"Hullo, Dave!"
"Hullo, Dick. I've been looking for you. My, but you're dressed up to-night. Going to a party that I haven't heard about?"
"Not exactly," laughed Dick. "I'm going to call on Mrs. Dexter."
"Oho!"
"She sent a note that she'd like to have me call this evening. What it's about I don't know."
"Then I can guess," offered Dave.
"What?"
"Mrs. Dexter was set on getting football uniforms for us. When the league dropped out at the bottom that spoiled her chance. Mrs. Dexter feels that she's under obligations, and so has sent for you in order to find what she can do in the place of buying uniforms."
"Do you think that's it?" questioned young Prescott, looking bothered.
"I'm sure of it."
"Then I wish I weren't going up there to-night."
"Have you got to?" asked Darrin.
"It would hardly look polite if I didn't go. But I'll tell you what, Dave."
"What?"
"You come along with me."
"Not much!"
"Why not?"
"First place, I'm not invited. Second place, I'm not dressed up, and you are. Extra, I don't want to look as though I were trotting up there after a reward."
"I'm not, either," Dick retorted with considerable spirit.
"I know you're not, but you can say 'no' for both of us, and for Greg thrown in."
"Then you won't come with me?"
"I'll feel more comfortable down here on Main Street," laughed Dave. "If you get back early enough you can tell me about it."
"If Mrs. Dexter doesn't want anything except to talk about rewarding us," grunted Prescott, "I can promise you that I'll be back bright and early."
"So long, then, and good luck!"
"What?"
"Good luck in getting away, I mean."
So Dick pursued his course alone, and feeling a good deal more uncomfortable, now that he had a suspicion of Mrs. Dexter's business.
Up at the pretty little Dexter cottage things had been moving serenely of late. Ab. Dexter had not been heard from, and his wife imagined that the fellow had gone to other parts. For weeks she had kept a special policeman in the house at night. On this particular evening the man wanted to be away at a lodge meeting, and Mrs. Dexter had felt that it was wholly safe to let him go, more especially, as resourceful Dick Prescott would put in part of the evening there.
When the bell rang, Jane being upstairs with little Myra, Mrs. Dexter herself opened the front door.
Then she sprang back suddenly, stifling a dismayed little scream, for Abner Dexter stood facing her.
"Didn't expect me, did you?" jeered the fellow, pushing his way into the hall. "Jennie, I'm at the end of my rope, and of my patience, too. I'm broke—have hardly a dollar in the world, and now you've got to do your duty and provide for me in the way that a rich wife should. In there with you!"
Ab. pushed her into a little room just beyond the parlor, and stepped in after her.
"Nice, comfortable place you have here, while I'm wondering where my next meal is coming from!" sneered the fellow.
"Abner, I gave you ten thousand dollars, and you promised to leave me alone," protested the woman, afraid of the evil look that she now saw in her worthless husband's face.
"Well, I haven't any of that money, and I've got to have more," retorted Dexter emphatically. "Jennie, I want twenty-five thousand dollars. Give me that, and I'll leave the country for good."
"I—I couldn't trust you," she faltered.
"Don't talk that way to me!"
"I have good reason to, Abner, and you know it."
"You thought I had forgotten you, didn't you?" he sneered harshly.
"I hoped that you had at last made up your mind to let me alone," replied the woman, trying to summon a bravery that she did not feel.
"I haven't forgotten you. Jennie, you will have to find and turn over to me the twenty-five thousand dollars that I want. You will never know any peace until you do do it, and you will never see me again after you have given me the money. Now, aren't you going to be sensible?"
"Yes," she flashed. "I'm going to be too sensible to listen to you any longer. You have been watching this house, and you came to-night because you knew I was alone. If you won't go, at least I shall not stay here to listen to you."
"Oh, yes, you will," replied the man angrily, barring the doorway.
At that instant the telephone bell in a niche in the hallway sounded.
"Let me answer that call," cried Mrs. Dexter.
"No, I won't!"
Then both heard, with very different feelings, a voice speaking these words:
"Central, I am Dick Prescott, at Mrs. Dexter's. I shall probably be interfered with. Call up the police station in a hurry and say that Dexter is here, threatening Mrs. Dexter, who is without defense. I——"
Slam! Dick felt himself seized by the collar. He was banged up roughly against the wall.
"You young hound!" blazed Ab. Dexter.
"Don't hurt him!" screamed Mrs. Dexter.
"I'll do as I please with this young hound!" snarled Dexter hoarsely. "What right has he interfering with me in this manner? Come along, you meddling youngster!"
As the telephone connection was still open, the girl at central office was able to hear every word.
Ab. Dexter, still gripping struggling Prescott by the collar, dragged him down the hallway and into the same room where he had recently been talking with his unfortunate wife. Mrs. Dexter followed, pleading.
"What are you doing here?" blazed Dexter, giving Dick a shaking that made his teeth rattle.
"I sent for him, Abner. I wanted to find how I could best reward him for——"
"For interfering with me on another occasion—yes, I know!" finished her husband, glaring at her. "You'd spend a lot of money on any one who tried to injure me, but you wouldn't give me a cent to keep me from starving!"
As Dexter rattled off this charge he worked himself up into a passion. He shook Dick again, until he espied a closet in the room, in the lock of which was the key.
"In there for you!" snarled Dexter, still shaking Prescott and dragging him across the room. Slam! Into the closet went Dick. Click! went the lock, and Dexter thrust the key into his pocket.
"I'll take command of things here, as I ought to," growled the man. "As for you, Jennie, here's another closet on the other side of the room. Come, for I don't want to hurt you."
Frightened badly now, the woman obeyed the impulse of Dexter's hand on her arm. She sank, cowering, into the other closet. Dexter turned the key in that lock also.
"Now, are you going to come to your senses?" He called through the locked door to his wife.
"If you mean am I going to give you any more money, I am not!" came Mrs. Dexter's reply, in a firmer tone, for she had been stung anew into defiance.
"Then good night—and good-bye!" he laughed harshly.
Both captives heard the scratching of a match. Dexter held the small flame against a drapery until it was burning freely.
He had no intention of having his wife burn up in the house, for, dead, her money would be lost to him forever. He planned only to scare her into nervous collapse. But Jane, the housekeeper, did not liberate the captives in the two closets as Dexter had expected. Instead, as the housekeeper came to the head of the stairs, heard the crackling of flames and smelled the rising smoke, she fell on the landing in a faint.
"Dick! Dick!" screamed Mrs. Dexter's voice. "The house is afire. Can't you break down the door and save us both?"
"I'm trying to," shouted back young Prescott above the din of his own blows. "I'm trying to—but I'm afraid this door is too strong for me!"
Inside of a minute Dick Prescott was both gasping and despairing.
Outside the volume of smoke was increasing. Some of it worked in through the cracks around the door.
Coughing, choking, trembling in a cold chill of dread, Dick continued frantically to hurl himself against the door.
"Can't you get out, Dick?"
"I'm awfully afraid I can't."
"Nor can I," screamed back Mrs. Dexter, though she was doing nothing besides beating a feeble tattoo with her soft fists against the panels of the door of her prison. "Jane! Jane!"
But the housekeeper still lay in a death-like faint above. As for Myra, she slept as only a tired small child can sleep.
"Oh, Dick, you must break down your door!" screamed the woman. "Myra—my child—upstairs. She'll be burned to death!"
"I'll keep on trying, ma'am, as long as I have any life left," Dick promised, chokingly.
Brave words! Young as he was, Dick Prescott was not of the kind to die a coward's death. Yet, in his own mind he was convinced that the door was too stout for him.
"You can't save us, can you?" called Mrs. Dexter's own choking tones finally.
"I'm still trying, ma'am."
"But you don't expect to succeed. Tell me the truth."
"I shan't give up, ma'am, but I am afraid that all the chances are against us!"
Bang! Bang! went Dick's shoulders against the panels. He was aching now from his hopeless exertions.
Yet, every time that he paused he heard the crackling of the flames outside. The sound told him that the woodwork had caught at last.
"Dick!"
"Yes, ma'am."
"I'm quite calm now."
"I'm glad to hear that, Mrs. Dexter."
"I've stopped thinking of myself, Dick. I know that my little Myra is asleep. She'll suffocate, and won't wake up to know any pain."
"But where's your housekeeper?"
"She must have slipped out after she put Myra to bed. There's no hope for us, Dick. We must go as bravely as we can. But, my poor boy, I can't tell you how sorry I am that helping me has brought you to such a plight."
"But you forget, Mrs. Dexter. Central will send a policeman. He will find out what's wrong here and save us."
"Don't try to comfort me with false hopes, Dick. You and I both know that the policeman can't get here in time to save us."
This had, indeed, occurred to Dick some moments before, but he wanted to help Mrs. Dexter to keep her courage up as long as possible.
"Dick," called a subdued voice, "your mother taught you to pray?"
"Oh, yes, ma'am."
"Then you know how to pray now—the last chance you'll have."
"All right, then," young Prescott shot back to her, "and I'll keep on working while I pray!"
Mrs. Dexter did not speak again. The smoke, passing into the closet, had proved too much for her, and she had collapsed on the floor.
But Dick, naturally stronger, and with robust lungs, was still fighting bravely, though he was conscious that he was growing feebler and that air was harder to get.
Then there came to his ears two sounds of the sweetest description. The first noise was that of running feet. The second was Dave Darrin's voice shouting:
"Fellows, there's some fearful work going on here. And here's the fire! Move like lightning! Bring water from the kitchen—in anything."
There was a sound of many running feet. Then Dick called, huskily:
"Dave, are you there?"
"Dick, where are you?"
"In this closet—locked in!"
"But there doesn't seem to be any key," quivered Darrin.
"No; Dexter took that away with him."
"Did he set this——"
"Yes; but listen! Mrs. Dexter is locked up in the closet opposite."
Dave crossed the room in a flash. Finding the key in the lock of the other closet door, Dave Darrin turned it and found Mrs. Dexter lying on the floor.
"Fellows!" bawled Dave hoarsely. "Never mind the water. Come here—on the jump!"
Half a dozen boys ran back into the room, just in time to see Dave struggling to drag Mrs. Dexter out to the front porch.
"One of you help me," directed Darrin. "The others batter down that closet door over there. Dick Prescott is locked up there, and there is no key."
"Here's a hatchet," cried another boy, running in from the kitchen. "Clear the way and let me at the door."
The boy was Greg Holmes. He brought the hatchet down with telling force at each blow, smashing all the paneling around the lock. In a very few moments Greg had the door open, and he and Dave helped catch Dick as the latter fell forward, dizzy and all but unconscious.
"Rush him out on to the front porch!" ordered Dave. "Then we'll come back and fight the fire!"
"Has—has anyone turned in an alarm?" inquired Dick, as he reached the porch and took in a life-saving breath of the pure, cool air.
"No," admitted Dave. "We forgot that. But I'll run and do it now."
"What's the matter? Fire?" called a man from the next yard.
"Yes," Dave yelled back. "Run and turn in an alarm, won't you?"
"I surely will," came the answer.
This left Dave free to remain and do what he could.
"I'm all right now," declared Dick, getting up out of the chair into which he had been dropped, though he was not yet any too strong. "Dave, you and the other fellows fight the fire the best you can. Greg, you come upstairs with me, and we'll find Myra and get her out of the smoke."
At the head of the stairs Prescott and Holmes found Jane, still in a faint.
"We'll need more help to get her downstairs," muttered Dick. "Greg, you find Myra, bundle her in blankets and rush down with her. I'll stay here until you come back."
When Greg, after darting downstairs with the child, returned, he had two other boys with him. It took all four to get Jane down and outside to one of the porch chairs.
"This is work for the doctor," announced Dick, looking from Jane to Mrs. Dexter. "You other fellows jump in to get the fire out, and I'll 'phone for Dr. Bentley. He's Mrs. Dexter's doctor."
While making that comment, Dick darted back to the telephone. As seconds were precious here, he merely called up central and stated what was wanted. Then he ran to join the others.
"There's a hose outside this window. I've seen it before," called Prescott, opening the window and jumping outside. Then:
"Dave!"
"Here I am, Dick."
"Here's the hose. I'll pass the nozzle in and then turn the water on."
"Bully for you, Handy Andy!"
Sizz-zz! Dave directed the stream against the liveliest flames. It was only a lawn-sprinkling hose that he held, but even that threw a lot of water.
Dick climbed in through the window again.
"We'll hold things down until the firemen get here," he announced energetically.
So busy had all been that only two or three out of the ten boys present had noticed that the fire-alarm whistle had called off the box number some time previously.
Finally, with a screeching of whistles and a clanging of gongs, a part of the Gridley Fire Department hauled up outside.
While hosemen fastened a line to a hydrant, and nozzlemen dragged the lengths in through the wide-open front door, the chief ran ahead of them.
"Where's the fire?" he called, and made his way inside.
"Well, you boys are dandies!" remarked the chief grimly. Then he ran out to the front door.
"Shut that stream off!" the chief bellowed hoarsely. "A lot of Grammar School boys have put the fire out with a lawn hose."
Two or three minutes later the policeman whom Prescott had summoned arrived, out of breath. Two minutes after that Dr. Bentley's auto stopped at the door.
Both unconscious women were revived, and Myra, who had not once awakened in all the excitement, was taken up and tucked in bed.
"How did you get into the house, Dick?" Mrs. Dexter at last found time to inquire.
"Why, the door was open just a crack, ma'am, when I got here. I heard Dexter threatening you, and realized that you must be alone. I knew I couldn't do much alone, so I sneaked in as softly as I could and got to the telephone."
As soon as he found himself with only his boy friends about, Dick demanded to know how they had arrived so opportunely.
"That's easy enough," Dave Darrin explained. "Just after you left me I ran into Greg, Tom, Dan and Harry. I told them where you'd gone, and what the business would probably turn out to be. Then—then—well, we got so awfully curious that we made up our minds to stroll up here to the corner and wait until you came out. Then we ran into four other fellows from our school, and there was a mob of us. To kill time we walked down past. As we went past we saw smoke coming out of one of the open windows on the ground floor. Then Bert Johnson remembered that he had seen Ab. Dexter come out and hurry away. It didn't take us long, then, to make up our minds to get into the house. We found the front door unlocked, and the rest was easy."
"We'll get out of here as soon as we can now," hinted Dick.
"Why?" Dalzell wanted to know, "This is the center of all the excitement in town to-night."
"Yes," Prescott replied, "but as soon as Mrs. Dexter thinks of it she'll send for us and offer more thanks and rewards. We can get away 'most any time now. And there comes her special policeman. Dexter won't be back to-night, anyway."
So the Grammar School boys slipped away, but they had added another page to the history of Gridley.
Dexter, with his usual luck, appeared to have made a safe retreat. The police paid a visit to his former cave up the road, but did not catch him there, although a police guard was kept at the cave for three days.
But Dick received a postal card, on the back of which was printed:
"If you ever interfere with me again, I promise you that your luck is at an end!"
The message was unsigned, but the message was postmarked at Gridley.
"There'll be loads of fun to-night," proclaimed Dan Dalzell, his eyes sparkling with mischief, as he danced up and down in the schoolyard at forenoon recess.
"Why?" asked Dick innocently.
"Don't you know what day this is?" Dan insisted.
"Yes; and I also know that to-night will be Hallowe'en."
"Then don't you know that there are going to be several barrels of fun uncorked in this old burg to-night?"
"I didn't know that barrels were ever 'uncorked,'" replied Dick judicially.
"Oh, pshaw! This isn't the first class in language!" retorted Dan disdainfully. "You're going to be out to see the fun, aren't you?"
"I suppose likely I shall be out on the street a little while after supper," Prescott admitted.
"Hear the young saint!" taunted Dan derisively, appealing to a group of boys. "No one would ever suppose that Dick Prescott had ever gotten up any mischief—hey?"
"Oh, Dick will have one or two tricks ready for us to trim our enemies with to-night," replied Ben Alvord. "Don't worry!"
"Sure! Dick never yet went back on the crowd," declared Wrecker Lane. "He's got a few good ones ready right now."
"Have you, Dick?" demanded a chorus of eager voices.
"Tell us one or two of the tricks now," pressed "Hoof" Sadby.
But Dick shook his head.
"Come on out with it!" coaxed Spoff Henderson.
"Ain't he the mean one—keeping it all to himself?"
"If Dick has anything hidden in his sleeve," broke in Tom Reade, "he'd show a lot of sense, wouldn't he, telling it to a lot of you fellows with loose-jointed tongues? Why, it would be in the evening paper, and the folks we want to torment would be at their gates waiting for us."
"We won't tell—won't breathe a word! Honest!" came in instant denial.
"I'll tell you just one thing, fellows, if you think you really can keep it to yourselves," grinned Dick.
"Go ahead!"
"Don't trust these talkative Indians with anything in advance, Dick," protested Tom Reade.
"Yes, yes—go ahead!" cried the boys.
"You won't tell, fellows, will you?" Dick fenced.
"Cross our hearts we won't."
"Well, then, fellows, the truth is that you are all on the wrong scent. I haven't thought up a blessed prank for to-night."
"Aw!" came an unbelieving chorus.
"Let's make him tell. Get hold of him. We'll paddle Dick Prescott until he'll be glad to tell."
There was a rush, but Dave and Tom got in front of Dick.
"Who wants to try the paddle first?" asked Dave, his fists clenching, as he faced the mischievous Grammar School boys.
"But I haven't thought of a thing, fellows," protested Prescott.
"Say, I want some of you fellows to help me take off old Pond's gate to-night," called Toby Ross. "We can take it down and hang it on the fountain in the square. That'll be a good mile from his house, and old Pond will be awful mad, because he'll have to tote it all the way back himself. He's too stingy to hire a teamster to take it back."
"And that's your idea of fun is it?" demanded Dick.
"It might be for a seven-year-old, but it sounds pretty stupid for an eighth grader."
"What do you want me to do, then—set old Pond's house a-fire?" queried Toby with an injured air.
"We'll have to take down a lot of signs and change 'em," proposed Ned Allen.
"What do you think of that, Dick?" asked Spoff Henderson.
"That sounds kiddish, too, doesn't it?" objected Dick. "And the trick is at least three times as old as Gridley."
"We can slip in at the back of George Farmer's place," suggested Wrecker Lane. "You know, he's always bragging about the fine milk he serves. Well, if we can get in at the cooling trough in his yard we can empty half the milk out of each big can and fill it up with water. Then won't he hear a row from his customers about watered milk?"
That brought a guffaw from some of the youngsters, but Dick shook his head.
"That's kiddish, too," he remarked.
"Say, what do you call kiddish tricks?" Hoof Sadby wanted to know.
"Why, things that have been done, over and over again, by small boys. All the tricks you fellows have named have been done by our grandfathers. That's why I call 'em kiddish. A fellow who can't think up a new one is only a kid. Use your brains, fellows."
"Well, if you're so all-fired smart, you tell us a new one that has some ginger in it," growled Wrecker.
"I told you that I hadn't any," retorted Dick. "I admit that I'm dull. But, if I do play any tricks to-night, they'll have to be just a little bit new. Boys of our age haven't any business traveling around with Hallowe'en jokes that are so old that they've voted and worn whiskers for forty years. It isn't showing proper respect for old age."
"Dick has a few new ones in his tank. Don't you worry about that," muttered some of the wise ones. "You just find Dick & Co. on the street to-night, and stick to 'em, and you'll see plenty of fun happening."
"I'll tell you something else that we fellows are growing a bit too old for, too, if you want to know," Dick offered presently, for the crowd still insisted on hanging out close to this usually fertile leader in fun.
"Fire away," groaned Spoff.
"Well, then, I mean the kind of tricks that destroy people's property. The fellow that shies a stone through the window of some one he doesn't like, or who carries off gates, or tramples flower beds is only a cheap penny pirate."
That was rather daring, for Dick's condemnation had touched rather closely some forms of mischief that boys always imagine as belonging to them on Hallowe'en night.
However, the general opinion was against quarreling with Dick. Without him and his chums on the streets, the Grammar School boys knew that there wouldn't be as much sport.
"You're trying to think up some good ones, aren't you?" asked Dave, as he and Dick were about to part on the homeward way at noon.
"Yes, of course; but I hope you other fellows have brains that are working faster than mine is to-day."
"Oh, you'll have something ready by to-night," laughed Dave.
"I hope so."
That afternoon the boys and girls in Old Dut's room did not appear to have their minds very much on their lessons. A man of Old Dut's experience knew why.
"I'll stay at home and sit tight on my place to-night," murmured the principal to himself. "Like as not I'm slated to be one of the biggest Hallowe'en victims."
When Dick reached Main Street that evening he found himself instantly the center of a crowd of at least twenty boys from the Central Grammar.
"What'll we do, Dick?" came the hail.
"Anything you like," agreed Prescott.
"But what have you thought up?"
"Nothing."
"Cut that!"
"Honest, fellows, I haven't."
"Never mind," sang out Dave. "We fellows will just roam around town for a while and see what is happening. Something will pop into our minds, and then we can have a bit of mischief."
"Hullo!" muttered Toby. "Say! Just look at Hoof!"
"Whatcher got there, Hoof?" demanded a laughing chorus.
For Hoof Sadby, looking more sheepish than ever before in his life, had appeared on the scene carrying a baby. It was a real, live one, too—his year-and-a-half-old brother, to be exact.
"Say, don't guy me too much, fellows," begged Hoof sadly. "I'm in a pickle, sure. Pop and mother are going to a sociable to-night. That is, they've already gone. And they said——" Hoof paused. "They said——" he tried again. Then, in final desperation he shot it out quickly. "They said I'd have to stay home, and—mind the baby!"
"Isn't that a shame?" came a sympathetic chorus, but a few of the fellows laughed.
"It's a boy, any way," argued Hoof, rather brokenly, "and a smart little fellow, too. Now, if he's going to grow up right as a boy the kid ought to start in early. So I've wrapped him up warm and have brought him out with me."
"What are you going to do with him, Hoof?"
"I'm going to tote the little fellow around to see the fun—if you fellows can stand having me with you," announced Hoof sadly, rather pleadingly.
"Why, of course you can come, can't he, fellows?" appealed Dick.
"If you're sure that the youngster won't catch cold," agreed Tom Reade. "A baby is a human being, you know, and has some rights of his own."
"Oh, I won't let the little shaver catch cold," promised Hoof. "See how warmly I've got him wrapped up."
As some of the fellows crowded about their encumbered mate, baby laughed and tried to reach them.
"He's a good fellow, if he is young," spoke up Greg. "Bring him along, Hoof."
So that was settled, and the crowd turned down one of the side streets. These darker thoroughfares, as all knew by experience, were safer for Hallowe'en pranks. The dark places were the easiest ones in which to escape when pursuit offered.
Nor had the Grammar School crowd been strolling along more than two minutes when Dick suddenly halted them by holding up one hand.
"What is it?" whispered several, mysteriously, as they crowded about the leader.
"There's Mose Waterman's house, and it's all dark there," murmured Dick. "And it's the same over at Mr. Gordon's. Now, you know, Waterman and Gordon have never spoken to each other since they had that law suit."
"Yes, yes!"
"Well, the warm weather lately has led Mose Waterman to leave his porch chairs out later'n usual. Now, fellows, suppose we lift the chairs from Waterman's porch and put 'em over on Gordon's porch. That wouldn't be far for Waterman to go after 'em, but do you think he'd do it? Never! He will growl, and swear that Gordon stole the chairs. And Mr. Gordon is too angry with Mose Waterman to take the chairs back. So it'll give us fun for a fortnight strolling by in the day time and noticing whether Waterman has his chairs back."
"Wow!" "Whoop!" "And you said, Dick"—reproachfully—"that you couldn't think up anything!"
Half a dozen figures moved swiftly and stealthily. In a twinkling the transfer of porch chairs from Waterman's house to Gordon's had been made. The young mischief-makers passed on, looking for more nonsense. But that joke became almost classic in Gridley. For days and days after that Waterman and Gordon glared at each other from their front windows, or whenever they met on the street. But neither would touch the chairs, and neighbors grinned every time they passed and saw the chairs still on the Gordon porch. One night, in November, however, Gordon took the chairs as far as the middle of the road. An hour later Mose Waterman slipped out from his unlighted house and carried the chairs back and into his own house. The neighbors had had their hearty laughs, however.
"Say, I'll bet that's the best thing done to-night," chuckled Toby Ross, as the "gang" pressed on to new scenes and new laughs.
But it wasn't quite the best thing done that night as later events showed.
"Here's where old Miss Lowthry lives," muttered Ned Allen, halting before a gate leading into the grounds surrounding a cosy little cottage.
"It wouldn't be very manly to do anything to scare lone women, would it?" demanded Dick.
"She's an old maid," protested Toby.
"That's no crime," insisted Dick.
"She has no use for boys," breathed Ben Alvord, complainingly.
"From some things that boys do, I don't altogether blame her," chuckled young Prescott.
"And—say! Don't Miss Lowthry hate babies!" grunted Wrecker Lane. "You remember Fred Porter? His folks used to live in that next house. When Fred was a baby they say he used to cry something awful. Well, once in the summer, after Fred had cried every night for a week, and Miss Lowthry had to hear it all through her open windows, what did she do but go to the health board and ask that the Porters be ordered to make their baby stop crying. There was an awful fuss about it, and Miss Lowthry made some talk about all babies being brats."
"They are not," denied Hoof Sadby indignantly.
"That's what I'm trying to tell you," went on Wrecker calmly. "That's why I have no use for old maids that hate babies. Now, there are some old maids that are really fine. But Miss Lowthry!"
"Wrecker, you live right near here," murmured Dick suddenly.
"'Course I do."
"Then come aside. I want to whisper something to you."
Then Dick talked in whispers with Wrecker for a few moments. The other boy was seen by the curious suddenly to double up with laughter. From that attitude Wrecker recovered, only to start off on the run.
"Say, what is it?" demanded a dozen cautious voices as Dick came back to the crowd.
"Now, see here, fellows, don't want to know too much. Just stay around and see what happens, and you'll all enjoy it as much as Miss Lowthry does."
"Then it's against her?" breathed Ben Alvord. "Good! great!"
"Now, you, Dave, stay here with me," Dick went on, disposing of his forces with the air of a general. "The rest of you fellows scoot across the lawn and hide in the bushes. Hide so that you can't be seen from the street or from the front door of the cottage, either. Then just wait and see what happens."
Tom Reade and Greg managed to get the crowd started. Then Dick called, softly:
"Oh, say, Hoof! I'll hold the baby for you a while. You must be tired."
Hoof started, and glared suspiciously. But he knew that Dick was "always on the square," and so, after swallowing hard, passed the tiny, bundled youngster over to Prescott's waiting arms. "Say, be careful what you do with him," pleaded Sadby. "He's a fine little fellow."
Then the crowd hid. How they watched and waited! Miss Lowthry's sitting room was lighted, and the boys could see her, seated in a rocking chair, reading a book.
It seemed ages ere Wrecker Lane returned. When he came he brought a basket. Some soft fragments of blanket rested in the bottom of it.
"Just the thing," chuckled Dick softly, placing the baby in the basket. "Now, skip over there, Wrecker, and hide with the fellows in the bushes."
Dick waited until Wrecker Lane vanished.
"Now, come along, Dave," chuckled Prescott. "You ring the bell just as I place the basket on the steps. Then we'll both hot-foot it to join the fellows."
A few moments later Dick and Dave scurried to cover, snuggling down among a lot of Grammar School boys who were holding their handkerchiefs wedged in their mouths.
Then they heard the front door open, saw Miss Lowthry peer out, and then heard her utter a shriek, followed with:
"Mercy me! Who has dared to leave a foundling on my step?"
And then, as she bent over and poked the pieces of blanket aside:
"Mercy! What a horridly homely brat!"
"It isn't!" exploded Hoof, in an undertone, as he snatched the handkerchief from his mouth. "Gracious! Wouldn't I like to pinch her!"
But Miss Lowthry must have recognized her duty as a citizen, for she picked up the basket and bore it into the house, slamming the door behind her.
"Wow! Oh, dear! oh, dear!" laughed a lot of mischievous youngsters hidden in the bushes.
"Look!" whispered Dave Darrin. "She has taken the basket into her sitting room. She's placed it on a table. There she goes to the telephone. Whee! See how she's working her arm, jerking that telephone bell crank!"
Some conversation that the young peepers, of course, couldn't hear passed over the telephone. Then Miss Lowthry hung up the receiver and thrust her forefingers into her ears as she turned to stare at the human contents of the basket on the table.
"The poor kid's hollering," muttered Hoof. "Can you blame it?"
All that followed, and which the boys could see through the lighted windows of the room interested them mightily. But at last they heard a heavy step on the sidewalk. Then one of the blue-coated guardians of Gridley's peace turned in at the gate, went up to the door and rang the bell.
"She sent for the police," chuckled Dick Prescott.
"Of course," grinned Dave.
The peeping boys saw the officer step through into the old maid's sitting room. Miss Lowthry pointed at the basket in a highly dramatic way. The policeman bent over to take a kindly look at the tiny youngster therein, then adjusting the pieces of blanket, he lifted the basket.
"Now, it's time to do your turn, Hoof," whispered Dick, giving young Sadby a nudge. "Slip over the fence and do it right."
Miss Lowthry followed the policeman to the door, opening it for him and letting him out.
"Boo-hoo!" sounded a heart-broken voice out on the sidewalk, in the darkness beyond. Then, as the policeman stepped down from the steps, Hoof suddenly let out a wail and darted into the yard.
"Say, Mister Cop, have you got it?" demanded Hoof eagerly.
"Got what?" demanded the policeman.
"My baby brother! You see, Mister Cop, some fellows took my baby brother and carried him off for a joke."
Then Hoof came into the pale light that was shed just past the open front door. There were tears in his eyes, all right, for an onion was one of the things that "Wrecker" Lane had brought from home. Hoof had rubbed a slice of the onion on the skin under his eyes, and the tears that he wanted to show were genuine enough.
"Is this your brother?" demanded the policeman, lowering the basket he was carrying.
The Sadby baby had begun to cry again, but at sight of Hoof the little fellow stopped suddenly, crowed and reached out with its little hands.
"After that do you have to ask if that's my kid brother?" demanded Hoof Sadby proudly.
"I guess it is, all right, Sadby," replied the policeman. "I know you. Well, if this is your brother, please take him off my hands—and welcome. You see, Miss Lowthry, it was nothing but the humorous prank of some boys. This is Hallowe'en."
"Boys!" sniffed Miss Lowthry, glaring. "Humph! I think I could eat a couple of boys, right now, if I could see them skinned alive and then boiled."
Hoof, once he had possession of the basket, raced away as though nothing else on earth mattered. This was good policy for, if he lingered, the policeman might begin to ask questions.
When the door had closed and the officer was gone, Dick and his crowd slipped out from concealment, joining Hoof and his baby brother.
"Oh, me, oh, my!" groaned Dave Darrin, stifling with laughter. "We must play this on some more folks."
"But say," warned Dick Prescott, "don't you think that, by the time we've played this on three or four more people, the policeman will begin to be suspicious of Hoof's wailing accents and his great joy at finding his kid brother?"
"Oh, we'll have to try it again, anyway," urged Tom Reade. "I know just the people to work it on. You know Mr. and Mrs Crossleigh? They live around on the next street. They haven't any children, and they're big cranks."
The Hallowe'eners hidden across the street, and Hoof Sadby posted up the street, ready to come on the scene and do his part when needed, Tom Reade and Greg Holmes crept up to the front porch of the Crossleigh home, deposited the basket, rang and then bolted.
In a short time a dim light was visible through the stained glass of the front door. Then that barrier itself was opened, and Mr. Crossleigh, a man past middle age, and in dressing-gown and slippers, came out.
Seeing no one, and coming further out, Mr. Crossleigh almost kicked the basket. But he recovered in time, and bent down.
The peepers, not far away, heard him utter an exclamation of amazement. Then:
"Wife!" he called back into the house. "Come and see who's here!"
"Who is it?" hailed a voice from inside. "Cousin Jenny?"
"No; it isn't."
"Who? The minister?"
Then Mrs. Crossleigh came down the hallway and out on to the porch.
"Now, who do you think it is?" chuckled Mr. Crossleigh, lifting the basket.
"Henry Crossleigh, where on earth——"
"Don't ask me where it came from, wife. I found it here on the stoop when I answered the bell."
"Well of all the——" gasped the woman in wonder.
"Ain't it!" agreed her husband.
"It's—it's—why, I do believe it's a real cute little shaver," continued the woman hesitatingly.
"Fine little fellow, I should say, though I'm no judge," continued Mr. Crossleigh.
"And it isn't crying a bit. Do you suppose it's a foundling, left on our stoop, as we sometimes read of in the papers, Henry?"
"That's just what it is, of course. Folks don't leave small children around for a joke, wife."
"And have we got to take it in and keep it?"
"The law doesn't compel us to."
"But—Henry——"
"What is it, wife?"
"Do you suppose—we've never had any children. Do you think we could——"