened the envelope with clumsy
fingers. On a diminutive sheet of note paper, decorated at the top with
two laughing gnomes, ran an invitation copied from some older person's
formula:
"Miss Louise Martin requests the pleasure of Mr. John Fletcher's company
at a Halloween party to be given at her home on Saturday, October 31st,
from eight to ten o'clock."