"All right; we'll let it go at Joggers until you've put yourself far enough forward so that you'll be willing to use your own name."

Honk! honk! The car was under way.

When Dick and his three friends turned back to the tent they found all three of the remaining tramps in there, smoking vile pipes and playing with a greasy, battered pack of cards. "The weather's fine again," announced Dick, "and you'll find us the most hospitable fellows you ever met. My friends, we take pleasure in offering you the whole outside world in which to play!"

"Talk United States!" growled one of the tramps, without looking up from the game.

"Tom," laughed Prescott, turning to Reade, "strange dialects are your specialty. Kindly translate, into 'United States,' what I have just said to these men."

"I will," agreed Tom. "Attention, hoboes! Look right at me! That's right. Now—-git!"

"You might let us stay on a bit longer," grumbled one of the tramps. "We ain't bothering you folks any."

"Only eating us out of house and home," snapped Dave.

"And delaying the time when we must wash up the tent after you," added Danny Grin.

But the tramps played on, smoked on.

"Did you fellows ever hear of that famous man, Mr. A. Quick Expediter?" Tom asked the tramps.

"No," growled one of them.

"Expediter was a truly great man," Tom continued. "He had a motto. It was a short one. One word, and that word was—-'git'!"

"We are famed for our courtesy," remarked Darry. "We'd hate to lose even a shred of our reputation in that line. But in these present years of our young lives we are football players by training, and high school boys merely for pleasure. We know some of the dandiest tackles you ever saw. Shall we show you a few of them? If you object to observing our tackles—-and sharing in the effects—-then signify your wishes by placing yourselves at a safe distance from such enthusiastic football wranglers as we are."

Greg, Danny Grin and Harry were already crouching as though for a spring. Dave took his place in an imaginary football line-up, leaning slightly forward. Tom Reade sighed, then advanced to the line. All were waiting for the battle signal from Dick Prescott.

By this time the most talkative of the three tramps noted the signs of a gathering squall.

"Come on, mates," he urged, with a sulky growl, "let's get out of here. These young fellows want their place all to themselves. They're just like all of the capitalistic class that are ruining the country to-day! Things in this country are coming to a pass where there's nothing for the fellow who——-"

"Who won't work hard enough to get the place in the world that he wants," Tom Reade finished for the tramp, as he ushered the three of them through the doorway.



CHAPTER XVIII

DICK PRESCOTT, KNIGHT ERRANT

That day of enforced tie-up was followed by three days of hard hiking. The Gridley High School boys showed the fine effects of their two vigorous, strenuous outings. Each had taken on weight slightly, though there was no superfluous flesh on any of the six. They were bronzed, comparatively lean-looking, trim and hard. Their muscles were at the finest degree of excellence.

"We set out to get ourselves as hard as nails," remarked Dave, as the boys bathed in a secluded bit of woodland through which a creek flowed. It was, the morning of their fourth day of renewed hiking. After the swim and breakfast that was to follow, there were twenty miles of rural roads to be covered before the evening camp was pitched.

"I guess we've won all we set out to get, haven't we?" inquired Reade, squaring his broad shoulders with an air of pride. "I feel equal to anything that a fellow of my size and years could do."

"I think, without boasting, we may consider ourselves the six most valuable candidates for Gridley High School football this year," Prescott declared. "We ought to be the best men for the team; we've worked hard to get ourselves in the pink of physical condition."

"I wouldn't care to be any stronger than I am," laughed Danny Grin. "If I were any stronger folks would be saying that I ought to go to work."

"You will have to go to work within another year," Dick laughed, "whatever that work may be. But you must work with your brain, Danny boy, if you're to get any real place in life. Your muscles are intended only as a sign that your body is going to be equal to all the demands that your brain may make on that body."

"If my mental ability were equal to my physical strength I wouldn't have to work at all," grinned Dalzell.

Splash! His dive carried him under the surface of the water. Presently he came up, blowing, then swimming with strong strokes.

"Danny boy seems to have the same idea so many people have," laughed Prescott. "They think that a man who does all his real work with his brain isn't working at all, just because he doesn't get into a perspiration and wilt his collar."

Splash! splash! Reade and Darrin were in the water racing upstream.

"I don't know when I've ever found so much happiness in a summer," asserted Greg, as he poised himself for a dive into the water.

"I wonder if Timmy Hinman ever had the nerve to stick to his father's wagon long enough to get it back to Fenton," said Dave, as he swam beside Reade.

"If he ever took that wagon home, I'll wager that he drove the last few miles late at night, so that his 'society' friends wouldn't have the shock of seeing him drive the peddling outfit that sustains him," Reade replied.

"I'll never forget the younger Hinman's disgusted look when he tried to drive the outfit from our camp, the other morning, with his saddle mount tied behind and balking on the halter," grinned Darry.

"I wonder why such fellows as Timothy Hinman were ever created," Tom went on. "Every time I think about the gentlemanly Timmy I feel as though I wanted to kick something."

Only the day before, stopping at a postoffice on the route, as had been arranged with Dr. Hewitt, Dick & Co. had received word that the peddler was seriously ill with pneumonia, with all the chances against his recovery.

"If the peddler should die," suggested Dave soberly, "do you believe that Timmy Hinman will be able to face the thought of going to work for a living?"

"It would be an awful fate," Tom declared grimly. "Timmy might try to work, but I don't know whether he would be able to live through the shock and shame of having to earn the money for paying his own bills in life."

"There's that irrepressible Dick again!" called Greg five minutes later.

"What's he up to now?" asked Tom, from further up the creek.

"He has had his rub-down, got his clothing on and is now at work frying bacon and eggs."

"Then don't disturb him," begged Reade, "or he might fry short of the quantity of food that is really going to be required."

Five minutes more, however, saw the last of the boys out of water and rapidly getting themselves in shape to perform their own required duties. There could be no idlers in the party when Dick & Co. were away from home on a hike.

Yet, once breakfast had been disposed of, and the dishes washed, there seemed something in the August air that made them all disinclined to break camp and move on.

"I wish we could stay here all day, and move on to-morrow," murmured Hazy, thus voicing the thought of some of the others.

"And then blame the tramps for loafing!" exclaimed Dick.

"Do we look as though we had loafed this summer?" challenged Dalzell.

"No; but one or two of you would have done a good deal of it if you hadn't been afraid of the contempt of the others," smiled Prescott.

"Honestly, now," demanded Hazy, "wouldn't you enjoy just staying here and lounging today, Dick Prescott?"

"I would," Dick assented.

"There, now!"

"But that isn't what we left home to do, so we won't do it."

"Eh?" queried Hazy.

"Attention, Lazybones Squad!" called Prescott, springing up. "Hazy, harness the horse and hitch him to the wagon. Tom, Dave and Greg, take down the tent. I'll pack the bedding. Dan, load the kitchen stuff on the wagon."

This occupied a few minutes.

"Now, all hands turn to and load on the floor planks, bedding and the tent," called Dick.

This, too, was quickly accomplished, though all six were now perspiring.

"Greg, I believe it's your turn to drive first to-day," Prescott announced. "Up with you! Forward—-march!"

Dick led the way out of camp, at a brisk four-mile-an-hour stride. The long hike was started, at last. After that there was no grumbling, even during the hourly halt of ten minutes.

The noon halt found them with eleven and a half miles covered out of the twenty. Five o'clock brought Dick & Co. to the outskirts of Fenton, a town of some twenty-five hundred inhabitants.

"Whoa!" called Tom, reining up half a mile from the town. "There are woods here, Dick. If we go any closer to Fenton, we'll either have to keep on traveling to the other side of the town, or ask the authorities for permission to camp on the common. Don't you believe we had better stop here?"

"These are the woods that Dave and I had just picked out," Prescott replied. "We were going to keep on traveling until we found out who owns the woods. This isn't quite in the wilderness, Tom, and we must begin again to seek permission to make our camp from owners of property."

"If these are the woods," grunted Tom, "there can be no use in going farther. You and Dave trot on ahead, and bring us back word."

"All right," sang out the young leader, "but don't drive onto the ground, or unpack, until we are back with word about the owner's permission."

Three minutes of walking brought them to a farmhouse that looked like the abode of prosperous people.

"Well, what is it?" demanded a stout man, with a good-humored face, as he stepped out from a barn.

"We wish to know, sir," Dick explained, "if you can tell us who owns the woods about a quarter of a mile back, at the right hand side of the road?"

"I think I can," nodded the man. "Will you describe the woods a little more particularly?"

As Prescott complied the farmer broke in:

"Those are my woods, all right. What do you want of them?"

Dick explained the desire of himself and his friends to camp there for the night.

"Who are you boys?" asked the farmer, keenly eyeing Dick and Dave.

"Gridley High School boys, out on a vacation jaunt."

"You won't do any damage to my woods, will you?"

"Certainly not, sir," Dick promised.

"Then go right ahead and pitch your camp, young man. Enjoy yourselves."

"We shall have to gather and use quite a bit of firewood, sir," Prescott continued.

"Well, there's considerable dead wood lying about there."

"May we pay you a proper price for the use of the firewood, sir?" Prescott went on.

"If you try to," laughed the farmer, "I'll chase you out of the woods. Make yourselves at home, boys. Have as good a time as you can."

"Thank you, sir."

"And—-have you had any fresh milk lately?"

"Not a lot of it, sir."

"Would you like some?"

"Why, if we may pay——-"

"You may pay me," promptly agreed the farmer, "by bringing the pail back when you pass this way in the morning."

With that remark he went into another building, soon coming out with an eight-quart pail filled with milk.

"This sort of stuff isn't much good, except when you haven't had any for a long time," laughed the farmer. "Enjoy yourselves. Say, you don't play football with the Gridley High School eleven, do you?"

"All of us do," Dick admitted.

"Thought so," chuckled the farmer. "That's why I was interested in you. I saw the Thanksgiving game at Gridley last year. Great game nervy lot of boys, with all their sand about them. There was one fellow in particular, I remember, who broke doctor's orders and jumped into the game at the last minute. He saved the game for Gridley, I heard. I'd like to shake hands with him."

"Then here's your chance, sir," laughed Dave, shoving Dick forward. "Mr. Dick Prescott, Gridley High School."

"My name's Dobbins," smiled the farmer, extending his hand. "Glad to meet you, Prescott. I thought it was you all the time. Mebbe the young man with you is Darrin."

"Yes," laughed Dick, and there was more handshaking.

"I hope I'll see the rest of your friends when you pass in the morning," said the farmer cordially.

"Hiram—-supper!" called a shrill voice from The doorway.

"Coming, mother! Boys, it does one good to meet the right sort of fellows once in a while. Enjoy the woods in your own way, won't you?"

"That man is right. As he says, it does one good to meet the right sort of fellow once in a while—-and he's the right sort," declared Darry fervently, as the chums trudged back to their outfit.

Camp was pitched, and supper was soon under way. When it was all over, and everything cleaned up, Dick looked about him at his friends.

"I wonder if any of you fellows feel the way I do to-night?" he asked. "We still have our white clothes, and Fenton is something of a town. We've been in the woods for so long that I feel just like dressing up in white and taking a stroll into town."

Tom, Dan and Dave voted in the affirmative. Greg and Hazy averred that they had walked enough for one day. So the four boys donned white, while the other two remained behind in flannel and khaki.

Dick and the three companions of his stroll when almost in Fenton, were passing through a street of pretty little cottages when a tiny figure, clad in white ran out of the darkness, bumping into Dick's knees.

"Hello, little one!" cried Prescott, cheerily, picking up a wee little girl of four and holding her at arm's length. "Hello, you're crying. What's the matter? Lost mother?"

"No; lost papa," wailed the little one.

"Perhaps we can find him for you," offered Tom, readily.

"Mollie! Mollie, where are you?" came a woman's voice out of the darkness.

"Is this your little girl, madam?" called Prescott. "We'll bring her to you."

In another moment the woman, young and pretty, also dressed in white, had reached the child and was holding her by the hand.

"Oh, you little runaway!" chided Dave, smilingly, as he bent over, wagging a finger at the child.

"No; it's papa that runned away," gasped the little one, in a frightened voice. "He ran away to a saloon."

"Oh, said Dave, straightening up and feeling embarrassed as he caught the humiliated look in the young woman's face.

"Pa—-runned away and made mama cry," the little one babbled on, half sobbing. "I must go after him and bring him home."

"Be quiet, Mollie," commanded her mother.

"Papa comes, if he knows you want him," insisted the child. "I tell him you want him—-that you cry because he went to saloon."

For an instant the mother caught her breath. Then she began to cry bitterly. Dick and his friends wished themselves almost anywhere else.

"It's too bad when the children get old enough to realize it," said the woman, brokenly. Then, of a sudden, she eyed Dick and his chums bravely.

"Boys," she said, "I hope the time will never come when you'll feel that it's manly to go out with the crowd and spend the evening in drinking."

"The way we feel about it now," spoke Dick, sympathetically, "we'd rather be dead than facing any degradation of the sort."

They were only boys, and they were strangers to the woman. Moreover, little Mollie was looking pleadingly towards Dick, as if loath to let him go. In her misery the young wife poured out her story to her sympathetic listeners. Her husband had been a fine young fellow—-was still young. His drinking had begun only three months before.

"We have our own home, more than half paid for," added the woman, pointing to a pretty little cottage. "Tom has always been a good workman, never out of a job. But lately he has been spending his wages for drink. Last month we didn't make our payment on the house. Today he got his month's pay, and promised not to drink any more. He was going to take us into town to-night for a good time, and we were happy, weren't we, baby? Then two of his saloon cronies passed the house. Tom went with them, but said he would come right back for us. He hasn't come yet, and he won't come now until midnight. The month's pay will be gone, and that means that the home will be gone, after a little. Boys, I shall never see you again, and it has seemed a help to me to talk to you. Remember, don't ever——-"

"Madam," asked Dick, suddenly, in a husky tone, "do you mind telling us your husband's name, and the name of the place where he has gone?"

"His name is Tom Drake, and he has gone up to Miller's place," answered Mrs. Drake. "But why do you ask? What——-"

"Mrs. Drake," Dick continued, earnestly, "we don't want to be meddlers, and we'll keep out of this, if you request it. But the child has given me an inspiration that I could help you. If you authorize me, I'll go to Miller's and see if I can't help your husband to know that his happiness is right here, not in a saloon."

"I—-I fear that will be a big undertaking," quivered Mrs. Drake.

A big undertaking, indeed, it was bound to be!



CHAPTER XIX

"I'LL FIGHT HIM FOR THIS MAN!"

"It's wonderfully kind of you!" breathed the woman, gratefully. "But it really won't do any good. When a man has begun to drink nothing can reclaim him from it. My only hope is to be able to have a talk with Tom when his money is gone."

"Of course if you dislike to have us try, Mrs. Drake——-" Dick began.

"I don't dislike to have you try!" cried the woman, quickly. "All I am thinking about is the hopelessness of your undertaking. You simply can't get Tom out of Miller's to-night until the owner of that awful place turns him out at closing time. I know! This has happened before."

Dick stood in an uncertain attitude, his cap in hand. The appealing face of the child, looking eagerly up at him, made him wish with all his heart to try to do a good act here, yet he couldn't think of going on such an errand without the young wife's permission.

"Let him go, mama," urged the child. "He'll bring papa back."

Dick looked questioningly at the woman.

"All right, then, go," she acquiesced. "Oh, I hope you have good luck, and that you don't make Tom ugly, either. I'll say, for him, that he has never been ugly yet."

"Mrs. Drake, we all four accept your commission—-or permission, whichever it is," replied Dick, bowing. "We'll try to use tact and judgment, and we'll try to bring Mr. Drake back with us."

Dick asked a few questions as to where Miller's place might be found. Then he set off, he and his chums walking abreast.

"Bring him back!" Mollie said plaintively. "Then mama won't cry, and I won't, either."

"I feel like a fool!" muttered Tom Reade, when they were out of earshot of the waiting mother and child.

"If you don't like the undertaking, you might keep in the background," Dick suggested.

"It's likely I'd back out of anything that's moving, isn't it?" Reade demanded, offended. "I don't mind any disagreeable business that we may run into. But I feel like a fool when I think of the message we'll have to take back to that poor woman and baby."

"Tom Drake will deliver the message to them," replied Dick, firmly.

"If he's sober even now," murmured Danny Grin, uneasily.

"I'm strong for the task!" declared Dave Darrin, with enthusiasm.

"So would I be," Tom defended himself, "if I thought that even a night of fighting would result in anything like success. But——-"

"Better stop right here, then," Prescott, suggested, smiling earnestly. But neither of Dick's companions stopped.

They were walking briskly, now. As they had been told, Miller's was the first place on the right hand side, where the business street of Fenton began. It had been a tavern in the old days, and was still a big and roomy structure.

Yet there was no mistaking the room in which the object of their quest was to be found. The door of the saloon opened repeatedly while the boys stood regarding the place.

Dick stepped over to a man who had just come out.

"Is Tom Drake in there?" Dick asked.

"Yes."

"Is he sober?" Dick pressed.

"Yes; so far," answered the man.

"Will you do me a great favor? Just step inside and tell him that there is a man outside who wants to see him. Just tell him that, and nothing more."

"Are you from Drake's wife?" asked the man, looking Dick over shrewdly.

"Yes," Dick admitted, candidly.

"I'll do it," nodded the man. "Drake has been making a fool of himself. He'll go to pieces and find himself without a job before the year is out. You wait here. I'll find a way to coax him out for you."

Soon the door opened again, and there came out Prescott's messenger followed by a clean-cut, well-built young man of not more than twenty-eight years of age.

"There's the young man who says he wants to see you," the citizen explained, pointing to Dick.

Tom Drake walked steadily enough. He certainly was not yet much under the influence of liquor.

"You wanted to see me?" he asked, looking somewhat puzzled as he eyed young Prescott.

"Yes," Dick admitted.

"What about?"

"Will you take a short walk with me," Dick went on, "and I'll explain my business to you."

"I don't believe I can take a walk with you," Drake answered. "I'm with some friends in there."

He nodded over his shoulder at the door through which he had just come.

"But my business is of a great deal of importance," Dick went on.

"Can't you see me to-morrow?" asked Drake, eager to get back to his companions.

"To-morrow will be altogether too late," Dick replied.

"Then state your business now."

"I'd much rather explain it you as you walk with me," Prescott urged, earnestly.

"Are—-are you from the building loan people?" asked Tom Drake, suddenly.

"No, I am not from them," Prescott replied, then added, truthfully enough: "But it's partly about that building loan matter that I wish to talk with you."

"Who sent you here?" asked Drake, half-suspiciously.

"A child," Dick replied. "At least, it was a child's face that gave me the resolution to come here and have a few words with you."

"A child?" repeated Drake. "What child?"

"Yours."

"A child?" echoed the young man. "Mine? Do you mean Mollie?"

"Yes," Dick went on, rapidly. "The child wanted to come here herself to get you, and I came in her stead. It was better that I should come than that little tot. Don't you think so?"

"I'm afraid I don't understand you," returned Tom Drake, beginning to look offended.

"Mr. Drake, do you know that your wife and child are all dressed up—-in their prettiest white gowns, waiting for you to come back to bring them into town to-night for the promised treat? Don't you understand the pain that you're giving them by showing that you prefer a lot of red-nosed loafers in Miller's to your own wife and child? The unhappiness that you're causing them to-night isn't a circumstance to all the misery that you're piling up for them in the years to come. Switch off! Switch off, while you're yet man enough to be able to do it! Won't you do it—-please? You must know just how happy that little kid will be when she sees you come swinging down the street to bring her and her mother into town. You know how that little tot's eyes will shine. Can't you hear her saying, 'Here's papa! He's come.' Isn't that baby worth a twenty-mile walk for any man to see when he knows she's his own kiddie and waiting for him? Come along, now; they're both waiting for you; they will be the happiest pair you've seen in a long time."

"I don't know but I will toddle along home," said Drake, rather shame-facedly. "I—-I didn't realize how time was slipping by. Yes; I guess I'll go home. Much obliged to you for letting me know the time."

But at that moment the door opened, and a voice called out:

"Drake! Oh, Drake. Come here; we want you."

"Can't, now," the young man called back. "I'm due at home."

"Home?" came in two or three jeering voices.

Then several men came out of the saloon, laughing boisterously.

"Come back, Drake! We can't let you slip off like that. You're too good a fellow to play the sneak with us. Come on back!"

"I—-I tell you, I'm due at home," insisted Drake, though he spoke more weakly.

"Hey! Here's Drake—-says he's going to slip home on us!" called one of the tormentors.

More men came out of the place, some of them staggering. With the new arrivals came one whom Dick and his friends rightly guessed to be Miller—-a thickset man, with swaggering manner, insolent expression and rough voice.

"What's this about your going home, Drake?" demanded one of the new arrivals.

"I—-I really ought to go home," Drake tried to explain.

"Cut that out," ordered Miller roughly. "You're booked to spend the evening with us, and the evening has hardly begun."

"I promised this young fellow I'd go home," said Drake slowly, "so I guess I will."

"And what has this young feller got to say or do about it?" demanded Miller angrily, as He pushed his way to Drake's side, then glared at Dick Prescott.

"And what have you got to say about his not going home?" Dick asked hotly. "Isn't this a free country, where a man may go home when he chooses?"

"It's a free country, and a man has a right to spend his evening in my place when he's invited," Miller asserted roughly.

"Yes; your invitation will hold until his month's pay is gone from his pocket," Dick flashed back. "That's all you want. Drake has sense enough to see that, and he's leaving you."

"He isn't going home for three hours yet, or anywhere else!" snorted Miller, whose breath proclaimed the fact that he had been using some of his own goods.

Dick laughed contemptuously as he turned to Tom Drake with:

"You see! That fellow thinks he can give you your orders. That fellow begins to believe that he owns you already."

"Who are you calling 'that feller'?" demanded Miller, dropping a heavy hand on Dick's shoulder.

"I referred to you," replied Prescott, pushing the man's hand from his shoulder.

"If you get too funny with me I'll hit you a crack that will carry your head off with it!" snarled the saloon keeper.

"Pshaw!" Prescott answered cuttingly. "You aren't big enough, or man enough, either!"

"What's that?"

Miller aimed a vicious, open-hand blow at young Prescott's face. It didn't land, but, instead, Dick's right hand went up smack! against the fellow's cheek.

"Hang your impudence!" roared Miller, angrily. "I'll pay you for that! I'll teach you!"

He made a rush at Dick, but two men who had been attracted by the commotion jumped in between them.

"Hold on, Miller!" objected one of these passers-by. "You can't pummel a boy!"

"I'll make him howl for hitting me!" roared Miller, doubling his big, powerful fists. "Get out of my way, or I'll run over you!"

"Get out of his way, please!" cried Dick suddenly. "Let Miller at me, if he wants. I'm willing to fight him. I'll fight him for Tom Drake's right to be a man!"



CHAPTER XX

IN THE MILKSOP CLASS?

"Good! And I'll hold the stakes!" cried Tom Reade jovially, as he took light hold of Drake's arm.

"Let Miller at the boy!" howled one of the bystanders. "He'll show the boy something. The kid is getting big enough to learn, and he ought to be taught."

"I'll fight Miller, if he has the sand!" proclaimed Dick, who now had his own reasons for wanting to sting the liquor seller into action. "I'll fight the bully, but not here in a saloon yard. There is a vacant lot the other side of the fence. We'll go in there and see how much of a fighter he is."

More citizens had gathered by this time, and there was every sign of an intention to stop further trouble. But Dave Darrin sprang into the crowd, saying, almost in an undertone:

"The respectable men here don't want to try to stop this affair. A lot of useful manhood depends upon the issue. Don't worry about my friend, if he does look rather young. He can take care of himself, all right, and he is calling for a fight that ought to be fought. You respectable men in the crowd keep still, and just come along and see fair play—-that's all."

Dave's earnest eloquence won over many of the men representing the better element of the crowd.

"Jove! He's a plucky boy!" cried one man.

"But Miller will pound him to a pulp!"

"Come along, everyone, and see whether rum or water is the best drink for fighting men!" insisted Tom Reade.

There was a general movement toward the vacant lot. Miller was muttering angrily, while some of his red-nosed victims were jeering.

In the field Dick took off his hat and coat, then his tie, and passed them to Dan Dalzell.

"Dave," whispered Prescott, "you stand by as my second, but don't make any too stiff claims of foul. This will have to be rough work, from the start."

Miller, already in his shirt sleeves, did not feel that he had any need of special preparation. Prescott looked altogether too easy. Not that Miller lacked experience in such matters. In other years he had been a prize-fighter of minor rank, and had been considered, in his class, a fairly hard man to beat.

"Now, stand up, boy," ordered the saloon keeper, advancing. "And take back the crack you passed to me."

"Let's have it," taunted Dick, throwing himself on the defensive.

Miller aimed a vicious blow but did not land. Instead, Prescott hit him on the short ribs.

"If you're going to fight, stand up and take your medicine!" roared Miller, in a rage.

"Handle your own foot-work to suit yourself!" Dick retorted. "I'll do the same. But you can't fight, anyway!"

That taunt threw the liquor seller into a still greater rage. With a yell he sprang at Prescott. But again Dick failed to be there.

The high school boy was not having an easy time, however. Miller's strength was formidable, and Dick knew that he could not stop many straight blows from his opponent without disaster.

Two merely glancing blows scraped the lad, who had landed four blows on Miller. The big fellow, however, seemed able to endure a lot of punishment.

"I didn't come out here to run a race!" Miller insisted, as he tried hard to corner the boy.

"Then stand still, and I won't hit you so hard!" mocked Prescott, as he struck the man again on the short ribs.

Then, of a sudden, Prescott hit the earth. He had miscalculated, and Miller's left fist had landed on his nose.

With a hoarse laugh Miller started to follow up the advantage with a kick.

"Here! Come back! None of that!" shouted a citizen, throwing his arms around Miller's neck. "Let the boy get to his feet. Fight fair or—-we'll lynch you when it's over!"

But Dick was up, the blood flowing freely from his nose. Yet he was hardly less cool as Miller was released and the two again faced each other.

"Finish him up, Miller, and we'll get back to pleasure!" laughed one of the drunkards in maudlin glee.

"The boy has no show. This is an outrage!" protested an indignant citizen. "It ought to be stopped."

As the two sparred Dick suddenly saw his chance to get in under the powerful guard of his antagonist and landed a hard blow on his solar plexus.

"Umph!" grunted Miller, as he partly doubled up under the force of the blow.

That instant was enough for Prescott to drive in a blow that nearly closed one of the big fellow's eyes.

"Stop this fight!" yelled the same citizen.

"Don't you do it!" warned another. "The boy is taking care of himself all right. Let him wind the bruiser up."

Now Miller, smarting and fearing accidental defeat, forgot caution and tried to rush in for a clinch. But this was the kind of attack that Prescott was skilled in dodging.

Dick gave ground before the furious assault, but he did so purposely. Back he went, step by step.

"Miller's got him!" cheered the liquor seller's friends.

At last Dick found what he wanted, the opportunity to drive in again on the big fellow's wind. Miller gave vent to another grunt, followed by a howl, as he felt a stinging fist land against his other eye.

Now, Dick had his man blinded, ready for the finish. A high school fist landed on the side of the big fellow's throat, sending him to his knees. Dick took but half a step backward as he waited for the big fellow to get to his feet. The instant that Miller rose Dick darted in, landing his right fist with all his strength on the tip of the man's chin.

This time the work was complete. Miller went down. Dick, smiling, though breathing quickly, stood over his fallen opponent, counting slowly to ten.

Then, in a moment, those who had favored the boy's side in the fight realized just what had happened.

Loud cheers arose from the crowd. Tom Drake was one of the first to dart in and seize young Prescott's right hand briefly before another man wanted to shake it. Dick was fairly made to run a gauntlet of handshaking.

Most of Miller's "friends" retreated in sulky bad humor. Three of the liquor seller's followers, however, picked the big man up, staggering under his weight, and bore him behind the door that had closed on more than one man's career.

"What do you think of that, Mr. Drake?" demanded Tom Reade jubilantly. "Do you put Dick Prescott in the milk-sop class?"



CHAPTER XXI

THE REVENGE TALK AT MILLER'S

"Let's get out of this place," whispered Dick in Dave's ear as Darry helped him to staunch the flow of blood from his nose.

"There, the bleeding has stopped," muttered Dave. "Now, put on your coat and button it up. Then the blood stains on your shirt won't show."

Tom Drake had very little to say, but he kept close to Prescott.

"Shall we walk down the road a bit, Mr. Drake?" asked Dick, as soon as he had his coat on.

"I'm in a hurry to get home," nodded the young workman. "I shall know where I belong, after this. No more of Miller's for me! For that matter," the young man added, with a hearty laugh, "I don't believe Miller would ever let me in his place again. Of course, in his own mind, he will blame me for what happened to-night."

"I hope he didn't get much of your money before it happened," murmured Prescott, as be and Drake, followed by Dave, Tom and Dan, got clear of the crowd and down into a quieter part of the road.

"He got less than a dollar of my wages," replied Drake. "I'm sorry he has that much, but he'll never get any more. Say, Prescott, but you are a fighter! I can imagine how 'sore' Miller will be, to-morrow, over having been whipped by such a stripling as you are."

"I've one great advantage over Miller," Dick rejoined. "I've never tasted alcohol, and Miller has saturated himself with it for years."

"I used to have an idea that liquor was strengthening," murmured Tom Drake. "I know quite a good many men who take it to keep up their strength."

"They're fools, then," Dick retorted tersely. "You could see, in Miller to-night, what alcohol does toward making one strong. That man is still powerful, but I'm satisfied that he was once a great deal stronger. Miller's muscles have grown flabby since he began to drink. His speed is less than it must have been formerly. Even his nerve—-his grit—-has been impaired by the stuff he has been drinking. Did you notice how early in the fight his wind left him? The man has very little of his former strength, and the blame belongs to the liquor he has used."

"Here's my gate," said Tom Drake, at last, as they halted before the little cottage. "Come in. I've got to tell my wife about you. I wonder where my two girls are?"

Dick and his friends tried to get out of going into the yard, but their new friend would not have it that way, so silently they followed Drake up the path. Then, through a front window, Tom Drake saw his girls.

His wife sat at a table, her head resting on her arms. On the floor sat the toddler, Mollie, still in her white dress. She had two broken dolls, pretending to play with them, but the woebegone look in her little face showed that her thoughts were elsewhere.

Tom Drake choked as he looked in at the window. Then, throwing up his head resolutely, he lifted the latch, entering the room with firm tread.

"I'm a bit late, girls, but come on up in the village!" he invited. "Here, Hattie, you take charge of this little roll," he added, thrusting his money into his wife's hand.

Not more than three minutes later the three Drakes issued from the house, Mollie enjoying a "ride" on her father's shoulder.

"Why, where are the boys?" he demanded. "I left them here."

"Gone, like all good angels, when their work is done," smiled his wife.

"It's all right, anyway, girls," Tom Drake answered cheerily. "We're pretty sure to find 'em up in the village, where we're going."

In the first place that the Drakes entered they came upon Dick and his three friends. The Gridley boys, after dodging a crowd that wanted to lionize young Prescott, had taken refuge, unseen, in the back of an otherwise deserted ice cream saloon.

"There they are!" cried Mollie, running the length of the shop, as fast as her chubby little legs could take her. She ran straight to Dick who bent over to give her a gentle hug.

"I don't know what to say to you young men," cried Mrs. Drake, halting beside the boys, her voice breaking a little, her eyes moist.

"Then, if you'll permit me to offer a suggestion," Dick smiled back, as he rose, "it seems to me that conversation might spoil several good things. Won't you all sit down and be our guests in a little ice cream feast that we have started?"

It was almost an hour before the little party broke up. A few interested citizens, however, found the hiding place of the Gridley High School boys and insisted on coming in to shake hands with the boys.

"Take your family and slip out through the back door," Dick whispered to Tom Drake.

"I don't know that I'll ever see you again," murmured Drake huskily, "so I want to say——-"

"Don't say anything," Dick smiled back. "You're all right, from now on. And we've all learned something to-night. We'll let it rest there. Good-bye, and the best of good luck for you and yours."

So the Drakes escaped from what would have been an embarrassing scene. Nor were Dick and his friends long in getting away from the too-enthusiastic citizens.

"It's late enough for us to go back to camp and turn in, isn't it?" suggested Tom Reade.

"I was thinking of that myself," Dick admitted.

"You must be tired, anyway," Dave hinted. "You whipped Miller all right, but he was a tiring brute, and I'll wager that you're both sore and exhausted."

"I'll plead guilty to a little bit of both," Dick Prescott assented, laughing at the recollection of Miller at the time when that brute's second eye was closed.

Yet it was more than half an hour after their return to camp when slumber finally began to assert its claim upon the Gridley boys. For Greg and Harry, as soon as they had heard a few words as to the evening's adventure, insisted upon hearing all of it before they would let Dick turn in.

"I'll bet they're sore in Miller's place tonight," chuckled Greg, just before be extinguished the second lantern.

Certainly anger did reign in Miller's place for the rest of that evening.

Miller had been brought to consciousness, after considerable effort. He was even able to be up and about his place, but his swollen features looked like a caricature of a face.

"The schoolboy that was able to do that to you, Miller, must have been eight feet high and as wide as a gate," remarked one of the red-nosed patrons of the place.

"Shut up!" was Miller's gracious response.

There were other drinking places in Fenton, and to these the news of the big fellow's drubbing quickly spread.

Indeed, the fight seemed to be the one topic of the talk of Fenton that evening.

As it happened, it wasn't very long before word was brought to Miller that Dick and his friends were camping down on Andy Hartshorn's place.

"It's queer that Hartshorn will let such young toughs stop on his land!" growled Miller.

"They ought to be chased out of town—-that's what!" growled a patron of the place.

More of this talk was heard, until finally someone demanded thickly:

"Well, why can't we chase 'em out of town?"

At first, the idea met with instant favor among the dozen or more worthless men gathered in Miller's saloon. The plan grew in favor until one man, slighter than the rest, observed:

"Say! Stop and think of one thing. We know what one of the boys did to Miller, and there are six of those boys down at the camp!"

That rather cast a damper over the enthusiasm until one blear-eyed man of fifty observed, knowingly:

"Well, we don't need to go alone. There are other men in Fenton who think the way we do. We can go down to the woods in force, and pretend that what we want to do comes as a rebuke administered by the citizens of Fenton."

"Hurrah!" cheered one man who seemed in danger of falling asleep.

"Miller, let us use your telephone," urged the former speaker.

"No, you can't," retorted the liquor seller quickly. "It's all right for you men to do whatever you think is right, but you've got to remember that I've got to be kept out of whatever happens."

Well enough did the wretch know that half-hearted opposition from him would only fan the flame hotter among the men who considered themselves his friends.

So the messengers were sent to the other drinking places in town. Word was passed for a night raid "by representative citizens," as these topers called themselves.

Men of the same turn of mind soon came flocking in from other drinking resorts.

"Don't talk here about what you're going to do for the good of the town," Miller ordered. "Remember, I've got to be kept out of this. My position is a delicate one, you understand."

Soon after midnight the disreputable army of vengeance seekers was straggling down the road. Talking had ceased. These drink-driven wretches were hunting for the camp of Dick & Co. and they were going to attack it in force.



CHAPTER XXII

UNDER THE STING OF THE LASH

When the crowd reached the camp of the high school boys all was silent there. From within the tent came the sounds of the heavy breathing of the sleepers.

"Everything is ready, and there isn't even a dog on the place!" was the exultant word passed back.

"Bunch up! Get in close and surround the tent," ordered another voice. "We want some of you men behind the tent, so that none of the youngsters can slip away from us. Come along, now. Don't talk! Don't make so much noise. Easy, now!"

Thus the figures continued to gather, like so many evil spirits of the night.

Here and there one of the rabble fell over something in the dark, or tripped over a root or stone as he moved about among the shadows.

In the intervals of absolute silence the steady breathing of the six Gridley High School boys could still be heard, until one man in the rabble, less sober than the others, fell over a packing-case, barking his shins and giving vent to a yell of pain.

"What was that?" asked Greg Holmes, waking and rising on one elbow.

Outside all was quiet again.

"Hey, Dave, get up!" Holmes called, shaking the arm of Darry, who lay asleep on the adjoining cot. "I heard something going on outside. We'll both get up, light a lantern, and——-"

"Yes! Get up and come out!" jeered a voice near the tent door. "Come out and have a look at us. The reputable citizens of Fenton are to chase you out of town—-and we'll do it, after we get through with teaching you manners!"

"Fellows! Hustle!" shouted Greg, leaping from his cot. "Get ready for trouble. All the topers and loafers who ever knew Miller are outside to avenge the beating that Miller received from Dick!"

"We'll show you!" came a hoarse yell, and then the foremost ruffians in the crowd surged in through the tent door.

But Dave had succeeded in lighting a lantern, and this he took time to hang from a hook on the nearest pole.

Five boys clad only in their pajamas faced this angry rabble. Dan Dalzell slept through the confusion until Reade, in passing him, hauled him from bed.

"What are you men doing here?" thundered Reade, striding to the head of the little group of defenders.

Dick was now beside him like a flash.

"You fellows get out of here!" Prescott ordered, his eyes flaming.

"We'll get out when we get ready!" came the hoarse answer. "Now, friends, show these young imps——-"

But that speaker got no further, for a blow from Tom's fist brought him to the ground.

All six of Dick & Co. were now on the fistic firing line.

For a few moments they carried all but consternation to their opponents. As they were forced back from the doorway, however, more and more of the mob poured in.

The very weight of numbers was bound to count against Dick & Co. who were likely to suffer severely at the hands of the miscreants.

Just then there came a flash across the canvas of the tent. The light had been thrown by a swiftly-moving automobile. There was another automobile directly behind it. Both cars came to a stop at the roadside, while from them leaped more than a dozen men.

These men were armed—-each with a horsewhip. In an instant the invaders found them selves assailed from behind.

Whish! slash! zip!

In another instant all was uproar. Yells of pain from the mob rent the air, for these latest arrivals were laying about them with their horsewhips with an energy worthy of a good cause.

"Here, you, Andy Hartshorn. Stop that! Don't you hit me! I know you, and I'll have the law on you!" shrieked one of the frightened wretches.

"He who goes to law should have his own hands clean," quoth Farmer Hartshorn, as he dealt the fellow a stinging blow on the legs.

Those of the crowd outside the tent fled in every direction, hotly pursued, and again and again they were stung by the lashes.

Those of the invaders still in the tent were now in a panic to get out and away. As they dashed through the doorway they felt the slashing of horsewhips, while Dick Prescott and his chums hammered them from the rear.

In less than thirty seconds the invaders had been cleared away. They fled in screaming panic, scattering in all directions, some of them being pursued and lashed for a distance of many rods up or down the road.

On all sides the fleeing wretches threatened their persecutors with the law, but these threats did not stop the punishment.

"I guess it's all right now, boys!" called Farmer Hartshorn grimly, as he strode up to the place where Dick & Co. had gathered just beyond their tent.

"What was that mob, anyway?" Dick asked.

"A gang that came after revenge for what you did to Miller to-night," laughed the farmer.

"I thought as much," muttered Dick.

"They've been gathering at Miller's, and other like places, for a couple of hours," Mr. Hartshorn went on. "But, as is the case with all such movements, some news of it leaked outside. We got word a bit late, or we'd have been here before that crowd came along. When we knew the word was straight some of us telephoned to others, and our crowd was gotten together, but as it is, we got here in season. Are any of you boys hurt?"

"No, sir; not one of us," Dick declared. "But some of us might have been seriously injured if you gentlemen had been delayed for another minute."

"We'll know the rascals to-morrow," spoke up another of the rescuers. "If they appear on the streets at all they'll be recognized. We have marked them up pretty well. They've gone off vowing to have the law on us."

"All they'll do will be to put arnica on themselves," declared Mr. Hartshorn. "And they will send friends to the drugstore for the arnica. They won't take the risk of being recognized on the streets. They'll be a shame-faced lot in the morning."

"It was mighty good of you men to come down and help us out," murmured Dick Prescott gratefully. "We would have had a pretty tough time if we had been left to ourselves."

"We'd go further than we've traveled tonight, to help out boys like you," declared another man present. "Prescott, that was a fine thing you did to Miller to-night, and Tom Drake will be grateful as long as he lives."

"If Drake keeps away from drink in the future," Dick answered, "he will have reason to congratulate himself."

"Oh, Drake will keep away from the stuff after this," said one of the citizens. "Young Drake has a head of his own, and we'll see that he uses it. We'll keep a friendly eye over him. Don't worry. Young Tom Drake will never associate with any of Miller's kind again."

"Whenever any of you boys want to go to sleep, just say so," urged Mr. Hartshorn, "and we'll run along."

"Why, I believe we're a bit waked up, at present," smiled young Prescott, as he turned to glance at the others in the light thrown by the automobile lamps.

"I don't feel as though I needed any more sleep," laughed Tom Reade.

"If you boys are thinking of sitting up to watch against another surprise, don't bother about it," advised Mr. Hartshorn. "You've seen the very last that you'll see of those rascals. Men of that sort never have nerve enough to attempt a risky thing twice."

"I'm going to put some wood in the stove and make coffee," Danny Grin announced.

"Can't we offer you a cup of coffee, gentlemen?" proposed Prescott. "And sandwiches? We have plenty of the fixings for sandwiches."

The idea prevailed to such an extent that Dalzell put on a kettle of water to boil, while Tom and Dave began to slice bread and open tinned meats.

"I'm going to sit down on the ground and be comfortable," declared one of the Fentonites, when coffee and food were passed around.

"Do you know, gentlemen," said Tom Reade, as he munched a sandwich, "I'm beginning to like Fenton next to our own town of Gridley."

"Fenton isn't anywhere near as large a place as Gridley," replied one of the guests.

"No; but for its size Fenton is a lively place," Reade went on. "There seems to be something happening here every minute."

"That is when young fellows like you come along and start the ball rolling," chuckled Farmer Hartshorn. "There has been more excitement to-night in Fenton than I can remember during the last five years. I've seen you play football, Prescott, and you're a wonder at the game. Yet what you did to-night for young Tom Drake is a bigger thing than winning a whole string of the greatest football games of the year."

"Football is more exciting, though," smiled Dick.

"Is it?" demanded Mr. Hartshorn. "More exciting than what you've been through tonight? Then I'll never play football! More excitement than you've had to-night isn't healthful for any growing young fellow!"

For fully an hour these men of Fenton remained at the camp, talking with their young hosts, and, incidentally, picking up a lot of information about the sports and pastimes that most interest wide-awake boys of to-day.

At last, however, disclaiming the thanks offered by Dick & Co., the guests went away in the automobiles that had brought them, while Dick Prescott and his chums prepared to finish out the night's rest.



CHAPTER XXIII

TIMMY, THE GENTLEMAN, AT HOME

"Oh, won't life seem stale when we get back into the land of crowded business streets and schoolhouses?" grumbled Reade, as, perched on the seat of the camp wagon, he drove out onto the highway the next morning, followed by the other members of Dick & Co. on foot.

"No, sir!" Darry retorted. "Life won't seem stale on that account. Instead, it will be brightened by the pleasant recollection of this summer's fun, which is now so soon to be ended."

"You're not going through Fenton, are you, Dick?" asked Greg.

"I guess we'll have to. We were pretty well cleaned out of some of our provisions last night. We shall have to replenish our food supply, and Fenton is the only real town along our route to-day. The rest are small farming villages."

"But we'll attract a lot of attention," declared Holmes.

"You won't," laughed Darry. "You didn't go to town with us last night, and consequently you're not known there."

"I'd rather not go through the town myself," Dick explained, "but it seems to me that as long as we must purchase supplies we ought to make a stop in the town that's likely to have the best stores."

Fenton's principal street had rather a sleepy look this hot August morning. There were but few people abroad as Dick & Co. turned into the main thoroughfare.

At Miller's place there was not a sign of life. "I'll wager that brute is applying raw beef to his eyes this morning," muttered Tom, somewhat vindictively.

Prescott's watchful glance soon discovered a provision store that looked more than usually promising. At a word from him Tom reined in the horse, while Prescott and Darrin went inside to make purchases.

When they came out they found Farmer Hartshorn and another man talking with Tom Reade.

"You young men of Gridley don't look any the worse, this morning, for the excitement you had last night," said Mr. Hartshorn, after a cordial greeting. "Reade tells me that you left the milk-pail at my house as you came along."

"Yes, sir," Dick nodded. "And with it, we left our very best thanks for the fine treat that milk proved to be to us."

"Prescott, shake hands with Mr. Stark. He's our leading lawyer in this little place."

"I've heard a good deal about you this morning," said the lawyer, as he shook hands.

Mr. Stark was a tall, thin man, of perhaps forty-five years of age. Warm as was the day he was attired wholly in black, a bit rusty, and wore a high silk hat that was beginning to show signs of age. He belonged to a type of rural lawyer that is now passing.

"I think we've heard of you, too," smiled Prescott innocently.

"Have you?" asked the lawyer, looking somewhat astonished.

"Yes," Dick went on. "I think it must have been your letter that Mr. Reuben Hinman showed us one day. It was in regard to a bill he had given you to collect. Mr. Hinman is in the hospital and must need quite a bit of money just at present so I beg to express the hope that you have been able to collect the other half of the debt—-the half that belongs to him."

Lawyer Stark reddened a good deal, despite his sallow skin.

"Why, what about that other half? What's the story?" questioned Mr. Hartshorn, his eyes, twinkling as though he scented something amusing.

"Oh—-er—-just a matter of business between a client and myself," the lawyer explained, in some confusion.

"And poor old Hinman was the client, eh?" asked the farmer.

"We don't know very much about the matter," Dave Darrin broke in, a trifle maliciously, for he fell that it might be a good thing to show up this lawyer's tricky work. "Mr. Hinman gave Mr. Stark a bill of twenty dollars to collect, and——-"

"It was—-er—-all a matter of business between a client and myself, and therefore of a confidential nature," Lawyer Stark broke in, reddening still more.

But Dave was in no mood, just then, to be headed off so easily, so he went on:

"Mr. Hinman showed us the letter, and asked us what we thought of it, so that rather broke the confidential nature of the matter. You see," turning to Mr. Hartshorn, "the bill was for twenty dollars, and it seems that. Mr. Stark was to have half for his trouble in collecting it. Now the letter that Mr. Hinman showed us——-"

"I protest, young man!" exclaimed the lawyer.

"The letter," Darry went on calmly, "was to the effect that Mr. Stark had collected his own half of the twenty dollars, and that the collection of Mr. Hinman's half of the money seemed doubtful."

"Now, now, Stark!" exclaimed the farmer, looking sharply at the lawyer. "Surely, that isn't your way of doing business with a poor and aged client like Hinman!"

"I have collected the remainder of the bill, and am going to mail a settlement to Mr. Hinman to-day," muttered the lawyer, trying to look unconcerned. "All just a matter of routine office business, Mr. Hartshorn."

But the lawyer felt wholly uncomfortable. He was thinking, at that moment, that he would heartily enjoy kicking Darrin if the latter didn't look so utterly healthy and uncommonly able to take care of himself.

"Do I hear you discussing money that is due my father?" inquired a voice behind them. "If so, my father is very ill, as you doubtless know, and I would take pleasure in receiving the money on his behalf."

Timothy Hinman, looking wholly the man of fashion, made this offer. He had come up behind the group, and there was a look in his eyes which seemed to say that the handling of some of the family money would not be distasteful to him just then.

"I'll walk along with you to your office, Mr. Stark, and receipt for the money, if you're headed that way," suggested the younger Hinman again.

"Unless you hold a regular power of attorney from your father, you could hardly give me a valid receipt," replied the lawyer sourly, as he turned away from Mr. Hartshorn and the boys and started down the street.

"Won't my receipt do until my father is up and about once more?" pressed Timothy Hinman.

"No, sir; it won't," snapped the lawyer.

"Have you heard, this morning, how your father is?" Dick inquired.

"Just heard, at the post-office," Hinman answered. "My father had a very bad day yesterday. Er—-in fact, the chances, I am sorry to say, appear to be very much against his recovery."

"He must feel the strain of his father's illness," observed Dave sarcastically.

"He does!" retorted Mr. Hartshorn, with emphasis. "If old Reuben dies young Timothy must go to work for a living. The disgrace of toil will almost kill him. His two sisters are as bad as he is. They've never done a stroke of work, either. All three have lived on the poor old peddler's earnings all their lives, though not one of the three would be willing to keep the old man's house for him. There are a lot of sons and daughters like them to-day. Perhaps there always have been."

Mr. Hartshorn waited until Dick and Dave had finished with the purchases and had loaded them on the wagon.

Then the farmer shook hands with each member of Dick & Co.

"I'm coming up to Gridley to see the football game this Thanksgiving," he promised. "I hope I'll see as good a game as I did last year. Anyway, I'll see the work of a mighty fine lot of young fellows."

Prescott expressed again the heartiest thanks of himself and friends for the timely aid given them during the trouble in camp.

"We've lost so much time this morning that we'll have to hustle for the rest of the day," Tom called down from the wagon seat, as he started the horse.

An hour later they were more than three miles past Fenton.

"Get out of the way, Tom!" called Dave. "Drive up into someone's yard like lightning. Here comes a whizz wagon that wants the whole highway."

Behind them, its metal trimmings flashing in the sun, and leaving a trail of dust in its wake, came an automobile traveling at least sixty miles an hour.

Yet, fast as the car was going when it passed them, the speed did not prevent one occupant from recognizing them and calling out derisively. Then, half a mile ahead, the car stopped, turned, and came slowly back toward the wondering Gridley boys.



CHAPTER XXIV

CONCLUSION

Five rather contemptuous pairs of youthful eyes surveyed Dick & Co. as their outfit plodded on its way.

"Aren't they a mucker looking outfit?" demanded one voice from the car.

Then the automobile shot ahead again.

"Phin Drayne! Humph!" said Darry rather scornfully.

Phin Drayne is no stranger to the readers of the "High School Boys Series," who will recall Phin as the "kicker" who, at the game on the Thanksgiving before, had sulked and refused to go on the field, hoping to induce the other members of the Gridley High School gridiron team to coax him to play. Thus Dick, though suffering at that time from injuries, and forbidden to play, had been forced out onto the field to help win the great game of the season. Of course a kicker like Drayne did not like Prescott. Dick worried but little on that account.

"There! they are coming back," Greg announced. "They are grinning at us again."

"If they keep on grinning," threatened Darry, "we'll sic Danny Grin onto them. When it comes to grinning our own Danny boy can grin down anything on earth."

As if to verify that claim, Dalzell began to grin broadly. Besides this, he turned his face toward the occupants of the automobile as it once more passed Dick & Co.

Just at this point the car slowed down. Phin Drayne looked as though he were exhibiting his fellow students of Gridley High School as so many laughable freaks.

"That's what I call a vacation on the cheap," Drayne remarked to his friends, in a tone wholly audible to Dick & Co.

"It is 'on the cheap,'" Dick called out pleasantly. "And yet, our trip hasn't been such a very cheap one, either, and we've earned all the money ourselves. I don't suppose, Drayne, you ever earned as much money in your life."

"I don't have to," scoffed Phin Drayne. "My father is able to supply me with whatever money I need."

"Why!" uttered Dan Dalzell. "Our old Drayne is just another Timmy Hinman of the regular kind, isn't he?"

Dan looked so comical when he made this observation that his five chums burst into a shout of gleeful laughter.

Phin Drayne didn't relish that very sincere laughter. Though he didn't understand the allusion, he suspected that he was being made the butt of a joke by Dick & Co.

"Drive on, George," he requested his friend at the wheel. "One hates to be seen in the company of such fellows."

The car's speed was let out several notches, and shot down the road ahead of Dick & Co.'s plain little caravan.

"Now that I think of it," Dick declared, "Phin is just another edition of Timmy Hinman, isn't he? And so are quite a good many of the fellows we know. The world must be nearly as full of Timmy Hinmans as it is of fathers either wealthy or well-to-do. I'd hate to belong to the Timmy Hinman crowd!"

"As for me," sighed Tom comically, "I don't see any chance of my becoming a Timmy until I'm able to do it on money accumulated for myself."

As Phin Drayne was still in Gridley High School, and had an overweening idea of himself as a football player, it is extremely likely that we shall hear of him again, for which reason, if for no other, we may as well dismiss him from these present pages.

A few more days of earnest hiking, followed by restful sleep in camp at night, brought Dick & Co., one fine afternoon toward the end of August, in sight of the spires of Gridley.

"There's the good old town!" called Dick, first to reach the rise of ground from which the view of Gridley was to be had.

"Good old town, indeed!" glowed Dave Darrin.

"Whoop!" shouted Tom Reade irrepressibly. "Whoop! And then—-whoop!"

Dalzell, as he stood still for a few moments, gazing ahead, grinned broadly.

"He thinks his native town is a joke!" called Greg Holmes reproachfully.

"No," replied Dalzell, with a solemn shake of his head. "I am the joke, and it's on Gridley for being my native town."

"I'm glad to be back—-when I get there," announced Hazy. "I shall be glad, even if for nothing more than the chance to rest my feet."

"Nonsense!" Dick retorted. "You'll be out on Main Street, to-night, ready to tramp miles and miles, if anything amusing turns up."

At the first shade by the roadside Dick &. Co. halted for fifteen minutes to rest.

"Now, each one of you do a little silent thinking," Prescott urged.

"Give us the topic, then," proposed Reade.

"Fellows," Dick went on, mounting a stump and thrusting one hand inside his flannel shirt, in imitation of the pose of an orator, "the next year will be an eventful one for all of us. In that time we shall wind up our courses at the Gridley High School. From the day that we set forth from Gridley High School we shall be actively at work creating our careers. We are destined to become great men, everyone of us!"

"Tell that to the Senate!" mocked Tom Reade.

"Well, then," Dick went on, accepting the doubt of their future greatness, "we shall, at least, if we are worth our salt, become useful men in the world, and I don't know but that is very close to being great. For the man who isn't useful in the world has no excuse for living. Now, in a little more than another hour, we shall be treading the pavements of good old Gridley. Let us do it with a sense of triumph."

"Triumph?" quizzed Tom soberly. "What about?"

"The sense of triumph," Dick retorted, "will arise from the fact that this is to be the last and biggest year in which we are to give ourselves the final preparation for becoming either great or useful men. I'm not going to say any more on this subject. Perhaps you fellows think I've been talking nonsense on purpose. I haven't. Neither have I tried to preach to you, for preaching is out of my line. But, fellows, I hope you all feel, as solemnly as I do myself, just what this next year must mean to us in work, in study—-in a word, in achievement. It won't do any of us any harm, once in a while to feel solemn, for five seconds at a time, over what we are going to do this year to assure our futures."

For once Tom Reade didn't have a jest ready. For once Dalzell forgot to grin.

The march was taken up again. The next halt was made in Gridley, thus ending their long training hike, the boys going to their respective homes.

"Just give three silent cheers, and we won't startle anyone," Tom proposed.

"We went out on the trip to harden ourselves," murmured Dave, "and I must admit that we have all done it."

That evening Dick and Harry Hazelton drove the horse and wagon over to Tottenville, where the camp wagon was returned to its owner, Mr. Newbegin Titmouse.

"You young men have worn this wagon quite: a bit," whined Mr. Titmouse, after he had painstakingly inspected the wagon by the light of a lantern.

"I think we've brought it back in fine condition, sir," replied Dick, and he spoke the truth. "The wagon looks better, Mr. Titmouse, than you had expected to see it."

"You owe me about five dollars for extra wear and tear," insisted the money-loving Mr. Titmouse.

But he didn't get the money. Again Dick Prescott turned out to be an excellent business man. Dick was most courteous, but he refuted all of Mr. Titmouse's claims for extra payment, in the end even such a money-grubber as Mr. Newbegin Titmouse gave up the effort to extort more money for the use of his wagon than was his due. He even used his lantern to light the boys through the dark side alley to the street where the trolley car ran.

Two or three times after this Dick and his friends heard from Tom Drake. That young workman never repeated his earlier error. In time he paid for his home, then began the saving of money for other purposes. To-day Drake owns his own machine shop and is highly prosperous.

Old Reuben Hinman lingered many days between life and death. At last he recovered, and in time was discharged from the hospital.

However, his first attempts to run the peddler's wagon again revealed the fact that the peddler's days on the road were over. He was no longer strong enough for the hard outdoor life.

Timothy Hinman and his sisters came forward when the Overseers of the Poor began to look into the peddler's affairs. These dutiful children wanted to be sure to obtain whatever might be their share of their father's belongings.

Timothy and his sisters obtained their full shares—-nothing.

The Overseers of the Poor found that they could effect an arrangement by which the peddler's home, his horse and wagon, stock and good will could be sold for four thousand dollars.

This was done. With half the money Reuben Hinman was able to purchase his way into a home for old men. Here he will be maintained, without further expense, as long as he lives, and he will live in a degree of comfort amounting, with this simple-minded ex-peddler, to positive luxury.

The other two thousand dollars, at the suggestion of the Overseers of the Poor, was spent in buying an annuity from a life insurance company. This annuity provides ample spending money for Reuben Hinman whenever, in fine weather, he wishes to go forth from the home and enjoy himself in the world at large.

Timothy has been forced to go to work as a valet. The daughters tearfully support themselves as milliners. Reuben Hinman long ago spent the ten dollars received from Lawyer Stark.

The tramp who accepted work from Dr. Hewitt made good in every sense of the word. In fact he did so well that, in time, he took unto himself a wife and is now the head of a family, which lives in a little cottage built on Dr. Hewitt's estate. The name of "Jim Joggers" has given way to the real name of that former knight of the road. However, as the man is sensitive about his idle past, we prefer to remember him as "Joggers."

And now we come to the end of the "High School Boys Vacation Series."

It is to be hoped that these four little volumes have not dwelt so much upon fun as to make it appear that pleasure is all there is in the world that is worth while.

Dick Prescott and his friends were destined to discover that all the pleasure in the world that is worth anything at all comes only as the reward of continuous, hard and useful endeavor.

The further adventures that befell Dick Prescott and his chums while they were still Gridley High School boys will be found in the fourth volume of the "High School Boys Series," which is published under the title, "The High School Captain of the Team; Or, Dick & Co. Leading the Athletic Vanguard."

In that volume, the last dealing with Dick Prescott's high school days, the value of sports and the worth of honor and faithful work will be set forth as strongly as lies within the power of the narrator of these events.

THE END