"I suppose, mother, that depends a bit upon what I've been doing, doesn't it?"

"Why, has anything happened out of the usual?"

"I'll tell you about it," agreed the lad.

"Wait until I put up the shutters and lock the door," directed his father. "Then we'll all go upstairs."

Gathered on the floor above, the Prescotts listened in amazement to what their son narrated.

"Why, I never heard of so much happening before in one day," gasped Mrs. Prescott.

"It never happened to me, before, anyway," laughed Dick. "However, I hope I've brought home a good excuse for being out a little late."

"Dick," broke in his father solemnly, "the next time any such train of events happens you have my permission to be out until—let me see. Well, say, until quarter of ten. But don't let such things happen too often. And now, to bed with you!"

"Dick is not going to bed just yet," interposed his mother. "A boy who has been as active as he has to-night is bound to be hungry. Come with me to the pantry."



CHAPTER VIII

TWO ACCIDENTS—OR TRAPS?

Before Gridley left its breakfast tables the following morning Dick Prescott and his chums were rather famous.

For the editor of the "Blade" had played up the Dexter abduction for the big local story in the morning's issue.

Dick saw it, of course, and felt a curious thrill when he saw his own name in big block type. The names of Dave and Greg were also there.

"I'll read the yarn to you while you eat," smiled his father. "This is a great day for you, lad. You're tasting, for the first time, the sensation of looming large in the public eye."

Dick read the story over twice for himself before starting for school. Yet the first thrill was missing.

"Pshaw! Len Spencer, or someone, has made a hero tale out of a boys' lark," muttered the Grammar School boy. "It sounded fine, at first, but that just shows how ready a fellow is to believe he's smarter than other folks. Whee! But we'll get a choice lot of teasing out of the fellows at school to-day!"

Prescott was glad, that morning, that he contrived to pick up Dave and Greg on the way to school.

"Get yourselves braced," Dick warned his friends. "All the fellows will be out to roast us for being 'heroes.' Oh, we'll catch it."

No sooner had the three turned the corner that led down to the school than one of their class-mates "spotted" them.

"Here come Dick & Co!" roared the discoverer. "Turn out! Give 'em a welcome! Dick & Co.—lost children trapped and trained! See the real, bony-fido heroes! 'Ray! Now, then, altogether—ouch!"

The spouter found himself suddenly flat on his back on the sidewalk, having been sent there by a vigorous trip from Tom Reade.

"All that ails you, Hen Dutcher, is that you didn't get your name in the paper," called Tom denouncingly. "But you will, one of these days. It'll be in the police-court news, though. Sixty days for vagrancy!"

"Say, do you know what I'll do to you?" demanded young Dutcher, clenching his fists and advancing upon Reade.

"Nothing," asserted Tom calmly. "That's all you ever do, except make a noise with your mouth. I never hear your mouth making any noise, though, when recitation in arithmetic is going on."

"You think you're smart, don't you?" glowered Hen Dutcher.

"I don't think you are, anyway," retorted Tom, turning on his heel.

Dan Dalzell and Harry Hazelton were at hand, and now the whole of Dick & Co. presented a rather solid front. Some of the other boys wanted to do some "guying," but Tom's prompt and vigorous rebuke to Dutcher had cooled the ardor of a lot of would-be teasers.

The bell rang soon, calling all inside. School opened as usual, but after a little Old Dut glanced up, looking keenly at Dick and two of the latter's friends.

"I am glad to be able to tell you all," began the principal, "that three of my boys, last night——"

As he paused all eyes were turned toward three boys who were turning different shades of red.

"Three of my boys," continued Old Dut, "did their school credit by displaying the qualities of good citizenship. You all know whom I mean. Master Prescott, do you care to rise and tell us something of the events of last night?"

"I'd rather not, sir," pleaded Prescott.

"Master Darrin?" pursued Old Dut.

"I feel like Master Prescott, only more so," replied Dave, turning redder still.

"Master Holmes?"

"By the advice of my lawyer," rejoined Greg solemnly, "I have nothing to say."

"I'm glad to see that our young men are modest, as well as brave," continued Old Dut.

Some of the boys had been staring expectantly, some of the girls admiringly. Laura Bentley, the doctor's daughter, looked secretly pleased when she heard Dick decline to tell of his adventures.

"First class in American history will now recite," announced Old Dut, and the work of the day had begun. Yet, somehow, most of the pupils seemed to have forgotten whatever they had previously known of the campaign against Richmond.

At recess Dick, Dave and Greg, flanked by their three other chums, managed to keep clear of tormentors.

When school was out at noon, however, one boy called out:

"Are we going to have football practice this afternoon, Dick?"

"He can't waste the time," sang out Hen Dutcher derisively. "He has a job going a-heroing."

Tom Reade turned sharply, but this time there was no need of his darting at the tormentor. Six boys had promptly caught up Hen—two by the legs, two at the body and two more at the shoulders. Rushing Hen to the nearest tree, they promptly and soundly spanked him by the very simple method of holding his legs apart and swinging his body smartly against the tree-trunk.

"You kids think ye're smart!" growled Hen ruefully, as he rubbed himself.

"Everyone knows you're not, Hen," retorted one of the late spankers. "You're only stupidly fresh."

Hen quickly subsided and vanished.

"Yes; we ought to have football practice this afternoon," Dick answered, when the question was put to him again. "We have no time to lose if we're going to play this season. How many of you fellows have studied the rules?"

"I have," answered several.

"But, say," broke in one boy, "we can just as well give up the idea of having uniforms. We fellows can't raise the cash."

"Mrs. Dexter has offered to buy the uniforms," put in Greg incautiously.

"Has she?"

A whoop of delight went up from some of the boys.

"She'll be able to buy us bully ones; she has lots of money these days," declared one listener.

"Yes; Mrs. Dexter offered to supply the money," Dick admitted. "But, fellows, I want you all to think that over. I, for one, shall vote against getting our uniforms that way."

"Why?" came a chorus.

"Because, fellows, if we haven't brains and industry enough to get our uniforms ourselves we've no business togging up at all. We can play pretty good football, for that matter, with nothing but the ball itself."

Some sided with Dick; others were in favor of letting any one who was willing provide the field togs for the Central Grammar School eleven.

Dick didn't stop to argue long. He was hungry for his dinner. On Main Street he parted from his chums, pursuing his way home alone. He had not gone far when he had to pass a new building in process of erection. Three stories had already been built up, and the workmen were now engaged in putting on the fourth and last story.

Dick was just passing the main entrance of the new building when he heard a warning rattle above. Instinct made him dart into the entrance.

Nor did he move an instant too soon. Some thirty bricks fell to the sidewalk with a great clatter. Among them landed a heavy hod.

"My! But that was a close shave!" quivered the boy. "A second or two later and my head would have been split open!"

He darted out, but did not stop until he had reached the middle of the road.

"Hey!" Prescott shouted up to the top of the building, but no one answered.

"Be careful, up there, where you dump your bricks!" called Dick once more.

A customer coming out of a store next door caught sight of the bricks and the hod.

"What's the matter, Prescott?" called the man.

"Some workman was careless, and let that hod and all the bricks fall," Dick answered. "I heard them coming, and got in out of the shower just in time."

"No workman did that," muttered the man, after staring in bewilderment for a moment. "The men are all off, getting their dinner."

"Then who could have done it?" Dick wanted to know.

"Humph! If you have any enemies, Prescott, I'd say that trick was done by some one who didn't care how badly you were hurt."

"Oh, nonsense!" rejoined Dick. "I don't believe any one hates me badly enough to do a thing like that."

"Didn't you have some trouble with a couple of men yesterday?"

"Why, yes; but——"

Dick halted suddenly, looking puzzled. Could it be possible, after all, that this was a "delicate" attention from Ab. Dexter?

For Dexter had no need to be afraid of walking the streets of Gridley. His wife had refused to procure a warrant for him on the charge of attempted abduction of Myra. She was unwilling that her child should bear the disgrace of having a father in prison.

Three other men had drawn close and halted. To them the first man explained what had happened.

"Come on!" cried one of the newcomers, hastening into the building. "One of you stay out on the sidewalk; another go to the back of the building. We'll soon find out whether there's any one in the building."

Dick joined, as the person most interested, in the swift, thorough search that was made.

No other human being than the searchers, however, was to be found in the building.

"I don't believe any one threw it at me," said Dick thoughtfully, after all hands had returned to the street. "The hod must have been left standing near the edge of the building—perhaps against the top of a ladder. Then the breeze up there may have jarred it out of place. At any rate, I'm not hurt, and no harm is done. But I wish to thank all of you gentlemen for taking the trouble to make the search."

"Humph!" muttered one of the men, after Dick had hurried away. "The idea of a hod being left standing, and then being blown over into the street doesn't satisfy me!"

Dick was late reaching home. What he had in the way of dinner he had to force down hurriedly, and then start for school once more.

After school that afternoon most of the boys of seventh and eighth grades turned up at the field, eager for more football work.

"It seems to me," announced Dick thoughtfully, "that there is no sense in kicking a ball around the field aimlessly. There isn't much use in rushes or mass plays, either, until we know what we are doing and can do it according to the rules. So, fellows, what do you say to seeing who knows the rules best? Let's have a drill in rules."

Many of the youngsters objected to that as being too tame. Yet Dick's idea carried the day, after all. Some of the fellows went away, thinking this sort of procedure too much like a lesson and too little like fun. After nearly an hour's discussion of the rules two elevens were formed and there was time for some play.

Dick & Co. left the field together. On the way home young Prescott spoke of the falling of the bricks at noon.

"That wasn't any accident," spoke up Dave, with an air of great conviction.

"You think some one did that on purpose?"

"I'm sure of it," Dave asserted.

"Who could have done it?"

"Who but Ab. Dexter?"

"Wrong!" volunteered Tom Reade. "Up at the field a man in a buggy hauled up to watch the play. He happened to mention that he had seen Dexter over in Stayton this noon. Stayton is nine miles away from here."

"Then of course it wasn't Dexter," declared Dick.

"It must have been that other fellow," suggested Greg.

"You mean that special officer, Driggs?" inquired Dick.

"Of course. And I'll tell you where else we saw that fellow Driggs. He was the driver of the cab last night. I've just placed that voice of his."

"Then Driggs was disguised last night, the same as Dexter was."

"Of course."

"And I can tell you something else," continued Tom Reade. "I know what Dexter was doing in the drug store last night. I met Len Spencer this noon. Len had been investigating."

"What did Dexter want in the drug store?" asked Prescott.

"Soothing syrup. Len says he guesses that Ab. Dexter was afraid Myra would make too much noise before he got through the night, and that Dexter must have meant to drug the child into quietness."

"It ought not to have taken Dexter all that time just to get a bottle of soothing syrup," suggested Prescott.

"It did, in this case," Reade declared. "The druggist thought there was something queer in Dexter's manner, and so he questioned him sharply as to what Dexter wanted to do with the stuff. Dexter got confused, next angry, and the druggist had about made up his mind not to sell the stuff."

"Well, I hope we've heard the last of that precious pair, Driggs and Dexter," murmured Dalzell plaintively.

"Mrs. Dexter holds the key to that situation," remarked Dick thoughtfully. "If she lets Dexter have money, from time to time, he'll still hang around. If she won't let him have money, and has herself guarded from him, then by and by he'll get tired. Then he'll clear out for new scenes and try some other scheme of getting a living without working. Mrs. Dexter——"

"Sh!" warned Harry Hazelton. "Speaking of angels, here she comes now."

"Boys, I've been looking for you," cried Mrs. Dexter, halting before them. "We didn't come to an understanding last night about the uniforms for your football team."

"How's Myra to-day?" asked Dick, anxious to shelve the other topic.

"She's all right to-day, except that the child is very nervous. That is natural, of course, after her bad scare last night."

"Aren't you afraid to leave her alone?"

"Myra isn't alone. She has Jane to look after her, and Special Officer Grimsby is in the house. I have hired Mr. Grimsby to live at my house for the present. He's a brave man, and will stop any nonsense that may be tried by certain people."

"Well, we must be getting along," urged Prescott. "It is very near our supper time, and——"

"But about the uniforms?" persisted Mrs. Dexter.

"Mrs. Dexter, the fellows appreciate your offer very highly. It pleased them all to know that you made it."

"I'm glad to hear that," smiled Mrs. Dexter.

"But, ma'am," Prescott continued just as earnestly, "while the fellows all feel extremely grateful, they would rather you didn't think of doing anything of the sort. The fellows feel that if they're smart enough to wear football uniforms, they're smart enough to get 'em. It would take all feeling of hustle out of the team if some one else smoothed the way for them like that."

"I see," half assented Mrs. Dexter reluctantly.

"Therefore, ma'am, if you will accept our gratitude for your offer, and agree to the notion of the fellows that they'll do best if they do their own hustling, we'll all be mightily pleased as well as grateful."

"Oh, well, then," replied the good woman, "we'll simply consider that the matter is postponed. I can't agree, as easily as this, to drop what I have considered my privilege."

As soon as could be, Dick & Co. made their escape.

They met again for a little while in the evening. Nothing of any real moment happened while they were together.

While Dave Darrin was on his way home, however, and going along a dark part of the street, something whizzed by his head, striking the sidewalk just ahead.

"Quit your fooling!" yelled Dave, wheeling about angrily.

No human being, however, was in sight. Dave ran back, some two hundred feet in all, but could see no one on the little street, nor in any hiding place near by.

Then Dave went back to inspect the missile. It was a stone, slightly larger than his two fists together.

"Whew!" whistled Dave inwardly. "That thing wasn't meant for any joke, either!"



CHAPTER IX

AN AWESOME RIVER DISCOVERY

"Want to come, fellows?" asked Greg, halting Dick and Dave on Main Street Saturday morning.

"Where?" asked Dick.

"Jim Haynes told me I might take his big canoe this morning."

"So you're going canoeing?" queried Dave.

"Yep; and better'n that, too," glowed Greg. "You know Payson, the farmer, up the river?"

"Of course."

"This being an apple year, Payson told me I could have a few barrels of apples if I'd pick 'em and pay him twenty cents a barrel. His orchard is right along the river bank. Isn't that a cinch?"

"I'd like to go," rejoined Dick wistfully. "But I can't, very well. You see, I've got to work in the store this afternoon. Dad is going to be away."

"Your mother'll let you go, if you tell her what a fine time you can have."

"That wouldn't be quite fair," replied Dick, shaking his head. "Mother would let me go, I know; but the trouble with her," he added, with a smile, "is that she's always too easy. And I know there's more work to do in the store this afternoon than she can handle alone."

"I'd go in a minute," Dave chipped in, "but you see I've agreed to go to the express office this afternoon and help check up bundles. I'm to get a quarter for it."

"Huh," returned Greg candidly. "I'm disappointed about you two. It takes money to buy apples, even at twenty cents a barrel. You two generally have some money."

"I've got five cents," laughed Dave. "Here it is."

"I've got a whole quarter, as it happens," added Dick, producing the coin. "I'm not going to be mean, either."

"Whew, but I'll have a job pulling the canoe alone," muttered Greg ruefully. "And it isn't much fun picking apples all alone. However, I'm going. Maybe Harry Hazelton can go with me. Tom can't and Dan won't. I'll see that you two get your shares of apples for the money you've turned over to me."

"My share will be half a hat full," laughed Dave.

"And then some more, and still some more," added Greg readily. "I won't forget that you two financed my expedition."

"I wish awfully that I could go with you, Greg," spoke Dick truthfully. "But it wouldn't be fair for me to think of leaving everything at the store for mother to do this afternoon."

"Oh, that's all right," nodded Greg.

"And you can bet that I wish I were going with you," supplemented Darrin. "But I get a lot of snaps like this one at the express office, and there are too many fellows hanging around there looking for my chance. It isn't the easiest thing in the world for a fellow to pick up silver quarters, Greg."

"Don't I know!" muttered Holmes.

So Greg went on his way.

"Say, wouldn't that be a great way to put in the afternoon?" sighed Dave. "These fine September days get into a fellow's blood and make him itch for the river and the fields."

"Don't tempt me," begged Dick Prescott plaintively. "I'm trying to do the square thing by mother, and I do want to go with Greg!"

"Oh, well, a fellow can't always act on the square and have a good time, too," philosophized Dave. "On the whole, I guess I'd rather have the satisfaction of acting on the square."

Afternoon toil brought its rewards, however. Five members of Dick & Co., released from further responsibilities, met as usual on Main Street that evening. They strolled about, met other fellows from the Central Grammar, discussed football and talked over all the other topics dear to the hearts of Grammar School boys.

"I wonder how Greg got along this afternoon?" suggested Dave. "Any of you hear?"

The others shook their heads.

"We could go down to his house and ask him, only it would look as though we were just hunting for apples," said Dick.

"Oh, Greg knows us better'n that," declared Tom Reade. "And Greg will simply bring the apples to us, if we don't go to his house. What' say if we take a trip down Greg's way? Maybe we'll meet him coming up to find the crowd."

This counsel prevailing, the five set out on a direct walk to Greg's home. A block away they met Mr. Holmes coming in their direction.

"You're just the ones I wanted to see, boys," was Mr. Holmes's greeting. "Where's Greg?"

"We were going down to the house to find him, sir," Dick responded.

"I'm a good deal worried," confessed Mr. Holmes. "Greg went up river this afternoon, after apples, and he hasn't been home yet."

"Not home yet?" gasped Dave Darrin.

Then he and Dick gazed at each other in an amazement that quickly turned in both hearts to a sickening fear.

Dave recalled the stone flying past his head; Dick remembered the flying hod of bricks. And Greg had been the third of their party who had blocked Ab. Dexter's plans!

"Oh, Greg's all right," spoke up Tom Reade cheerily.

"Then why isn't he home?" demanded Mr. Holmes. "He has had time to paddle down from Payson's three times since dark."

There was no gainsaying this statement. All five of the youngsters plainly showed their uneasiness.

"Maybe Jim Haynes knows something about the canoe," suggested Dan Dalzell.

"No; for Jim has just left our house," replied Mr. Holmes. "Jim came over to see what luck my boy had had. I'm growing more worried every minute. I think I'll go down to the river."

"We'll go with you, sir, if you don't mind," urged Dick.

"I'll be glad to have you, boys."

But the trip to the river did not lessen their worry. At the boathouse, where Jim Haynes kept his canoe, Jim's craft was the only one absent.

"There won't be any sleep in our house to-night until Greg gets home," spoke Mr. Holmes plaintively. He saw by their faces that Greg's five chums were equally uneasy. Yet all five dreaded equally to mention the bare thought that Greg might have fallen in with violence at the hands of cowardly Ab. Dexter.

"What in the wide world are we going to do?" whispered Dave aside to Dick.

"Oh, dear, I don't really know. At any rate, we'll have to leave that to Mr. Holmes."

"Boys," spoke that gentleman suddenly, "who owns that gasoline launch yonder?"

"Mr. Edward Atwater," Dick answered.

"That looks like a powerful reflector light on the bow."

"Yes, it is, sir," Dave volunteered.

"Where does Mr. Atwater live?"

"On Benson Avenue," Tom Reade replied.

"Boys, I'm going over and see if I can induce Mr. Atwater to take us up the river to-night."

"May we go, too, sir?" begged Dick anxiously.

"Yes; if you get your parents' permission. We may be up the river late to-night."

Mr. Holmes turned on his heel, going away at a walk that was close to a run.

The five members of Dick & Co. scurried homeward. Every one of them secured permission to go with Mr. Holmes, and to be out as late as necessary. Dan Dalzell, the last of the five to get back to the boathouse, was there for some minutes ere Mr. Holmes turned up with Mr. Atwater.

The owner of the roomy launch speedily had things in running order. The "Napoleon," with the reflector light going brightly, turned out of the berth and headed up the river.

"My notion, Mr. Holmes," called the owner, sitting over the steering gear, "is that we had better go rather slowly. If you'll turn that light from side to side we ought to be able to scan the whole river as we move."

Mr. Holmes was already busy swinging the light on its pivot. Behind, peering ahead in all directions, crouched Dick Prescott and his chums.

They had gone about a mile upstream when Dick suddenly called out:

"Turn the light to the right again, Mr. Holmes, please. Yes; there it is. Don't you make out a canoe over close by the shore?"

"Turn over there, Mr. Atwater," called Mr. Holmes, his hands shaking as he tried to hold the light steadily on the floating object that Dick's keen vision had picked up.

"Is—is that Jim Haynes's canoe?" asked Mr. Holmes in a choking voice, as the launch swung in close to the drifting craft.

"Yes, sir," spoke Dick huskily. "See, there's an 'H' in a circle on the bow."

Mr. Atwater ran up so close that the boys reached over and held the canoe by its rim. There could be no doubt that it was Haynes's canoe. All of the boys recognized it.

"There are no apples in the canoe," murmured Tom Reade.

"You glutton!" muttered Dan Dalzell angrily.

"No; I wasn't thinking of that," Tom retorted indignantly. "But there being no apples shows that Greg didn't get as far as getting any. If anything happened, then it happened before he had time to load the canoe with apples."

"And that must have been hours ago," spoke Mr. Holmes with a noise in his throat that was curiously like a sob.

Silently Dick and Dave fished for the bowline of the canoe, then went back and made it fast astern.

"What now?" queried Mr. Atwater, looking at Greg's father.

"I think, perhaps, we had better go on up to Mr. Payson's," suggested Mr. Holmes. "It isn't too late to call on him, and he will be able to tell us whether Greg showed up at his house at all."

The launch was soon alongside the little landing at Mr. Payson's place. Taking a lantern from the boat, Dick and his friends explored the orchard for signs of Greg until Mr. Holmes returned.

"Mr. Payson tells me that he didn't see my boy," stated Mr. Holmes. "What can we do now, I wonder?"

"I should think, sir," Dick suggested, "that it's plain enough that Greg didn't try to go home by the river. The canoe may have gotten adrift, and he may have started toward home on foot. Some of us, I think, ought to follow the road. We may find Greg somewhere along the road, injured as a result of some accident."

"That's a good idea," nodded Mr. Holmes. "Yet I shall want Mr. Atwater to keep on searching along the river, and some of you boys ought to be with him, using your sharp eyes."

A conference was held at the landing. Tom Reade and Harry Hazelton boarded the "Napoleon," after which Mr. Holmes and the other boys set out for the road.

Truth to tell, neither those aboard the launch nor those who slowly followed the road back to Gridley had much hope of encountering news of the missing Greg.

"He has fallen in with Ab. Dexter or Driggs," whispered Dave to Dick when they were so far from Mr. Holmes that the latter could not overhear them.

"That's the way I feel about it," nodded young Prescott. "First, the affair of the bricks for mine; then the big stone that whizzed by within an inch of your head at night. And now Greg, the third of us to spoil the abduction plan, is mysteriously missing."

"There's some scoundrelly plan back of all three affairs," replied Dave Darrin with conviction. "Yet why should Dexter take all this trouble to punish boys?"

"First of all, because we interfered with him, and spoiled his bold stroke," guessed Dick Prescott. "Next, through hitting so mysteriously at us all, he probably hopes to scare Mrs. Dexter out of her life. If Dexter gets her thoroughly nervous and cowed probably she'll buy him off with a lot of her inherited money. That fellow Dexter would do anything on earth to escape the penalty of having to work for his living."

"The mean rascal!" was all Dave could mutter, and he said it with pent-up savagery.

Wherever a light showed along the country road the seekers after Greg knocked at doors. Invariably the answer was the same—no tidings.

It was after one o'clock Sunday morning when the Grammar School boys returned to their several homes, discouraged and heartsick.

Of course the "Blade" got wind of the affair and had Len Spencer and another reporter out working on the mystery.

The police, too, took a hand, though there was an absolute lack of clues upon which to work.

Broad daylight came Sunday morning, and still no Greg Holmes accounted for. Now, the police took a further hand by beginning to drag the river.

The mystery continued throughout that long, dreary day. The Grammar School boys felt as though "there had been a death in the family." Len Spencer was aware of the suspicions against Ab. Dexter, but, through fear of the libel law, he was restrained from putting his suspicions into print until there was some real proof against Dexter.



CHAPTER X

A PROBLEM IN FOOTPRINTS

Monday morning dawned bright and clear.

Yet, at 7.40, the fire alarm whistle blew "twenty-two," the signal for "no school."

Some boys heard the whistle and wondered. Dick & Co., minus Greg, who were gathered on Main Street at the time, did not wonder.

Two minutes later a series of long, loud blasts rang out, the signal to call the populace to fire headquarters.

"Just what we thought," guessed Dick, as he, Dave, Dan, Tom and Harry started on a run. "There's no school because there's to be a general hunt for Greg."

The volunteer firemen of Gridley were among the first to reach fire headquarters. The few regulars of the fire department could not leave their posts. They must be on hand in case of fires starting.

But the police, the local militia officers and a few fire-department officials were quickly gathered and ready to lead searching parties. As swiftly as could be, the fire chief detailed the leaders for the parties that were to go in the various directions.

The boys of Gridley were left to join which ever searching parties they chose.

"Which crowd shall we go with?" asked Tom Reade.

"I think we'd better go with the crowd that's going up the river road," hinted Dick. "Have the rest of you any better plan?"

No member of Dick & Co. had a better suggestion to make, so Dick's plan prevailed.

There were some twenty men in the party that went up along the river road, and more than a dozen boys. Captain Hall, of the Gridley militia company, commanded this expedition.

"Now, just as soon as we get out into the country," explained Captain Hall, as they started, "we shall do well to spread out. We can cover a wide range of ground, and yet keep within hearing of each other, so that we can signal."

The first part of the road was covered rapidly. Out in the rural part Captain Hall halted his searching party and disposed of the men and boys under his command.

The line, when it moved forward again, extended into the fields for a considerable distance on each side of the road. Everyone had a complete description of Greg's clothing and hat when he had last left home. All were instructed, also, to look for a gunny sack, or any fragments thereof, for Greg had carried such a sack with him on his expedition up the river, and this sack had not yet been found.

"Even a shred of that sack, if found, may form a most important clue," added Captain Hall impressively. "I'll keep to the road. If a searcher finds anything that he regards as a clue, let him pass the word along to me as rapidly as possible. Then we'll halt the whole line, on each side, until that clue has been investigated. Don't any of you boys—or men, either, for that matter—get any idea that he's just tramping for pleasure. There is no telling who may have the luck to find a clue that will soon lead to the end of the search. Now, forward!"

It was with a sincere good will and much straining of eyes that the hunt started. It proved to be slow work. Every now and then some seeker came across what he thought might prove a clue, and then the line halted.

Many times footprints were the cause of halting the line. One set of footprints that a man found, and on which he passed the signal, proved, when measured by Captain Hall's tape measure, to be the prints of a pair of number-ten boots.

"Greg Holmes, a thirteen-year-old boy, hadn't feet of that size," remarked the militia officer almost sharply. "We know that young Holmes wears a number four boot."

Still the line dragged on. Noon came, finding the searching party about a mile above Payson's and in wilder country. Some of the men were decidedly hungry, as were also all of the boys.

Captain Hall's whistle blew sharply, bringing in his forces.

"We never thought, of course, of provisioning this expedition," said the officer, with a smile. "Do you see that farmhouse ahead? Spread out your line again, and look for me to signal when we come up with that farmhouse. If the folks living there have any food that they will sell, I'll pay for it, and we'll halt a few minutes to stoke up for more steam."

There was a cheer at this announcement, after which the line spread out again. Ten minutes later a halt was made at the farmhouse, and the flanks of the searching party came in. The farmer's wife, it turned out, had an assortment of food that she was willing to sell at a rather good price. On this assorted stuff the searchers fed, washing it all down with glasses of milk. Then the search was taken up once more.

"We're moving about a mile an hour now," Dave called across to Dick, as the Grammar School boys, away out on the right flank, tramped through a stretch of woods. "Greg may be a hundred miles from here at this minute. Question—what day in the week shall we have the luck to come up with him?"

"We're doing the best we can," Dick called back.

"Don't pass along that old chestnut that 'angels can do no better,'" grimaced Dave.

"Well, could they?"

"I don't know. But do you expect that we'll ever find Greg, moving along in this fashion?"

"Honestly, I don't," Dick called across. "But we're following the scheme laid down by wiser and older heads than ours, and I haven't any better plan to suggest. Have you?"

"I——" began Dave, but finished with: "Hang that branch! It flew back and hit me!"

"Look where you're going," called Prescott, as he climbed over a wall. "For your information, Dave, I'll say that we're coming to a road now."

Tom Reade, on Dick's right hand, and Harry Hazelton, on Dave's left, were also jumping into the road, which they started to cross hurriedly.

"Halt!" cried Prescott, and stood like one transfixed, staring down at the ground.

"What have you found?" jeered Tom. "A gold mine?"

"Better—I believe!" cried Dick joyously. "Hustle here, fellows! No—don't crowd too close or you'll trample it out."

"What do you see?" demanded Hazelton.

"This," answered Prescott, pointing down to the ground. His chums peered, too, and made out a very distinct footprint in the soft soil of this wild, little-used road through the woods.

"There's been a horse and wagon along here, too," Dick went on excitedly. "See the fresh wheeltracks, and the marks of the horse's hoofs?"

"But only that one bootprint," objected Tom. "It doesn't seem to me that it means much."

Dick gazed reproachfully at his grouped chums, his eyes blazing with excitement in the meantime.

"Say, don't you fellows remember how Greg ripped off the lower part of his left bootheel at football practice Friday afternoon?"

"Yes," admitted Dan Dalzell. "But how does this print prove——"

"I see!" broke in Dave Darrin tremulously. "This print, at the rear end, is from the same sort of heel."

"It surely is," nodded Dick. "Dan, you wear a number-four shoe like Greg's. Come here and let me measure the length of your left shoe with this string. Sit down first."

Young Prescott took the measure with his string, then applied it to the print in the ground.

"Same length, you see," flashed Dick triumphantly. "Fellows, that's Greg Holmes's footprint! You see, the print looks old, as though it had been made a couple of days ago. Yet there's been no rain and it isn't washed away. The footprint looks just about as old as the horse's hoof mark."

"Then you think that Greg took a carriage as far as here?" demanded Tom Reade dubiously.

"He was brought here in some sort of wagon!"

"Go on and read the rest of the page to us," begged Dan Dalzell, still skeptical.

"This was as far as Dexter, or whoever had Greg, wanted to bring him in the wagon," Dick continued, still scanning the ground, while employing his hands to wave away whichever of his chums attempted to come too close. "Probably Greg was taken somewhere not far from here. He may be mighty close to us now, fellows. Let's see. The footprint points straight ahead of us."

"Why isn't there more than one print?" insisted Harry Hazelton.

"Because Greg was probably lifted, so that he wouldn't leave too much of a trail."

"Then why aren't there more prints, especially of the man or men who lifted Greg?" questioned Dave.

"The men didn't intend to leave any trail at all," replied Dick, thinking hard. "Probably the first man down from the wagon landed on that hummock of grass there." Dick moved forward. "Yes, siree! Just look here, fellows—don't crowd too close to it and blot it out. See, there isn't a sharply lined footprint here, but there's a pressing down of the grass, as if some considerable weight had been pressed upon it."

Dick now moved slowly forward, the others on his flanks.

"Here's another footprint—the right foot, but Greg's size," he soon called.

Not one of the Grammar School boys but felt the full force of the excitement now.

"Say!" exploded Tom Reade suddenly. "We've plumb forgotten to pass the signal along to the others in the line."

"It's too late now. They're too far ahead of us," Dick announced. "Besides, if Greg isn't far from here, and if his captors are with him, we don't want to raise too much of a racket and scare the captors away."

"I wish they'd go away, the captors, if they're around here," grinned Dalzell. "Maybe they have guns, and would be cranky enough to use 'em on us, sooner'n give Greg up."

"If you're afraid, Dan, turn around and go back," advised Dick quietly, as he moved slowly forward. "The rest of you keep a sharp lookout for more prints around here."

"Who's afraid?" snapped Dan, his grin fading.

"Here's another footprint!" called Reade, who had ranged slightly ahead of the others.

Dick was quickly at the spot.

"That was made by Greg's left shoe," Prescott swiftly declared.

"Correct," nodded Tom Reade. "Say, fellows, we are on Greg's trail!"

The enthusiasm was "catching" by this time. The little line narrowed and the Grammar School boys pressed forward, tingling with the mystery and excitement of this problem written on the face of old Mother Earth!



CHAPTER XI

DAN SEES BEARS—IN HIS MIND

In twenty minutes, studying the ground harder than any one of the five had ever scanned a problem in arithmetic, the Grammar School boys had advanced some three hundred feet. Their course had taken them into the woods on the further side of the bridle path.

"I don't see any footprints around here," half grumbled Tom Reade.

"No," Dick replied, "because the ground is hard and stony here. This isn't the place to look for prints. But we may find some other sign at any——"

"Stop right where you are!" ordered Dave excitedly.

All halted at once, gazing up the hillside, where Dave pointed.

"Fellows, there's a big rock cropping up, and do you see that hole leading into it?"

"Looks like a bear's hole," suggested Dan, with another grin.

"Cheer up!" advised Dick, smiling. "There haven't been any bears in this part of the country in a century. But come on, fellows! That place is worth looking into."

Willingly enough all trotted up the slope to the hole in the rock, though, truth to tell, all the boys were rather footsore by this time.

The hole in the wall of rock proved to be some three feet in diameter. Dick struck a match and peered in.

"This tunnel seems to go in as far as I can see with the help of the match," young Prescott announced. "Fellows, some of us will have to crawl in here and see what we can find."

"Better not," advised Dan. "Greg isn't in there. And if that hole isn't the home of a bear then it's snakes. Ugh!"

"I'll go in with you, Dick," agreed Dave. "As for Dan, you stay out—'fraidcat'!"

"No more afraid than you are!" retorted Dalzell, stung into sudden spirit. "If you rascals are going to crawl in there, then I'm going with you. Can't take 'no' for an answer."

"If Dalzell finds any wild animals in that hole he'll feel like Daniel in the lions' den," chuckled Reade.

"I wish we had something to make a torch of," grumbled Dick. "It's slow work and a lot of nuisance to be lighting two or three matches every minute."

"Do I get a chance to go in there with you?" demanded Dan.

"I don't know whether you do or not," grimaced Dick. "You're such a scared-cat that——"

"Say that again, and you don't get—this," grinned Dalzell, hauling an object out into daylight. It proved to be a pocket electric lamp.

"Oh, you jewel!" glowed Dick.

"Am I a scared-cat?" insisted Dan, returning the lamp to his pocket.

"Nothing of the sort!" Dick declared readily.

"How about you, Dave?" demanded Dan, wheeling upon his other tormentor.

"I never admired any one's courage as much as I do yours, Danny boy," laughed Darrin.

"All right, then. You can use the lamp," conceded Dalzell, bringing it forth from his pocket and handing it over to Dick.

"Let's all hurry and get in there," proposed Tom Reade.

"Nothing like it!" rejoined Dick. "Wouldn't it be fine if we all crawled in there and Dexter and Driggs really happened to be in the neighborhood? They might come along and pen us all in there! Tom, you and Harry will have to stay outside on guard—and keep your eyes wide open."

"Hazelton can keep his ears wide open," suggested Reade. "His ears are the generous, wide-open kind, anyway."

Dick had already thrown himself on his knees, and, holding the lamp ahead of him, he crawled in as fast as he could over the rough, rocky floor of the tunnel.

Dave Darrin was right behind the leader. Third in line came Dan Dalzell, who comforted himself with the thought that, if Dick and Dave encountered anything dangerous, he (Dan) would have loads of time to crawl out again before the danger could assail him.

For more than a dozen feet the tunnel ran irregularly into the rock. Suddenly Dick uttered an excited shout.

"Whh-a-at's the matter?" almost chattered Dalzell. "What's hit you?"

"There's a regular cave here," Dick called back. "A fine, big place!"

At this moment Dave, too, straightened up as he stepped into the cave proper.

"What's going on in there?" Tom Reade called in through the tunnel.

"Stay where you are," Dalzell called back, "and don't let us get bagged in here by any one."

Then Dan straightened up on his feet and took several curious looks about him while Dick flashed the light.

"Say, this is bigger'n a barn in here, only not so high!" gasped Dan.

"I wonder why nobody ever knew of this dandy place before?" mused Dave. "And the air's good in here, too."

"The air's good enough," Dick assented hurriedly. "But what we came here for was to see whether we can find Greg. Come on, fellows—be quick."

"This leads to nothing, after all," sighed Dave Darrin at last.

"There may be other parts to the cave that we haven't found yet," advanced young Prescott. "Now, halt, everyone! Quiet! Greg?"

Dick's voice echoed in the place. Away off in one corner something seemed to be stirring.

"What's that?" asked Dick quickly.

"Time to beat it!" muttered Dan. "We've disturbed some animal that lives here."

"Sh!" ordered Prescott, holding up one hand. "Greg!"

Against their ear-drums came again, rather faintly, the sound of something moving.

"If you're Greg, you keep on making the noise until I locate you," urged Dick. "Fellows, you stay right where you are. Don't move."

Once more that sound of something moving came to the boys, and Dick, on tip-toe, moving softly, ranged toward the direction from which he believed the noise had come. As Dick moved away from them with the light, Dave and Dan found themselves in comparative darkness.

"If that's you, Greg, keep on making all the noise you can," directed young Prescott, as he neared one of the jutting ledges of rock.

A distant snort came as though in answer.

"If that's you, Greg, you can do it again," cried Dick in a low, eager voice. "If it's you, do it just four times."

Then Dick halted, realizing in the stillness that he could hear his own heart beating rapidly.

Again came the snort—one, two, three—four times. Then it stopped.

"Dave! Dan!" quivered Dick's voice. "Come running! It's Greg."

There was a sound of running feet—then a thump. Dave Darrin was still coming, but Dan had tripped over some little obstacle and had fallen flat.

"Hold on, there, you two!" howled Dan. "I've hurt my knee. Wait until I reach you."

But Dave and Dick paid no heed. Once more they had heard the snorts, and had made a dash for a low ledge of rock, from behind which they believed the sounds to have come.

Then both young leaders of the Grammar School boys gave a joyous whoop, mingled with dismay.



CHAPTER XII

THE BOY WITH THE OAKUM TASTE

"Hustle, Dan! We've found him!" rang Dave Darrin's voice, echoing through the rock-bound spaces.

"Greg, old fellow, you've had us worried," gasped Dick Prescott, sinking to the stone floor beside his friend.

Greg lay on the floor, tightly bound hand and foot, a gag of oakum stuck in his mouth and securely held there by cloth tightly strapped in place.

"Get your knife open, Dave, while I hold the light," ordered Dick. "We've got to have Greg free at once. See how white and sick he looks."

Slash! Dave cut away the gag first of all, picking out all he could of the gag.

"Ugh!" sputtered young Holmes, spitting out shreds of oakum. "You bet I'm sick!"

"How do you feel?" Dick asked anxiously, as Dave rolled Greg over and began to cut away the cords at the lad's wrists.

"Sick!" muttered Greg. "Sick of the very taste of that oakum stuff. Did you ever eat any oakum?"

"Can't say that I did," laughed Dick merrily, now that he knew at last that his chum was safe.

"You haven't missed much," growled Greg.

"There, your hands are free," announced practical Dave. "How long have you been here, Holmesy?"

"Since Saturday afternoon."

"Had anything to eat?" Dick wanted to know.

"No; and I'll have to get the taste of that vile oakum out of my mouth before I can endure the taste of food," uttered Greg dismally.

Darrin had made the last slash at Greg's foot-lashings.

"Now, get up, old fellow!"

Both helped young Holmes to his feet, but he would have fallen had not Dick caught him.

"Circulation's all stopped," muttered Greg disgustedly. "No wonder! The scoundrels must have tied me as tight as they knew how. Ugh! That fierce oakum taste!"

"Say, you'll be the hero of the town when you get home, Greg," proclaimed Dan Dalzell, who had groped his way to the spot.

"Hero? With that oakum taste in my mouth?" sputtered young Holmes. "Bosh! I'd sooner have a good gargle than be two heroes!"

While Dick supported the rescued boy, Dave Darrin was rubbing Greg's legs roughly up and down to promote better circulation.

"Now, take a few steps," advised Dave. "See how you can go."

Supported by Dick's arm, Greg did fairly well in the way of walking. Of course every step that he took helped restore the circulation.

"Wow! There's going to be an exciting time in Gridley," grinned Dan Dalzell.

"What day is it now?" inquired Greg.

"Monday—afternoon," Prescott answered.

"My folks must be stirred up."

"They're crazy," Dan supplied very impressively.

"How far is this place from Gridley?"

"Six miles. Don't you know where you are, Greg!"

"Haven't an idea in the world."

"How did you get here? What happened?"

"Wait a little while," begged Greg. "I've just got to spit all the oakum taste out of my mouth before I want to do much talking."

By this time they were at the tunnel that led outside.

"Hullo, Tom!" called Dick through the tunnel.

"Hullo yourself, and see how you like it!" came from outside.

"Tom," cried Dick joyously, "we've found Greg! We're bringing him with us."

"Can't he bring himself?" demanded Reade. Then, in a suddenly scared voice:

"Is he—dead?"

"Dead sore on oakum as a food," laughed Dan, grinning broadly.

Dick, holding the light, was piloting Greg through the tunnel. In a few moments all were outside. Tom and Harry danced a jig for sheer joy.

"Greg, aren't you thirsty?" demanded Dick, as young Holmes stood blinking in the bright sunlight.

"I shall be, as soon as I get the oakum washed out of my mouth," grimaced Greg. "Whew! What a vile taste that sort of stuff has!"

"Folks in the good old town won't believe us when we get back," muttered Darrin.

"Yes, they will; they'll have to," insisted Dan, producing some articles from one of his pockets. "Here are some of the cords you cut from Greg's wrists and ankles, and here's some of the oakum."

"Throw that oakum stuff away, or else hide it. Please do," begged young Holmes, making a wry face.

"Come on. There's no time to be lost," advised Dick. "We've got a long way to go, and Greg needs the exercise. Besides, he's thirsty and hungry—or ought to be."

Within five minutes the Grammar School boys came across a spring. There Greg knelt and took in several mouthfuls, one after another, for the purpose of rinsing his mouth of that nauseating oakum taste. Then, at last, he swallowed water freely.

"My, but it's good to be out in the world again," breathed Greg happily. "But how did you fellows find me?"

"The whole town turned out to search," Dick explained. "There was no school to-day. And we came across clues that led us here. That's enough, from our side. Now, tell us how you came to be in such a fix."

At this point the Grammar School boys came out on the highway.

"Better each put a few stones in your pockets, fellows," advised Dick Prescott, stooping. "If we should meet any one we don't want to meet, stones might not prove such bad ammunition. Now, Greg, start in and tell us what happened."

"You know that big clump of bushes near the landing at Payson's?" asked young Holmes.

"Yes."

"Well, Saturday afternoon I landed, tied the canoe and then, with a gunny sack on my arm, started toward the orchard. Just as I was going by the bushes I heard a little noise. Before I could turn I was thrown flat. Then a man was on top of me, holding my nose ground into the dirt."

"Dexter? Driggs?" questioned Prescott.

"I couldn't see who it was. Next thing my own gunny sack was forced over my head. I could feel, now, that there were two men working over me. Then my hands were yanked behind me and tied. Next my feet. I forgot to say that when I was thrown I was hurled in among the bushes. Well, after I had been bound a dark cloth of some kind was passed around the sack over my eyes."

"Didn't you holler?" asked Dan, his mouth wide open.

"Yes. While the cloth was being tied tight I thought it was time to start in to yell. At the first sound a pair of hands gripped me around the throat. Whee! I thought I was being hanged, certainly! I must have been black in the face when that scoundrel let up on choking me. Well, I took the choking as a hint that I wasn't expected to make any noise. After that I was thrown on my back, but I couldn't see anything. One man, who had rather soft hands——"

"Dexter," guessed Dick.

"Most likely. Well, he sat with one hand across my throat, and I didn't think it was my time to yell, so I lay quiet. After a while I heard a wagon coming along. Then I was lifted into the wagon and a lot of old sacking was thrown over the whole length of my body. I guess it was the same sacking that you found me lying on in the cave. Then the wagon started and I had a long ride. At last we branched off into what I guess was a sort of bridle path. Not so very long after the wagon stopped and I was lifted down to my feet. I walked a little way, guided by one of the men, and then they lifted me up and carried me. Then I felt them poking me through that tunnel. After that I saw some kind of a light, dimly, through the cloths over my head, and then I was thrown down where you found me. The light was out then, and the cloths were taken off my head. Then that sickening gag was jammed into my mouth."

"Didn't you offer any kick?" inquired Dan.

"Where was the use?" sighed Greg. "I knew that men who had gone to all that trouble to bother me wouldn't waste any time listening to what I might have to say."

"Then you don't know," inquired Dick, "if Dexter and Driggs were the men?"

"They didn't speak once, from the time they grabbed me up to the time when they left me in the cave," Greg answered. "Hours after that I must have fallen asleep. I woke up to hear their voices a little way off. They were talking in whispers. I couldn't hear all that was said, but I'm certain in my own mind that the two were Dexter and Driggs."

"Did you make out anything that they were talking about?" pressed Dick.

"Here and there I caught some of it. I heard one man scolding the other about throwing bricks and shying a stone; and so that must have been what happened to you, Dick, and to you, Dave. I'm pretty sure it was Dexter who was doing the scolding. Later I heard him say it was foolish, and this carrying me off was much more to the purpose—that a thing like my being carried away would do a heap more to 'scare that woman' and make her understand that she had some one she couldn't afford to fool with. Next the other man broke in and said that lugging me away was foolish, and only a cause of trouble. But the other man broke in, with a laugh, and said he'd make 'that woman' pay handsomely to have me set free. He said she had always been a tender-hearted woman, and would spend plenty of money to save the life of a boy who had helped her. Then the two men, I judged from the sounds, left the cave. Any way, I haven't heard any sound of them since then. I——"

Here Greg stopped suddenly, clutching at a tree that he was passing.

"Fellows, I feel about all in," he remarked brokenly. "I'm awfully dizzy, too."

"You're played out, starved and all used up—that's what ails you," exclaimed Dick sympathetically. "We'll halt here and give you a chance to rest."

In five minutes Greg declared himself fit to go on again. Dave and Dick walked on either side of him, half supporting him.

"There's a house ahead, and a telephone wire running into it," said young Prescott. "We'll try to get that far, and then we'll telephone into Gridley."

That much of the trip was made, with a couple of short halts for rest. Dick went up to the front door of the farmhouse and knocked loudly. It was the farmer himself who came to the door.

"We've found the boy that all the searching parties were out looking for," Dick announced. "May we use your telephone to send the word into Gridley?"

"You sure can," rejoined the farmer. "Come this way." Then, with a side glance at young Holmes, "I guess you're him."

"Yes," nodded Greg.

"And you hain't had a bite to eat for a day or two?"

"No."

"Mother," called the farmer, leading the way into the living room, "here's that missing youngster that there's been all the fuss over. He's hungry. You know what treatment that calls for."

Dick, in the meantime, had espied the telephone and was engaged in ringing up. He called for the police station and sent the news to the chief.

"And say that I'm hitching up a team and am going to bring you all in," added the farmer. So Prescott added that item of information.

"Hark! Hear that?" broke in Dick a minute later, while nearly all the others were talking at once. Despite the distance there came to their ears the sound of Gridley's fire alarm whistle, sounding the recall for all searching parties.

"Now, goodness knows I'd like to offer you a lot more to eat, young man," said the farmer's gray-haired wife, patting Greg's head. "But, after fasting so long you don't want to eat too much at first. What you've had ought to be enough until you've had your drive and are at home with your own folks."

"I feel fine, ma'am," responded young Holmes gratefully. "I don't know how to thank you. And I'm glad you stopped my eating too much for my own good. I'll be all right now, when I get home."

The farmer drove up to the door and called out. All of Greg's friends wanted to help him outdoors, but he insisted that he could walk all by himself. Into the farm wagon piled the Grammar School boys, after having thanked the woman of the house most heartily.

"This is a lot better'n walking, after all," murmured Greg gratefully.

Even with his late start the boys were ahead of the searchers under Captain Hall, who had heard the signal and were now returning.

"Turn down one of the side streets, will you, please?" begged Greg, as the party neared the outskirts of Gridley. "I don't feel exactly like meeting a whole crowd."

For, even at a distance, it could be seen that Gridley was swarming with thousands of people who had not joined the searching parties.

Thus Greg was delivered at his own home, and the other members of Dick & Co. were up on Main Street before the news had spread of young Holmes's return.

All sensational events are dead as soon as they have been discussed for a few hours. The police authorities visited Greg at his home and questioned him, then reluctantly decided that there was not enough evidence for issuing a warrant for Abner Dexter and his man Driggs. But the news came over, from Driggs's own town, that the fellow had been dropped from the police force there.

On Tuesday morning school went on as usual, and in the afternoon the boys of the Central Grammar went at their football practice as though nothing had happened.

Before the practice game Dick called a meeting in the field, at which he and Dave Darrin were authorized to challenge the North and South Grammar Schools to a series of games.

Within the next three days both schools had been heard from, and there seemed every prospect of keen rivalry between the boys of the three schools.

Many days went along ere Dick & Co. heard again from Dexter or the latter's henchman. Yet events were shaping that were destined to mark important pages in the history of Gridley.

Except for football, in fact, things were now so quiet that Dick Prescott had not an inkling of the startling events that were ahead of him.



CHAPTER XIII

A GREAT FOOTBALL POW-WOW

"I have important news to communicate," began Old Dut dryly, after tapping the bell for the beginning of the afternoon session.

Dick and some of his friends looked up rather placidly, for they knew what the news was to be.

"All lovers of football in the Central Grammar School," continued the principal, "are requested to meet in the usual field immediately after the close of school. The purpose is to form a league and to arrange for games between the three Grammar Schools of Gridley. I will add that I am glad that so much interest in athletics is being displayed by our young men. To show my pleasure, I will add that if any of the young men in this school are so unfortunate as to incur checks this afternoon that would keep them in after school they may serve out the checks to-morrow instead. First class in geography! For the next twenty minutes the boys of this class are requested to remember that football is not geography!"

Excited as many of the youngsters were, and great as was the temptation to whisper, it happened that not a boy in the eighth grade received a check or a demerit, as it is usually called, for any form of bad conduct that afternoon. Immediately at the close of school the almost solid legion of boys of the seventh and eighth grades started on a run for the big field in which they had been practising of late.

"Now, we'll have to wait a few minutes for the fellows from the other schools," announced Dick when he had marshaled his forces in the field. "It will take them longer to get here."

"Here come some of the North Grammar boys!" called a lookout, a few minutes later. "Hi Martin is one of them."

"Welcome to the North Grammar," called Dick, as Hi Martin and two other boys made their appearance on the field. A dozen more boys from the same school could be seen straggling along in the rear by twos and threes.

"My, but you fellows have brought a mob," was Hi's greeting.

"We invited all of the fellows of the two top grades," Dick explained.

"A small, select committee would have been better," remarked Hi. "When you have too big a crowd you can't hear each other, for everyone is talking at once. So you fellows of the Central Grammar think you can play football, do you?"

"We don't know," laughed Prescott. "We want to find out."

"Huh!"

"Here come a dozen fellows from the South Grammar," announced another lookout.

"Huh! They're coming in a mob, too," uttered Martin in some disdain. "There's at least thirty in their crowd."

"Well, you Norths have brought at least fifteen," observed Dave.

"But only three of us are a committee," retorted Hi Martin. "The other fellows are just hangers on—camp followers, so to speak."

"Don't get too chesty, Hi," objected one of the outside dozen from the North Grammar.

"Don't try to give me any orders, Ben Lollard," snapped Martin. "We got all our orders from the school before we started."

"Who represents the South Grammar?" called Dick as the new comers trooped on to the field.

"Well, aren't there enough of us here?" demanded Ted Teall.

"But Martin, of the North Grammar, thinks each school ought to be represented by a committee," explained Dick.

"Committee of three," amended Hi Martin.

"Huh! That's a dude arrangement," rejoined Ted Teall.

"We have some sense of dignity at the North Grammar," snapped Hi Martin, flushing.

"And you carry it around with you all the time," jeered young Teall.

Things began to look badly for the success of the league. Many of the North Grammar boys came from rather well-to-do families, and not a few of these boys considered themselves infinitely superior to the class of boys that helped to make up the Centrals and Souths.

"Let's not have any disagreements," urged Dick coaxingly.

"Then keep these Souths in check," grumbled Hi Martin.

"Don't let the Norths get too fresh just because they have clean collars every day," advised Ted Teall.

"Fresh? It takes a South Grammar boy to be fresh," sputtered Hi.

"Oh, does it?" sneered Ted. "Dude!"

"Mucker!" responded Hi cheerfully.

"Say, if you could only use your hands as well as you do your mouths," sneered Ted, "ten——"

"We do," announced Hi Martin, bounding over in front of Teall.

"Fight! Fight!" howled half a hundred boys gleefully.

Ted Teall was more than willing, and Hi looked as though he were afraid only of soiling his hands in touching a South Grammar boy. Dick, however, darted in between the pair, and Darrin, Reade and Dalzell followed.

"Now, stop all this fooling, fellows," begged Dick. "We all know that Ted and Hi can fight. What we want to find out is whether there are brains and muscle enough in town to get three football elevens together. Ted, put your hands in your pockets. Hi, you move back. We don't want any fighting here."

"Then that cub will have to stop calling names," retorted Teall.

"You started it yourself," retorted Martin.

"You're another!"

"Fight! Fight!" yelled many of the young onlookers.

Ted was willing, and Martin not unwilling. Crowds surged forward, threatening to push the North and South champions to close quarters.

"Let's go home, if nobody ain't going to do nuthing," remarked one South disgustedly.

"Stop all this, fellows—please do," begged Dick once more. "Ted and Hi, you two show your good sense by shaking hands."

"Shake hands with that?" demanded Hi scornfully, glaring at Teall.

"Shake hands with a high-collared dude?" muttered Ted. "I'd get mobbed for disgracing my part of the town."

"You are a disgrace, anyway," snapped back Hi.

"Now, you get back, Martin, and let us get down to real football," directed Darrin, pushing Martin back several feet. "No; you needn't glare at me. I won't fight you, at all events, until the football season is over."

Dalzell was backing up Dave in an effort to keep Martin back. Reade and Hazelton now placed themselves in front of young Teall.

"Now, come to order, please!" called Dick.

"Hey, Prescott! Who asked you to preside?" hailed a South Grammar boy.

"I don't know that I want to, either," Prescott answered, with a smile. "But some one has to start the meeting. As soon as you come to order you can choose any one you want for presiding officer. All I'm trying to do is to get the thing started. Come to order, please."

"I'll meet you on Main Street any Saturday you like, Hi Martin!" called Ted belligerently.

"I wouldn't go out of my way to meet anything like you," shot back Martin.

"Order! Order!" insisted Dick. "Come to order, fellows!"

By the aid of his chums and a few other friends, and a great deal of "sh! sh!" all through the crowd, Dick at last got the meeting into a semblance of quiet.

"Now, as I said before," Prescott went on, "all the reason I had for taking the chair——"

"Where is it?"

"What did you take it for?"

"——was to get the meeting started," Dick went on. "Now that we're at least as quiet as some of the very small boys here will allow us to be, suppose you nominate some one to preside over this meeting."

"Dick Prescott is good enough for us," sang out several Central Grammar boys.

"Hi Martin!" came from the North squad.

"Ted Teall!" insisted the South boys.

"Well, whom do you want?" insisted Dick patiently.

"Dick Prescott!" "Hi Martin!" "Ted Teall!"

"Don't waste time trying to choose a chairman, Dick," advised Dave. "Just hold on to the job yourself, and try to get something through the meeting."

But a clamor went up on all sides that lasted fully a minute.

"Mr. Chairman!" shouted Tom Reade as soon as quiet came.

"Reade," acknowledged Prescott, with a bow in Tom's direction.

"Will you kindly state the object of the meeting?"

"The object of the meeting," Prescott went on, "is to see whether each of the three Grammar Schools in this town is able and willing to organize a football team. The object, further, is to see whether we can form the three teams into a league and play off a series of games for the championship this fall."

"Who's going to run the league?" demanded Ted Teall.

"That's for this meeting to decide," Dick answered. "I would suggest that each school nominate a committee of three to represent it in a council of nine made up from the three schools. That the council choose a chairman and that the council have full charge of league arrangements."

"Is Hi Martin going to be in that council?" called a South boy.

"I presume so, fellows," responded the chair. "Martin is already a member of a committee of three chosen at the North Grammar."

"But we haven't any committee of three," objected a Central boy.

"We can soon straighten that out," piped up Tom Reade. "I'm going to make a motion, and it's addressed only to the fellows of the Central Grammar. I move that Dick Prescott, Dave Darrin and Greg Holmes represent the Central."

"All in favor say 'aye,'" directed Prescott.

The motion was carried with a rush, there being no dissenting voices.

"I would now suggest," Dick continued, "that the South Grammar fellows put forward their committee of three. Then the council can get together, and soon be able to report back to the whole crowd."

But Ted Teall, who had been talking rapidly in undertones to several of the Souths, now yelled back:

"No, sir-ree! That doesn't go. South Grammar wants the whole thing put through in town-meeting style. Let every fellow here have his say."

"Will that be agreeable to the North Grammar?" asked Dick, glancing at Martin.

"Not much," retorted Hi. "South Grammar has twice as many fellows here as we have, and Central has a bigger crowd present than both other schools put together. Let's have committees and organize 'em into a council."

"We Souths won't stand for anything but town-meeting style," bawled Ted Teall.

"But we haven't enough fellows for that," objected Hi strenuously.

"Why didn't you bring more?" jeered Ted. "Did the rest of your fellows have to go home to put on clean collars and practise on the piano?"

"We shan't get anywhere unless the Souths put forward a more gentlemanly fellow to speak for them," remarked Hi with stiff dignity.

"Fight!" yelled one boy hopefully.

The surging and pushing began all over again, but Dick managed to make his voice carry over the hubbub.

"Fellows, what ails you all?" he cried. "Are we going to have it said that the Grammar School fellows of Gridley haven't brains and manners enough to get together and discuss an ordinary question or two?"

"What about uniforms?" spoke up a member of Hi's committee.

"Central hopes to have uniforms," replied Dick.

"North Grammar is going to have uniforms," shouted Hi Martin, "and we want to make it plain, right now, that we won't play with any team that isn't uniformed."

This cast a damper on the Souths, who knew, to a boy, that they couldn't hope to raise money enough to buy football uniforms.

"Aw," retorted Ted Teall scornfully, "what's the use of playing football with dudes that don't dare go on to the field if they haven't nifty uniforms and clean collars?"

"That's our stand," retorted Hi with intense dignity. "North Grammar will play no un-uniformed teams."

"And South Grammar won't play any dudes," shouted Ted defiantly. "We want real meat to play against—no mush!"

"Let's hear what Central Grammar proposes on this question?" put in Hi Martin hopefully. "Prescott, you said your school would be uniformed."

"Let's go home, fellows," proposed Ted, turning away and stalking off. For a moment the other Souths hesitated. Then, with a yell, they started off after their leader.

"Good riddance to muckers!" shouted a North boy derisively.

"Come to order, please," begged Dick. "Any one who calls names is out of order. It's bad practice."

"Who asked you to run this meeting, anyway, Dick Prescott?" snapped Martin.

"No one in particular, and I'm willing you should preside if you want to, Martin."

"The Centrals ain't any better stuff than the Souths," observed one of the Norths slightingly.

"Cut that out!" cried Dave, his eyes flashing. He stepped forward, looking for the fellow who had made the remark.

"I call upon the North Grammar delegation to step aside and confer for a few minutes," announced Hi. He led his own schoolmates some two hundred feet away.

"Say, the whole scheme's gone to pieces," grumbled Tom Reade disgustedly.

"Wait, and we'll see," answered Prescott hopefully.

The North Grammar boys talked matters over among themselves for two or three minutes.

"There, see!" grumbled Greg. "Hi Martin is leading his crowd away. They're all quitters!"

"That always seems to be the way with Grammar School fellows," sighed Dick. "High School fellows do big things, but you can't ever get Grammar School boys to stick together long enough to do anything!"

So Grammar School football died an almost painless death.



CHAPTER XIV

DICK STEPS INTO A DEATH-TRAP

"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!"



CHAPTER XV

WHAT GRAMMAR SCHOOL BOYS CAN DO

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.



CHAPTER XVI

OUT FOR HALLOWE'EN FUN

"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.

"Sure!" grinned Toby.

"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."