YOUNG MR. COME-BACK & CO.
"Say, you fellows----" began Hen, stepping out and joining Dick & Co.
All six turned to gaze at Dutcher. Then they looked at each other, the
same thought in six minds. It was Dick who spoke:
"Hen, we came near overlooking the fact that this is your chance to get
back to your friends. Get on your coat, your cap and mittens, and----"
"Whatcher talking about?" demanded Dutcher, looking almost startled.
"Hey! Mr. Dock!" bellowed Dave, using his hands as a megaphone.
The rather distant constable turned to look back.
"Please wait! There's a boy to go with you," Dave called.
"A-a-a-ll right," the answer came back.
"Hurry, Hen," Dick advised.
"But--but I don't want to go," protested Hen.
"You'd better," Dick advised him. "We housed you while it was necessary,
but now there's a chance to get back to your uncle's, so you may as well
go."
"I don't want----"
"Never mind about that," Dick continued firmly. "You'll be better off at
your uncle's, and Constable Dock is headed that way."
"But my uncle doesn't want me," whined Hen.
"Then why should you think we can endure you, Hen, if your uncle can't?"
demanded Tom Reade, with a short laugh.
"Don't keep the constable waiting, Hen," Dick pressed him. "Get your
motion started."
"Oh, well, if you fellows want to be mean, I suppose I'll have to go,"
faltered Hen. "But I was enjoying myself here."
"You'll enjoy yourself better still with your aunt," Dick urged with a
smile. "Besides, you'll have your aunt's good cooking and a real bed to
sleep in. If the country highways aren't broken out yet, they will be in
a day or two, and then you can get back to Gridley."
"All right, if you fellows bounce me out of camp," sighed Hen ruefully,
as he began to pull on his overcoat. "But I think you're about the
meanest----"
"Save the rest of it, Anvil, if you please, until we're all at home in
Gridley," Dave begged him.
"Say, you stop calling me Anvil," snarled Dutcher. "I don't like that
name."
"Why not?" pursued Dave. "It fits you."
"Tell that boy to hurry up, if he's going with us," bawled Mr. Dock from
a distance.
"Brace, Hen," Tom advised. "There, now you're ready. Good-bye, and come
again when you're grown up."
"Those fellows don't know much about good manners," thought Hen Dutcher
ruefully, as he started to run over the snow crust.
"Now that Hen is gone we'll be able to stay here a day or two longer,"
Dave announced. "We'll have the food to do it with."
"There's one good point about Hen Dutcher, anyway," grimaced Tom Reade.
"He's a good, sincere eater."
"He was eating us out of camp," Dick replied. "Now, fellows, with Hen
and Fits gone, we're all by ourselves--just the crowd that we want. The
snowcrust will bear, and we can move about. We ought to have a jolly
time tramping about through the woods."
"Hunting!" proposed Harry. "We've got the air rifle."
"Fishing," added Tom. "We brought tackle on purpose. We must be able to
find some pond hereabouts."
"But say!" Dick suddenly interjected. "Do you fellows realize that we
haven't been in the old shack since Mr. Fits left it? Queer as it may
seem to some of you, I believe that Fitsey had a hiding place even in
that little room. Let's go in there and see what we can root out in the
way of mystery explained."
All six of the boys trooped around to the smaller structure at the rear
of their camp. The door was still partly open. Dick, in advance, pushed
his way inside.
"Well of all the boobies, what do you think of us?" demanded young
Prescott, in deep disgust.
"We wouldn't take any blue ribbons at a brains' show--that's certain,"
affirmed Tom Reade.
The cook shack went up to a pitched roof. Up under the roof some
brackets had been made fast to the rafters. These brackets held a
quantity of rough boards that looked as though they had been stored up
there, years ago, to season indoors. Now, a rope hung down from this
artificial garret.
"Let's see what we can find up there," suggested Dick. Taking hold of
the rope, after shedding his overcoat, Prescott ascended, hand over
hand.
"This is where Fitsey stayed daytimes," Dick called down. "And it's not
a bad place, either. Here are two fur robes."
Dick tumbled them down below, followed by four pairs of warm blankets.
"It's all stolen stuff, I'll wager," Tom called.
"Likely enough," agreed Dick.
"See if you can find a lot of gold and gems up there," proposed Greg
Holmes.
"Nothing in that line. But stand below, two of you, and catch."
Dick began to toss down canned goods, sealed paper cartons of crackers,
canned fruits and the like.
"And to think that Fitsey took some of our poor food, when he had a
grocery store like that up aloft!" complained Harry Hazelton.
"Well, he didn't want us to suspect what he had hidden away around the
premises," Dick answered.
"Anything more up there?" called Dave.
"Nothing but one Grammar School boy," Dick announced, showing himself at
the edge of the simple loft. "I'm coming down. Each of you climb up
here, in turn, and see what a bully hiding place our old college chum
had."
One after another the boys inspected the place. It was small, but every
inch had been made to count by the late occupant.
"Fitsey pulled the rope up after him, and stayed here sleeping mostly in
the daytime," Tom called down, when aloft. "Say, fellows, after this,
when we're on the trail of a mystery, we want to look on the other side
of anything as big as a lumber pile."
Blankets, fur robes and food were transferred to the log cabin.
"But just how much better are we than thieves?" Greg suddenly asked.
"We've just been taking things that didn't belong to us."
For a moment or two that was a poser, for every member of Dick & Co.
tried, always, to be as open and honest as the day itself.
"Oh, well," grunted Dick at last, "we haven't been robbing Mr. Fits, for
a man of his habits never has anything of his own. All that he has he
steals from some one else."
"Then ought we not to try to find owners for the food we've brought in
from the shack?" queried Dave.
"Yes; if we can," agreed Dick. "But I doubt if the former rightful
owners of this food stuff would know their own goods. It's just such
stuff as one might find in anyone of a thousand grocery stores. We
couldn't identify any of these cans, ourselves, if we found it in any
one else's house. You see, these labels are all of common brands of
tinned foods. On the whole, fellows, I believe we have a clear right to
eat this food if we happen to need it while we're in the woods. It isn't
like stuff that a former owner could remember and identify."
The more they talked it over, the clearer this view became to the
Grammar School boys.
"We've time for a couple of hours of hunting, now, if any of you care to
go," Dick suggested. "We'll have daylight that long. But it won't do,
with any chance of Mr. Fits being about, for all of us to go at once. We
must leave at least two of the fellows, and they must close the shutters
and keep the bar on the door. The two fellows who stay behind can also
begin to get things ready against the supper hour. I'll be one of the
two to stay. Who'll be the other."
"No, you won't, Dick Prescott," retorted Greg. "You've been taking first
tricks at all the hard work. You've worked like a horse in this camp.
To-day you'll take the first trick at having some of the fun. I'll be
one of the two to stay in camp."
Dan also volunteered. Thereupon the other four, Harry carrying the air
rifle, started off into the woods, jogging along over the solid crust.
Though the air was keenly cold, to the boys it was all delightful. They
were warmly clad, even their feet being protected by heavy overshoes.
With caps drawn down over their ears, and warm mittens on their hands,
why should they mind if the mercury stood somewhat below zero?
Three of them were out on a trip of exploration. Hazelton, however, was
the young Nimrod. He wanted to bag a rabbit! Yet, seeing no game, Harry
finally persuaded Tom Reade to carry the rifle.
Then at last, all unexpectedly, Hazelton caught sight of a rabbit. The
little animal had hopped briskly over the snow, coming within sight of
the Grammar School boys. Ears pointing straight up, the rabbit sat on
its haunches, curiously gazing at these humans.
"Tom! Psst! ps-st! Halt!" called Harry hoarsely over the snow.
"Hey?" answered Reade, and all four came to a halt.
"There's a rabbit," called Harry softly, pointing.
"Bless me, so there is," agreed Tom.
"Well, why don't you shoot it? What are you carrying that air rifle
for?"
"To oblige you, I guess," responded Tom, not making any motion to raise
the rifle. "If you want to shoot the rabbit, come here and get the
rifle."
"If I move it will scare him away," protested Hazelton. "Quick! Get him
before he goes off on a run!"
Sighting, Tom raised the rifle, glancing through the sights at the
little white furred thing.
"Confound him! He looks too cute for anything," muttered Tom. "I haven't
the heart----"
Abruptly Reade lowered the air rifle.
"See here, Harry, if your mouth is watering for rabbit stew you come
here and get the gun, and do the shooting yourself. I'd feel like a
criminal, taking the life of that cute, innocent little thing!"
"Huh!" growled Harry.
"Come here and get the rifle, if you want to shoot," insisted Tom.
Harry looked about as queer as he felt, for a moment. Then, picking up a
piece of branch that had blown from a tree, Hazelton shied it at the
rabbit, which promptly scampered away.
"That's much the better way to go hunting," nodded Dick approvingly.
After that no more was said about hunting. Tom continued to carry the
air rifle, though plainly the weapon was all for show.
By and by the Grammar School boys came across a pond, an eighth of a
mile wide, with a brook emptying into it.
"It will be worth while bringing the tackle to this place to-morrow, and
trying for fish," proposed Dick.
"And then, if you get one, you'll get a tender hearted streak and put it
right back in the water," grumbled Harry.
"Perhaps," Dick laughed. "But say, fellows, the sun is setting, and
we're a good way from camp. Hadn't we better turn back?"
"My empty stomach says 'yes,'" nodded Darrin. So the youngsters trudged
back over their course. It was dark before they got near the log cabin.
"Ha, ha, ha!" came a croaking laugh from inside the cabin as Dick and
his chums neared the door. "That's a good one."
"Hen Dutcher's voice!" muttered Dave. "How on earth did that fellow get
back here?"
Dick reached for the latch-string, opening the door. Then these four
Grammar School boys received a big surprise.
Hen Dutcher was there, but so were Fred Ripley, Bert Dodge and a half
dozen other young fellows, all of them older and larger than the members
of Dick & Co. To make the intrusion still more impudent, Ripley's crowd
were all at table, eating the best that the cabin afforded.