CHAPTER XXII
A STARTLING MESSAGE
"Wake up, Frank!"
Frank, roughly shaken by Bob Upton, sat up in bed. He rubbed his eyesdrowsily, and for a moment all the strange happenings of the previous nightseemed like some dream.
Then Frank recalled reaching the school about ten o'clock in the morning,when all the students were in their classes, of reaching his roomunobserved, lying down on his bed in his clothes to rest and collect histhoughts, and of dropping into a nap.
"I say," hailed Bob excitedly, "where in the world have you been?"
"It's a long story," explained Frank with a prodigious yawn and stretchinghimself. "You wouldn't believe it if I told it to you. Have I been missed?"
"Missed?" echoed Bob, almost in a shout. "The head monitor sat up for youall night. The gardener and the steward have been searching the creek andhunting for you everywhere. Our tutor had arranged to send a party of theclass to hunt for you after dinner, and there's been all kinds ofexcitement and fuss about you."
"I'm sorry," said Frank, "but I couldn't help it. I've been kidnaped, Bob."
"What!"
"Don't blurt it out. I want to see Ned Foreman first. He's interested."
"Gill Mace was around with his sneering meanness," said Bob. "He said theboys had better see that none of their jewelry was missing."
"Did, eh?" said Frank. "He and his uncle will be interested, too, if thingscome out as I think."
"Frank, I must tell Professor Drake that you've come back."
"All right," assented Frank, who proceeded to take a refreshing wash as Bobflew from the room.
He returned just as our hero finished brushing his hair.
"You're to come down to the office at once," he said.
"All right," assented Frank.
He proceeded down the stairs without meeting any of his friends. Frankknocked at the office door and was admitted by Professor Drake.
"So you have returned, Jordan?" spoke the teacher in a somewhat severetone.
"Yes, Mr. Drake," replied Frank.
"I hope you have some satisfactory explanation to offer in regard to yourabsence against the rules of this school."
"I certainly have, Mr. Drake," said Frank. "There is considerable to tell,and it is very important. I would like to see the president before I sayanything, though."
"Professor Elliott is absent until to-morrow," said the tutor. "I am incharge here, and you must explain to me."
"I hope you will excuse me," replied Frank, "but there is a very goodreason why I must tell the president before any one else."
"You are pretty mysterious, Jordan."
"I hope you believe that I am doing just what is right until Mr. Elliottreturns," said Frank earnestly.
The teacher studied Frank's manly face for a moment.
"I must at least believe that you think you are right," he said after athoughtful pause. "We will have it that way, if you insist, Jordan."
"Thank you, Mr. Drake," said Frank. "You will find that I am not deceivingyou."
Frank was greeted at dinner with a babel of questions as to his mysteriousabsence. He told his friends that he had been away on business; that hecould explain only to the president of the academy.
He attended his classes that afternoon, and joined the crowd on the campusafter study hours. A baseball game was on. Frank was right-fielder, and heknew he was on his record in this, his first game, and did some pretty goodwork.
The game was running pretty close. Two of Banbury's men were on bases, whenFrank noticed a ragged urchin run up to a crowd of spectators.
The strange boy asked some questions, and the lad he addressed pointed toFrank.
"Are you--are you Mr. Jordan?" the youngster panted, running up to Frank.
"Yes," nodded Frank.
"Please, sir, quick--there's a man in the old cabin on Greenlee's farm. Hewants Ned Foreman to come right straight to him. He's all cut up andbleeding. He's dying. The boy yonder said you'd get Ned Foreman for me."
"Who is he?" demanded Frank, interested and startled.
"I don't know, only he said he must see Ned Foreman, because he won't lastlong. He's in an awful state. He's in an awful state. He just hollers andyells, and he's smashing a great big bracelet with shining stones in it."
"Jordan!"
"Hi--don't miss it!" Whiz!
Just past Frank's head flew a fly from the bat Frank had not turned intime. But he heeded not the yells, "Deserted his colors!" "Run away again!"or the fact that his neglect had sent two of Banbury's cohorts home.
Frank knew at once that the man the excited boy spoke of was either Jem orDan. The allusion to a bracelet had started him on a vivid run, the boykeeping breathlessly by his side, panting:
"I was passing the old cabin, when I heard some one groaning on the inside.Then the man told me to get Ned Foreman."
The little messenger led Frank straight to the hut and slipped down to thedoorstep almost exhausted, while his companion rushed through the opendoorway.
The man Dan lay on a heap of straw, silent and helpless. His clothing wasstained with blood. Frank at once ascertained that he was still alive, buthe had fainted from weakness.
He went out to the little fellow on the doorstep.
"What's your name?" asked Frank.
"It's Lem."
"Well, you're a grand little fellow," said Frank. "You've done a good dealalready, but I want you to run to the nearest farmhouse and tell the farmerthat he must get here right away to move a dying man to a doctor atBellwood."
"Yes, sir," nodded the obliging little fellow eagerly.
"Tell him I'll pay all the expenses, and yours, too, Lem, as soon as we getthrough with this business."
The boy darted away. Frank re-entered the hut. As he did so his foot kickedsome object, and it jangled across the rough board floor.
Frank picked it up with some eagerness and satisfaction. It was thebracelet that Lem had described--"with shining stones in it."
Our hero was a good deal excited as he examined the object in his hand. Hethrust it into his pocket with quite a thrill of satisfaction. He then wentcloser to the suffering Dan.
The man seemed to have dropped into a deep daze or sleep. Frank realizedthat he could do nothing for him until he was removed to some place whereskilled surgical aid could be summoned.
"It's wonderful," mused Frank, as he went outside, impatient and anxiousfor the return of his messenger. "This is certainly the bracelet that I'vehad so much worry about. I never saw it before, but it must be the onestolen from Lemuel Mace. How does it happen, though, that Dan has it here?Why is it all battered up? Where is Jem? Why wasn't it sold to the man,Staggers? Say, here's a big puzzle, but I've got the bracelet, and this manDan can be made to explain all about it when he gets his senses back."
Frank certainly had some perplexing thoughts as to the peculiar situationof the moment. He could only theorize what had happened.
The way he figured it out was that Jem had been unable to make any bargainwith the man Staggers and dispose of the bracelet. He had come back to thehut to report this fact to Dan. They must have had a quarrel over it, Frankdecided. Jem had probably been beaten off. Not, however, until he hadpretty badly bruised up his opponent. The bracelet must have got batteredin the struggle for its possession, or Dan, in the delirium which thefarmer boy had described to Frank, had banged it about, not knowing what hewas doing.
Frank paced up and down in front of the hut, turning all these thoughtsover in his mind, and really anxious about the condition of Dan, countingthe minutes and hoping for the speedy return of his messenger with aid. Hewas walking slowly on his tiresome patrol, when he heard a rustle in thebushes. He turned, somewhat startled. Before he could get fully around abrisk hand slapped him sharply on the shoulder, with the words:
"Hello, you--glad I've found you!"
Frank drew suspiciously away from a lad about his own age, and a totalstranger to him. He was well dressed, and had a kee
n pair of eyes and apleasant, rather quizzical expression of face.
Frank was on nettles for fear Jem might return, and at first feared thatthe boy might be some emissary of Brady or his recent kidnapers.
"Don't know me?" questioned the lad, smiling boldly and in an extremelyfriendly way into Frank's face.
"Well, I know you," retorted the other. "Here, Frank Jordan, of BellwoodAcademy, shake," and he extended his hand.
"Who are you?" inquired Frank, only feebly returning the hearty handshakeof the stranger.
"I am your everlasting debtor--friend, slave!" declared the lad vehemently."See here; that night, or, rather, morning, dark hallway--twoofficers--nabbed you, took you for me, and I got away."
"O--oh!" exclaimed Frank slowly, and with a decided shock. "I remember younow."
"Thought you would," nodded the lad briskly. "You don't seem a bit glad tosee me, but I am to see you."
Frank did not say anything in reply to this. In fact, the boy who had justrevealed his identity was not exactly welcome to Frank just at that moment.The latter remembered what the policeman, Hawkes, had said about him--thathe was an escaped convict, with a reward out for his arrest. That did notspeak well for the fellow. Then, too, Frank did not fancy the proximity ofsuch a person, with a diamond bracelet in his possession presumably worth agreat deal of money.
"How did you come to find me here?" demanded our hero with blunt suspicion.
"Didn't--just ran across you. But I was on my way to find you."
"Where?"
"At the academy."
"How did you know I belonged to the academy?" challenged Frank.
"Why, didn't I hear you mention the place and tell your name to thepoliceman?"
"Yes, that's so," admitted Frank. "But why did you want to see me?"
"To thank you."
"For what?"
"For saving me from arrest."
"Oh, then you admit that you are what the policeman said?"
"What was that?"
"A convict."
"Yes," answered the boy promptly.
"And an escaped convict."
"That's right, too."
"I don't know, then," said Frank, "that I did right in shielding you."
"Oh, yes, you did," declared the lad buoyantly. "See here, you're a goodfellow, a staving good fellow. You've just about made my future for me.Isn't that a big thing to do?"
"It is, if it's true," said Frank.
"Well, you'll think so when I tell you something. See here: I was an orphanboy down at the town where you saved me. Five years ago a crowd of fellowsstarted out one Hallowe'en night for fun. We had a mean fellow namedTompkins for a leader. He got us to obey his orders. I had to set fire to aheap of brush at one farmhouse. The others were to do certain stunts in thesame neighborhood. We found out later that Tompkins was using us as toolsto cover some real spite work of his. I set fire to the brush heap to scarethe farmer. The wind blew the sparks into a two-ton haystack near by, andit burned down. I was scared and sorry. I was worse scared and sorry thenext day, when I was arrested. Tompkins and his crowd had burned down somebarns and an old mill. Their folks were rich, and they could hire goodlawyers. I was a homeless orphan boy, and was made the scapegoat. They sentme to the reform school till I was of age."
Frank's mind, of course, was full of anxiety for the wounded man in the hutand impatient for the return of his messenger, but he could not help but beinterested in the story of his companion.
"My name is Dave Starr," proceeded the lad. "I went to the reform school. Isoon became a good-conduct trusty, but the life nearly killed me. I escapedone day, and if you go into any of the towns around Rockton you'll find mypicture in the police stations, with a fifty-dollar reward offered for myarrest."
"What have you done since you escaped?" inquired Frank.
"I have tried to make a man of myself," replied Dave Starr, drawing himselfup proudly. "I want to show you something," and he drew a folded paper fromhis pocket and extended it.
This was what Frank read:
"Received from Dave Starr $37.72, being payment and interest for damagedone to my haystack by fire. He says this was the only fire he wasresponsible for, and that it was an accident, and I believe him to be anhonest, truthful lad. "Signed, "JOHN MOORE."
"Understand?" inquired Dave.
"I think I do," nodded Frank. "You've cleaned the slate by paying yourdebts."
"That's it," assented Dave. "I went back to Rockton to settle that debt,and the policeman, Hawkes, saw me, recognized me, and I would now be backin that dismal, heart-breaking old reform school if it wasn't for you."
"Well, I'm glad I happened to help you," said Frank warmly.
"I've been pretty lucky since I escaped," narrated Dave. "I went away andgot work at a factory just outside a little town. One winter day, when alot of us were nooning, an empty palace car swung from a switching traininto a ditch. It caught fire. There was no water near, and a good twentythousand dollars was burning up, when I led the fellows to the car. Wesnowballed it till we put out the flames. That was my start in life. Whatdo you think? About two weeks later an agent of the railroad came around.He gave each of my helpers a ten-dollar gold piece, and he gave me onehundred dollars for saving the railroad property."
"That was fine," commented Frank,
"Wasn't it, though? Well, that was my nest egg. I bought a small stock ofnotions. I made money. By and by I had five hundred dollars. I had an oldfriend, who had known my father, who had a ranch in California. I wrote tohim, and he replied to my letter saying that he had a place for me. Well, Ispent a year on his ranch, raising plums. Then a month ago I struck a fineidea. I heard of how they did things in some African fruit colonies. Ienthused my employer. A month ago I came East with his instructions andplenty of money to gather together one hundred monkeys."
"What!" fairly shouted Frank.
"Just as I say," declared Dave with a pleasant smile.
"One hundred monkeys?"
"Yes."
"To start a show?"
"Not at all."
"What, then?"
"To teach the little fellows to help in the plum orchards. They can betrained easily. You see, when the plums are ripe we spread a sheet under atree and shake the tree. The monkeys pick up the plums fast as can be, andfill big wicker baskets with them. We take the gang around to otherorchards, and save the hiring of a lot of men."
"Well! well!" murmured Frank admiringly. "What a novel idea."
"I've had to pick up the little animals all over the big cities in birdstores," explained Dave. "At last I've got the hundred. They are in aspecial car down the road, and we start for the Pacific Coast to-morrowmorning."
"You certainly have had a queer experience, and you deserve a lot ofcredit," said Frank.
"I feel good for meeting a square, fair fellow like you, Frank Jordan,"continued Dave. "I'd like to feel I had a friend in you, and if I write toyou once in a while, will you answer my letters?"
"I shall be delighted," declared Frank.
"Well, I've said my say," resumed Dave in a practical way, "and I seeyou're busy about something about here, and I may be hindering you, so I'llsay good-by."
"Good-by," responded Frank, "and good luck wherever you go."
"Thank you. I say, you wouldn't mind if I sent you a little present as asort of reminder of what you've done for me, would you, now?" propoundedDave.
"Oh, you mustn't think of that," objected Frank.
"Do they allow pets up at the academy?"
"Oh, yes,--if the fellows keep them from annoying others."
"Well, you'll hear from me about to-morrow. Good-by, Frank Jordan."
The strange lad waved his hand to Frank in a friendly, grateful way, anddisappeared just as a wagon came rattling across the field toward the oldhut.