Dave Porter and His Rivals Part 23

I can fight with my fists."

"Well, remember what I said, Jasniff. It's my last warning."

"Oh, come on--they make me sick!" cried Link Merwell, a certain nervous tremor in his voice. "We don't want to listen to their hot air!" And plucking his crony by the arm he hurried out of the alleyway into the street.

"Shall we let 'em go, Dave?" whispered Phil. "I'd just as soon pound 'em good."

"If we did that, Phil, they'd claim we were three to two and took an unfair advantage of them. Let them go. They have their final warning, and if they don't heed it--well, they will have to take the consequences."

"I could hardly keep my hands off of Merwell."

"I felt the same way," said Roger. "He deserves all we could give him."

The three chums watched Merwell and Jasniff turn another corner. They expected to see the pair walk to where the automobile was standing, but instead noted that the two cadets entered the Oakdale Hotel.

"Must be going to see somebody," suggested Phil.

"Or else they have gone in to smoke and drink and play pool," added Roger. "You'll remember Merwell liked to drink. He was the one who did his best to lead Gus Plum astray."

"Yes, I remember that," answered Dave. "I am mighty glad Gus and he are keeping apart."

The three students walked past the hotel, and looking in at an open window, saw Jasniff and Merwell talking to a man who sat in the reading room with a newspaper in his hands.

"Why, that is that Hooker Montgomery!" exclaimed Roger. "The fake doctor who sells those patent medicines."

"We'd better not let him see us, or he'll be wanting a new silk hat from us," murmured Phil. And he grinned as he thought of what had occurred on the road on the day of their arrival at Oak Hall.

"I wonder if Jasniff met him at Dunn's on the river?" said Dave. "That is what the letter requested, you'll remember."

"Wonder what business Jasniff was to aid him in?" queried the shipowner's son.

"Maybe Jasniff is going to help him to dispose of some of his marvelous remedies," suggested Roger. "I reckon he could give the ignorant farmers as good a talk about them as Montgomery himself."

"More than likely, since Montgomery is a very ignorant man," answered Dave.

"The other fellows ought to be ready to go back to school by this time,"

said the senator's son, after watching those in the hotel for a minute.

"Let us hunt them up;" and thus, for the time being, Jasniff, Merwell, and Doctor Montgomery were dismissed from their minds. The meeting at the hotel was an important one to our friends as well as to those who partic.i.p.ated, but how important Dave and his chums did not learn until long afterwards.

It was a comical sight to see the boys of dormitories Nos. 11 and 12 walking back to the Hall, each with a shoe box under his arm. Sam Day led the procession, carrying his box up against his forearm, like a sword.

"Shoulder boxes!" he shouted, gayly. "Forward march!" And then he added: "Boom! boom! boom, boom, boom!" in imitation of a ba.s.s-drum.

"We've got boxes enough to last us for a year of picnics," cried Ben, for in Crumville, as in many other places, shoe boxes were frequently used for packing up picnic lunches.

"Say, that puts me in mind of a story!" put in Shadow, eagerly. "A girl who was going to get married had a shower, as they call 'em. Well, a wag of the town--maybe he was sore because he couldn't marry the girl himself--told all his friends, in private, that she was very anxious to get a nice bread-box. The shower was to be a surprise, and it was, too, for when it came off the girl got exactly eleven bread-boxes."

"Oh!" came in a groan. "The worst yet."

"Not so bad," said Dave, dryly. "If she filled the boxes the married pair must have proved a well-bred couple."

"Hark to that!" roared Phil. "Say, Dave, go and take a roll!"

"When it comes to a joke, Dave is the flower of this flock," was Luke's comment.

"Anyway, he takes the cake," murmured Ben.

"Ben, say something; don't loaf on the job," came from the senator's son.

"A joke like that is pie for Roger," murmured Polly Vane.

"Even so, n.o.body has a right to get crusty," murmured Plum.

"Or pious!" continued Dave, and then Shadow made a pa.s.s for him with a shoe box. Then Roger started to run, and the others came after him, and away they went in a merry bunch, along the road leading to Oak Hall.

Soon they came out at a point where the highway ran along the Leming River, and there halted to rest, for the run had deprived some of them of their wind.

"I hear a motor-boat," said Roger. "Wonder if it is Nat Poole's craft?"

"It is!" answered Plum. "Here he comes, right close to sh.o.r.e!"

The river was a good fifteen feet below the level of the roadway, and gazing down through the bushes lining the water's edge, the students beheld Nat Poole's motor-boat gliding along in a zig-zag fashion. Nat was not in the craft, which was evidently running without an occupant.

CHAPTER XV

A RUNAWAY MOTOR-BOAT

"What do you make of that?"

"The motor-boat must have run away from Nat!"

"Either that or Nat has fallen overboard!"

"Maybe Nat has been drowned!"

These and other remarks were made, as the boys on the highway gazed down at the craft that was speeding along in such an erratic fashion over the surface of the river. A closer look confirmed their first opinion, that n.o.body was on board.

"I'm going to try to stop her!" shouted Dave, and ran back along the highway, and disappeared into the bushes. Roger followed him closely, and some of the others trailed behind.

"I am going up the river--to see if I can find Nat!" shouted Phil, and away he sped, and Sam and Ben went along.

It was no easy matter for Dave to work his way down the bank of the stream. The bushes were thick and the footing uncertain, and once his jacket caught on a root and he had to pause to free himself. But at last he came out on a narrow strip of rocks and sand, at a point where the Leming River made a broad turn.

The water at this point was quite shallow, and here he thought the progress of the motor-boat would be stayed. His surmise was correct, the craft bringing up between several smooth rocks. The engine continued to work, pounding the boat back and forth, and threatening to sink her.

Fortunately, Dave had on a pair of gaiters he had borrowed, and they were so big that he slipped them off with ease. His socks followed, and then he rolled up his trousers to his knees, and waded into the stream.