The High School Boys' Canoe Club Part 4

Mr. Prescott had already walked away. d.i.c.k and his chums greeted the coming of truck and canoe with a wild whoop. Then they piled up on the truck to inspect their treasure.

Fred Ripley, returning with Mr. Dodge, a local banker, saw the six youngsters climbing up to look at their purchase. A broad, malicious grin appeared on Ripley's face.

"Sold! sold!" gasped Dave Darrin. Then his face flushed with anger.

For the canoe, which looked well enough on exhibition, proved to have three bad holes in her hull, which had been carefully concealed by the manner in which the craft had been propped up on the truck.

The great war canoe looked worthless---certain to sink in less than sixty seconds if launched!

CHAPTER II

"RIP" TRIES OUT HIS BARGAIN

Had a meaner trick ever been played on boys with whom it was so hard to raise money?

"Ha, ha, ha!" chuckled Fred Ripley, so loudly that the dismayed, angry boys could not fail to hear him.

"You sneak! You knew it all the time!" flared Dave Darrin, gazing down in disgust at the lawyer's son.

"Maybe I did know," Fred admitted, yet speaking to Mr. Dodge.

"You see, one of my father's clerks served the papers which attached the show."

There was no help for d.i.c.k & Co. They had parted with their money and their "property" had been turned over to them.

It is an ancient principle of law that the buyer must beware.

The auctioneer had been most careful not to represent the canoe as being fit for service. He had offered it as an historical curiosity!

d.i.c.k & Co. looked at the canoe anxiously.

"What shall we do with it?" asked Dave Darrin moodily.

"Make a bonfire of it?" asked Danny Grin.

"Might as well," Greg nodded.

"No, sir!" d.i.c.k interrupted. "Tom, what do you say? You're one of the really handy boys. Can't this canoe be patched up, mended and put in commission?"

"It might be done," Tom answered slowly.

The other five stood regarding him with eager interest.

"But we'd have to get an Indian here to show us how to do it."

"Where are the Indians that were here with the show?" asked Harry Hazelton.

"They went away as soon as the show was attached," d.i.c.k answered.

"Probably they're hundreds of miles from here now. They were only hired out to the show by their white manager, and they've gone to another job. Besides, they were only show Indians, and probably they've forgotten all they ever knew about canoe-building---if they ever did know anything."

"Then I don't see but that we're just as badly off as ever," sighed Greg. "We're out eighteen dollars and the fine canoe that we expected would provide us with so much fun."

"The paddles look all right, anyway," spoke up Harry Hazelton, lifting one out of the canoe and looking it over critically.

"Oh, yes, the paddles are all right, and the river is close at hand," spoke Dave Darrin vengefully. "All we need is a canoe that will float."

"If it were a cedar canoe we might patch it easily enough," Prescott declared. "But I've heard that there is so much 'science' to making or mending a birch bark canoe that an amateur always makes the job worse."

"Haw, haw, haw!" came boisterously from Fred Ripley. He and Mr.

Dodge were now standing before the table of the auctioneer's clerk.

Fred was paying down the remaining twenty-six dollars on the price he had bid for the handsome chestnut pony.

"Yes, you're laughing at us, you contemptible Rip!" scowled Dave, though he spoke under his breath. "You can afford to lose money, for you always know where to get more. You knew this canoe was worthless, and you deliberately bid it up on us---you scoundrel!"

"Shall we make Colonel Grundy a present of this canoe?" suggested Danny Grin dolefully.

"The poor old man hasn't money enough to get the canoe away from here, even if he wanted to," replied d.i.c.k, in a voice of sympathy.

"But how did the show folks manage to use this canoe?" asked Tom Reade.

"They didn't, except on a truck in a street parade, I imagine,"

d.i.c.k replied. "And that must be how the holes came to be in the bottom. The sun got in its work on the bark and oil, and blistered the body of the canoe so that it broke or wore away in spots.

Oh, dear!"

The sale was over, but a few odds and ends remained. Fred Ripley, having now paid the whole of his forty-one dollars through Mr.

Dodge, ordered his handsome new purchase led out.

A man came out, holding the pony's halter. He walked slowly, the pony moving contentedly after him.

"A fine little animal!" glowed Fred, stroking the glossy coat.

"He---er---looks rather old, doesn't he?" ventured Mr. Dodge.

"Not so very old," Fred answered airily. "There is a lot of life and vim left in this little fellow. And he can show speed, too, or I'm all wrong."

Then Fred's eye roved toward the pile of stuff on which no one had bid.

"There's a good saddle," suggested Ripley. "The real western kind," nodded the auctioneer.

It looked the part.

"I'll give you two dollars for the saddle," Fred offered.

"You'll pay ten if you get that saddle," replied the red-faced auctioneer.

"Put it up and let us see how the bids will run," proposed Ripley.