CHAPTER V
PUTTING ONE OVER
There was a shout of amazement from the boys in which could be detectedan element of unbelief and derision. But there was also a note of awethat was balm to Billy’s soul. Any one who was so familiar with thesupernatural was not to be regarded lightly. Billy felt that he hadscored a decided hit and swelled out his chest importantly.
“When did you hear them walk?” asked Skeets, looking about him a littleapprehensively.
“You’re just kidding,” declared Shiner, stoutly. “I don’t believe a wordof it.”
“I think that Billy’s getting us on a string,” affirmed Fred, althoughhis eager eyes showed that he was none too sure of it.
Billy waited for the storm of protest and comment to subside.
“I mean just what I said,” he affirmed. “Cross my heart and hope to dieif I don’t.”
This solemn affirmation helped to quell the doubters, especially asthere was nothing to arouse suspicion in Billy’s sober face.
“Well then, tell us all about it,” urged Mouser, who was anxious toobtain confirmation of his own belief.
“It was in our town when old General Bixby was buried,” explained Billy,amid a silence in which one could have heard a pin drop. “There was abig turnout and the band played awful solemn music.”
He paused for a moment.
“Yes, go on, go on,” urged Skeets excitedly. “Was it then that you heardthe ghosts walk?”
“Yes,” replied Billy. “It was then that I heard the Dead March.”
There was a moment of stupefaction, as the idea filtered into the mindsof Billy’s dupes. Bobby grasped it first.
“Run, Billy run!” he counseled. “They’ll kill you for that!”
But Billy had already edged his way to the rim of the group and by thetime they lunged for him was safely out of reach. Then he danced a jigand went through various gestures expressive of his pity and contemptfor the victims who had let themselves so readily be taken in.
“It’s too easy,” he shouted. “It really isn’t sportsmanlike to takeadvantage of such innocent boobs. It’s like taking candy from a baby.”
“It’s no use,” declared Bobby. “Billy is a hopeless case.”
“He sure is,” agreed Mouser, whose faith in ghosts had received a severebump. “I was watching his face too, but he was so sober that I fell forit and fell good and hard. The only satisfaction is that the rest of youfell for it too.”
Just then Dr. Raymond, the head of the school approached, and the boyssubsided. The doctor smiled pleasantly at the group and singled outBobby.
“I’d like to have you come to my office in a few minutes, Blake,” hesaid, “and you also Martin and Bangs. I have something to say to you.”
“Very well, sir,” the boys assented.
The doctor passed on, and the boys looked at each other. Usually aninvitation to the doctor’s office portended something unpleasant, andwas not looked forward to with any degree of enthusiasm.
“Now you’re going to catch it,” chaffed Skeets.
“What have you roughnecks been up to now?” demanded Shiner with mockseverity.
“Perhaps he’s going to scold you for falling for my jokes,” Billy rubbedit in.
But the three who had been summoned only smiled. There had been timesafter midnight spreads and other escapades, when such an invitationwould have made them decidedly uneasy. But just at the moment theirconsciences were clear, and it was without misgiving that a few minuteslater they knocked at the doctor’s door and were told to come in.
The doctor was seated at his desk, but rose as they entered and motionedthem to seats. He was a tall, rather spare man of middle age, with keeneyes and the face of a scholar, in which could be seen also theexperience of a man of affairs. There was an air of natural dignityabout him that warned any one that he would be an unsafe man to triflewith. But although he was a strict disciplinarian and the boys stood inwholesome awe of him, he was yet tolerant and broadminded and absolutelyjust. Any boy that was summoned before him for an alleged offense couldbe certain of being heard in his own defense, and of getting a “squaredeal;” and wherever possible, justice would be tempered with mercy.
He had built up a reputation for Rockledge School that was spread farand wide. His instructors were well chosen, the manners and morals ofthe boys were carefully looked after, and parents had no hesitation inconfiding their boys to his keeping. The institution was fortunate inits location, standing on the shores of Monatook Lake, a beautiful bodyof water, which afforded facilities for bathing, boating and fishing inSummer and for skating and other ice sports in Winter. In addition tothese natural advantages, the school had a well-equipped gymnasium andexcellently laid out fields for football, baseball and other sports. Fortraining both the mind and the body, Rockledge School left little to bedesired; and this was so well understood in that part of the countrythat there was usually a waiting list of applicants for admission to thestrictly limited number of pupils.
“I have sent for you boys,” the doctor said, after they had seatedthemselves, “to thank you on behalf of myself and the school for thegallant thing you did to-day in saving those boys from drowning in thelake. It took a lot of pluck and hard work, and I’m proud of you.”
The boys looked embarrassed.
“How is Lee Cartier getting along, Dr. Raymond?” asked Bobby eagerly,glad to change the subject. “Mr. Carrier told me that he wasn’t wellenough for us to see him.”
The doctor’s face took on a worried look.
“It’s a little early to tell yet,” be replied. “Dr. Evans, who has justgone, told me that the drenching he had received and the exposureafterward while you were getting back to shore had been a severe shockto his system. He comes from the South, you know, and hasn’t been uphere long enough to get hardened to our climate. There is a possibilitythat he may be in for a serious illness. Still, we’ll hope for the best.I won’t keep you any longer,” he said, rising as a signal of dismissal,“but I want once more to say to you that you have done honor toyourselves and the school.”
The boys bowed themselves out and closed the door behind them.
“The doctor’s a brick, isn’t he?” remarked Fred, as they went down thehall.
“You bet he is,” agreed Sparrow. “He’s the real goods.”
“He’s all wool and a yard wide,” was Bobby’s tribute to the head ofRockledge School.
A week passed swiftly by and then another, and by that time Winter hadcome in earnest. There had as yet been no snow, but the weather hadbecome intensely cold and the lake was beginning to freeze over. Atfirst, the ice looked like a gigantic spider’s web shooting out inshimmering threads until the entire surface was covered with a crystalcoating. Then the ice began to thicken at the shores, and it was evidentthat with the continuance of the cold weather it would soon be possibleto skate from one end of the lake to the other.
Skates were gotten out and polished and sharpened. Some of the boysbusied themselves with making ice sails, which they could hold in theirhands and which would carry them like the wind along the glassy surfacewithout the expenditure of any effort of their own, save what wasrequired to hold the sails. This contrivance had a special appeal to PeeWee, who was a profound believer in any device that would save labor. Hewas far too lazy however to make one for himself and had written homeasking his folks to buy and send him one. To the other boys’ suggestionthat it be especially reinforced or made of sheet iron, he turned a deafand scornful ear.
But before the ice was quite hard enough to be trusted, the snow took ahand. Up to then there had been nothing but a few flurries that didscarcely more than whiten the ground. But one afternoon, as the boyscame out of their last recitations, they saw that the skies werelowering and that a steady snowstorm was in progress.
Ordinarily this would have been welcomed, but just now the boys hadtheir minds set on skating, so that the sight of the whirling flakes wassomething of a disappointment.
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sp; “There goes our skating up the flue,” commented Shiner, as he looked onthe ground on which there was already an inch of snow. “The lake will beno good, if it’s all covered with snow.”
“And by the time the snow’s ready to melt, the ice will melt too,”mourned Sparrow.
“And I just got a notice from the express company this morning that myice sail was there,” complained Pee Wee.
“Oh, stop your grouching, you poor fish,” said Bobby. “In the firstplace the snow may not amount to anything. In the second place, if itdoes, we can get busy and sweep off enough of the ice on the lake toskate on. And in the third place, what we may miss in skating we canmake up in coasting.”
“‘The fellow worth while is the one that can smile When everything’s going dead wrong,’”
chanted Skeets. “I guess that means Bobby,” he added, giving the lattera nudge in the ribs.
“Well, what have we got to growl about anyway?” said Fred, falling intohis chum’s mood. “Here we are well and strong and able to put away threesquare meals a day”—here Pee Wee pricked up his ears. “Now if we wereshut up in a room like Lee Cartier, we might have something to kickabout.”
“Poor Lee!” remarked Bobby regretfully. “He’s certainly had a roughdeal. He’s lucky of course that he didn’t get pneumonia. But it’s nojoke to be kept in his room so long. I’m going over to see him for awhile as soon as supper is over.”
Which he did, accompanied by Fred and Sparrow, who had expressed adesire to go along.