CHAPTER III
A NEEDLESS ALARM
"It's only Flopps!" exclaimed Jack, after a pause—made painful from the fact that the conspirators had to assume uncomfortable attitudes because of the sudden alarm.
"That's right, so it is," agreed Ward, looking over the top of a packing case, and seeing the gardener putting away some of the implements he had used that day. "He's all right."
"Hold on!" exclaimed Andy in a whisper, as he saw the others about to leave their place of concealment, to proceed with the hazing operations that were under way.
"What's the matter now?" demanded Frank.
"If he sees the way we're togged up he'll raise a row sure," explained Andy. "He won't know us, and he'll think we're black-handers or something like that. He'll bring every professor and monitor out on the run. Lay low for another minute and he'll go out."
"I guess that's right," admitted Frank. "Andy is getting sense in his old age."
Once more the four crouched behind the cases, and watched the gardener in the dimly-lighted basement. Having put away the rake, spade and hoe, Flopps proceeded to put out the gas he had lighted, and left.
"Clear coast," announced Andy, after an observation. "Now to make the Freshmen know what's what. You notified the other fellows, didn't you?" he inquired of his brother and chums.
"Sure," asserted Frank. "They'll meet us outside."
The four proceeded cautiously until they had emerged from the lower part of the dormitory. They found some of their friends waiting for them, they, too, having eluded the vigilance of monitors and suspicious professors.
"Let's see," remarked Andy, in a low voice. "There are eight of us here."
"Six are coming from the West dormitory," volunteered John North.
"And ten from Bradley Hall," added Duke Yardly, referring to a new dormitory where some of the older students had rooms.
"Then we'll have enough for a start," commented Andy. As he spoke he advanced into a stray beam of light from a school window.
"For cats' sake, what have you on your face?" gasped Duke.
"That's our disguise," explained the younger Racer lad. "We're going to treat the Freshies to a new kind of hazing—a surprise, and we want you fellows to join in. Now I'll explain," and he did, at some length.
"Say! That's great!" exclaimed Donald Burgess. "How'd you think of that, Andy?"
"Oh, Andy's think-tank is always working," asserted his brother—"at least it is when it comes to such things as this. Now if it was a geometry proposition, or a Latin construction——"
"Oh, I'm as good at boning as you are," retorted Andy. "Here come the other fellows. Now I've got to tell them how to behave. You see the game is this," he went on. "You chaps will start in on the regular hazing stunts—making 'em eat salt, doing a dance, standing on their heads, and all that. Then in the midst of it we four will come bursting in, and—well, we'll see what will happen."
"That's right!" cried Tom Bennett, admiringly. "This will make a sensation all right!"
A number of luckless Freshmen had gathered for common communion and consolation in the large hall of the dormitory set aside for their special use. They were commiserating one with the other, wondering what sort of hazing would be meted out to them—for it had been rumored that the ordeal would start that night. Shortly after ten o'clock into the place burst a crowd of Sophomores and Juniors.
"Up, boys, and at 'em!" came the cry, and then began the struggle between the two forces. The Freshmen were taken at a disadvantage, and were soon overpowered. Then, too, the first-term lads did not like to put up too much of a fight.
For, be it known, hazing, as practiced at Riverview, was a sort of ancient and honorable institution, not very severe, and the lad who put up too much of a protest against "taking his medicine," had life made miserable for him the rest of his time at school. So there was more or less submission, though there were one or two rather strenuous encounters.
The Freshmen were being put through their "stunts," and being made to do all sorts of ridiculous things, when the door of the room, that was being guarded by a committee of the hazers, suddenly flew open, and a quartette of masked and bewhiskered figures rushed in.
"Hands up!" came the sharp command, and objects that glittered menacingly in the light were held forward. "Hands up!"
Instantly there was confusion, the hazers uttering louder cries of amazement than did the Freshmen.
"Go through 'em, boys!" came the command from the foremost figure, who seemed to be the leader. "See if they've got any coin. Take only gold watches, though; we can't use the dollar kind. Lively!"
"Oh, they're burglars!" yelled one of the hazers.
"That's what!" snapped one of the masked figures. "Hands up, and keep 'em up!" came the sharp command.
"What right have you in here?" demanded Duke Yardly, in threatening tones. "This is a private school, and——"
"Nothing's private when we come in!" said the leader. "Go through 'em, boys. We two will keep 'em covered!"
While two of the masked and bewhiskered individuals held the glittering objects pointed toward the crowd of startled students, the other two began a quick but systematic search of their pockets. Loose change and bills were abstracted, together with several gold watches.
"Oh, please don't take that!" begged one Freshman, as a gold match box was brought to light. "My best—my mother gave me that."
"Best girl, you mean!" snapped the taller of the masked figures. "Take it, boys."
"This is a high-handed proceeding!" declared John North.
"If you can get your hands any higher, lift 'em," said one of the hold-up individuals, sarcastically.
"All present are accounted for," reported one of the searchers, as he advanced toward the two guards, holding a hat filled with a miscellaneous collection of treasures.
"Very good. Back to the cave. And if you fellows have any regard for your own welfare you won't follow," the taller looter added significantly. "You'll stay here five minutes without giving the alarm or——" He did not finish, but looked suggestively at the object in his hand.
Backing to the door, the four hold-up individuals slipped quickly out of it, and locked it after them, making the group of Freshmen and hazers prisoners. At once there burst out a riot of talk in the room, succeeded by chuckles of mirth from the quartette.
"Say, it went off like apple pie," said one of the masked figures.
"Couldn't have been better," added another.
"Someone's coming!" was the sudden warning.
All but one of the figures swung out of sight around the corner of the corridor. This figure, still holding the object that had cowed the students, was in full view of a hall light as someone advanced. Then, seeing that the newcomer was a pupil, the masked figure, making a threatening gesture, commanded:
"Hands up!"
The effect of the order was startling. The student with a quick motion fairly leaped at the masked figure, knocking the shining object to one side, at the same time exclaiming:
"Ha! So you thought you'd catch me off my guard, eh? You thought you could sneak in here and get it? Well, I've fooled you. I've been looking for you the last three days. I expected you'd come East after me. But it won't do you any good. Now I'm going to give the alarm!"
There was so much of menace and threat in the voice and action of the student that the masked figure gasped. There was a fierce struggle, and as the new student took a long breath in readiness to sound the cry of alarm, the masked one called out:
"Hold on, old man! It's only a joke. We're doing a hazing stunt. No harm intended. Let go my shoulder. You're needlessly alarmed. It's only a joke, I tell you."
For a moment the two stood confronting one another, locked in a fierce grip. Then, as the student seemed to believe the assurance given him, he asked:
"Then you're not after—not after my——"
"We're not after anything," was the answer. "It's a joke, I tell you," and, tearing off his mask, the pretended hold-up man revealed himself as Frank Racer.