“It is nothing more than fair that you should have the post of honor, for you proposed it. I will talk the matter up among the fellows before I am an hour older.”
“Just one word more,” said Lester, as Jones was about to move off. “My room-mate is going to desert and go to sea. If I will make you acquaintedwith him, will you point out to him the boys who will help him?”
“I’ll be glad to do it,” said Jones, readily. “But tell him to keep his own counsel until I can have a talk with him. If he should happen to drop a hint of what he intends to do in the presence of some boys whose names I could mention, they would carry it straight to the superintendent, and then Huggins would find himself in a box.”
“If he runs away, will they try to catch him?” asked Lester.
“To be sure they will. Squads of men will be sent out in every direction, and some of them will catch him too, unless he’s pretty smart. Tell him particularly to look out for Captain Mack. He’s the worst one in the lot. He can follow a trail with all the certainty of a hound, and no deserter except Don Gordon ever succeeded in giving him the slip. Now you take a walk about the grounds, and I will see what my friends think about this yacht business. I will see you again in fifteen or twenty minutes.”
So saying Jones walked off to join his companions, while Lester strolled slowly toward the gate.The latter was highly gratified by the promptness with which his idea (Huggins’s idea, rather) had been indorsed, but he wished he had not said so much about his ability to manage the yacht. He knew as much about sailing as he did about shooting and fishing, that is, nothing at all. He had never seen a pleasure-boat larger than Don Gordon’s. If anybody had put a sail into a skiff and told him it was a yacht, Lester would not have known the difference.
“It isn’t at all likely that my plan will amount to anything,” said Lester, to himself. “I suggested it just because I wanted the fellows to know that there are those in the world who are fully as brave as Don Gordon is supposed to be. But if Jones and his crowd should take me at my word, wouldn’t I be in a fix? What in the name of wonder would I do?”
It was evident that Lester was sadly mistaken in the boys with whom he had to deal, and he received another convincing proof of it before half an hour had passed. By the time he had taken a dozen turns up and down the long path, he saw Jones and Enoch Williams hurrying to meet him. The expression on their faces told him that theyhad what they considered to be good news to communicate.
“It’s all right, Brigham,” said Jones, in a gleeful voice. “The boys are in for it, as I told you they would be, and desired us to say to you that you could not have hit upon anything that would suit them better. I have been counting noses, and have so far found fifteen good fellows upon whom you can call for help any time you want it. They all agreed with me when I suggested that you ought to have the management of the whole affair.”
“Where did you learn yachting, Brigham?” asked Enoch.
“On the lakes,” replied Lester.
“Then you must be posted. I have heard that they have some hard storms up there occasionally.”
“You may safely say that. It is almost always rough off Saginaw bay,” answered Lester; and that was true, but he did not know it by experience. He had heard somebody say so.
“I am something of a yachtsman myself,” continued Enoch. “I brought my little schooner from Great South Bay, Long Island, around into Chesapeake bay. Of course my father laid thecourse for me, and kept his weather eye open to see that I didn’t make any mistakes; but I gave the orders myself, and handled the vessel.”
Lester, who had been on the point of entertaining his two friends by telling of some thrilling adventures that had befallen him during his imaginary cruise from Oswego to Duluth, opened his eyes and closed his lips when he heard this. He saw that his chances for making a hero of himself were growing smaller every hour. He was afraid to talk about fishing in the presence of his room-mate; he dared not speak of bears while he was in the hearing of Sam Kenyon; and it would not be at all safe for him to enlarge upon his knowledge of seamanship, for here was a boy at his elbow who had sailed his own yacht on deep water. He was doomed to remain in the background, and to be of no more consequence at the academy than any other plebe. He could see that very plainly.
“There’s a splendid little boat down there near the wharf,” continued Enoch, who was as deeply in love with the water and everything connected with it as Huggins was, although he had no desire to go before the mast. “I bribed her keeper tolet me take a look at her the other day, and I tell you her appointments are perfect. I should say that her cabin and forecastle would accommodate about twenty boys. But this is cutter-rigged, and I don’t know anything about vessels of that sort; do you?”
“I’ve seen lots of them,” answered Lester.
“I suppose you have; but did you ever handle one?”
Lester replied that his own boat was a cutter; and when he said it, he had as clear an idea of what he was talking about as he had of the Greek language.
“Then we are all right,” said Enoch. “They look top-heavy to me, and I shouldn’t care to trust myself out in one during a gale, unless there was a sailor-man in charge of her. But if we get her and find that she is too much for us, we can send the yard down and make a sloop of her. It wouldn’t pay to have her capsize with us.”
Lester shuddered at the mere mention of such a thing; and while Enoch continued to talk in this way, filling his sentences full of nautical terms, that were familiar enough to him and quite unintelligible to Lester, the latter set his wits at work toconjure up some excuse for backing out when the critical time came. He was not at all fond of the water, he was afraid to run the risk of capture and punishment, and he sincerely hoped that something would happen to prevent the proposed excursion.
“Of course we can’t decide upon the details until the time for action arrives,” said Jones, at length. “But you have given us something to think of and to look forward to, and we are indebted to you for that. Now, let’s call upon your room-mate and see what we can do to help him.”
Lester led the way to his dormitory, and as he opened the door rather suddenly, he and his companion surprised Huggins in the act of making up a small bundle of clothing. He was startled by this abrupt entrance, and he must have been frightened as well, for his face was as white as a sheet.
“It’s all right, Huggins,” said Lester, who at once proceeded with the ceremony of introduction. “You needn’t be afraid of these fellows.”
“Of course not,” assented Jones. “We know that you intend to take French leave, but it is all right, and if there is any way in which we canhelp you, we hope you will not hesitate to say so.”
Huggins did not seem to be fully reassured by these words. The pallor did not leave his face, and the visitors noticed that he trembled as he seated himself on the edge of his bed.
“I am obliged to you, but I don’t think I shall need any assistance. This will see me through the lines, will it not?” said Huggins, pulling from his pocket a piece of paper on which was written an order for all guards and patrols to pass private Albert Huggins until half-past nine o’clock. The printed heading showed that it was genuine.
“Yes, that’s all you need to take you by the guards,” said Jones. “And when half-past nine comes, you will be a long way from here, I suppose.”
“I shall be as far off as my feet can carry me by that time,” replied Huggins. “But don’t tell any one which way I have gone, will you?”
“If you were better acquainted with us you would know that your caution is entirely unnecessary,” said Jones. “But you are not going to walk two hundred miles, are you? Why don’t you go by rail?”
“How can I when I have no money?”
“Are you strapped?” exclaimed Enoch. “I can spare you a dollar.”
“I’ll give you another,” said Jones, looking at Lester.
“I’ll—I’ll give another,” said the latter; but he uttered the words with the greatest reluctance. He was always ready to spend money, but he wanted to know, before he parted with it, that it was going to bring him some pleasure in return. As he spoke he made a step toward his trunk, but Huggins earnestly, almost vehemently, motioned him back.
“No, no, boys,” said he, “I’ll not take a cent from any of you. I am used to roughing it, and I shall get through all right. All I ask of you is to keep away so as not to direct attention to me. How soon will my absence be discovered?”
“That depends upon the floor-guard,” answered Jones. “If he is one of those sneaking fellows who is forever sticking his nose into business that does not concern him, he will report your absence to the officer of the guard when he makes his rounds at half-past nine. If the floor-guard keeps his mouth shut, no one will know you are goneuntil the morning roll is called. In any event no effort will be made to find you until to-morrow.”
“And then I may expect to be pursued, I suppose?”
“You may; and if you are not caught, it will be a wonder. Every effort will be made to capture you, for don’t you see that if you were permitted to escape, other boys would be encouraged to take French leave in the same way? Now, listen to me, and I will give you some advice that may be of use to you.”
If his advice, which was given with the most friendly intentions, had been favorably received, Jones would have said a good deal more than he did; but he very soon became aware that his words of warning were falling on deaf ears. Huggins was not listening to him. He was unaccountably nervous and excited, and Jones, believing that he would be better pleased by their absence than he was with their company, gave the signal for leaving by picking up his cap. He lingered long enough to shake hands with Huggins and wish him good luck in outwitting his pursuers and finding a vessel, and then he went out, followed by Enoch and Lester.
“How strangely he acted!” said the latter.
“Didn’t he?” exclaimed Enoch. “He seemed frightened at our offer to give him a few dollars to help him along. What was there wrong in that? If I had been in his place I would not have refused. Now he can take his choice between begging his food and going hungry.”
“I don’t envy him his long, cold walk,” observed Jones. “And where is he going to find a bed when night comes? The people in this country don’t like tramps any too well, and the first time he stops at a farm-house he may be interviewed by a bull-dog.”
Lester did not find an opportunity to talk with his room-mate again that day. They marched down to supper together, and as soon as the ranks were broken, Huggins made all haste to put on his hat and overcoat, secure his bundle and quit the room. He would hardly wait to say good-by to Lester, and didn’t want the latter to go with him as far as the gate.
“He’s well out of his troubles, and mine are just about to begin,” thought Lester, as he stood on the front steps and saw Huggins disappear in the darkness. “I would run away myself if Iwere not afraid of the consequences. It wouldn’t be safe to try father’s patience too severely, for there is no telling what he would do to me.”
Lester strolled about until the bugle sounded “to quarters,” and then he went up to his room, where he passed a very lonely evening. No one dared to come near him, and if he had attempted to leave his room, he would have been ordered back by the floor-guard. He knew he ought to study, but still he would not do it. It would be time enough, he thought, to take up his books, when he could see no way to get out of it.
Lester went to bed long before taps, and slept soundly until he was aroused by the report of the morning gun, and the noise of the fifes and drums in the drill-room. Having been told that he would have just six minutes in which to dress, he got into his clothes without loss of time, and fell into the ranks just as the last strains of the morning call died away.
“Fourth company. All present or accounted for with the exception of Private Albert Huggins,” said Bert Gordon, as he faced about and raised his hand to his cap.
“Where is Private Huggins?” demanded Captain Clayton.
“I don’t know, sir. He had a pass last night, and he seems to have abused it. At any rate he is not in the ranks to answer to his name.”
Captain Clayton reported to the adjutant, who in turn reported to the officer of the day, and then the ranks were broken, and the young soldiers hurried to their dormitories to wash their hands and faces, comb their hair, and get ready for morning inspection. While Bert and his room-mate were thus engaged, an orderly opened the door long enough to say that Sergeant Gordon was wanted in the superintendent’s office.
“Hallo!” exclaimed Sergeant Elmer—that was the name and rank of Bert’s room-mate—“you are going out after Huggins, most likely. If you have the making up of the detail don’t forget me.”
Bert said he wouldn’t, and hastened out to obey the summons. As he was passing along the hall he was suddenly confronted by Lester Brigham, who jerked open the door of his room and shouted “Police! Police!” at the top of his voice.
“What’s the matter with you?” exclaimed Bert, wondering if Lester had taken leave of his senses.
“I’ve been robbed!” cried Lester, striding up and down the floor, in spite of all Bert could do to quiet him. “That villain Huggins broke open my trunk and took a clean hundred dollars in money out of it.”
Lester’s wild cries had alarmed everybody on that floor, and the hall was rapidly filling with students who ran out of their rooms to see what was the matter.
“Go back, boys,” commanded Bert. “You have not a moment to waste. If your rooms are not ready for inspection you will be reported and punished for it. Go back, every one of you.”
He emphasized this order by pulling out his note-book and holding his pencil in readiness to write down the name of every student who did not yield prompt obedience. The boys scattered in every direction, and when the hall was cleared, Bert seized Lester by the arm and pulled him into his room.
“No yelling now,” said he sternly.
“Must I stand by and let somebody rob me without saying a word?” vociferated Lester.
“By no means; but you can act like a sane boy and report the matter in a quiet way, can’t you? Now explain, and be quick about it, for the superintendent wants to see me.”
“Why, Huggins has run away—he intended to do it when he got that pass last night—and he has taken every dollar I had in the world to help himself along. Just look here,” said Lester, picking up the hasp of his trunk which had been broken in two in the middle. “Huggins did that yesterday, and I never knew it until a few minutes ago. I went to my trunk to get out a clean collar, and then I found that the hasp was broken, and that my clothes were tumbled about in the greatestconfusion. I looked for my money the first thing, but it was gone.”
“Don’t you know that it is against the rules for a student to have more than five dollars in his possession at one time?” asked Bert. “If you had lived up to the law and given your money into the superintendent’s keeping, you would not have lost it.”
“What do I care for the law?” snarled Lester.
“You ought to care for it. If you didn’t intend to obey it, you had no business to sign the muster-roll.”
“Well, who’s going to get my hundred dollars back for me? That’s what I want to know,” cried Lester, who showed signs of going off into another flurry.
“I don’t know that any one can get it back for you,” said Bert quietly. “It is possible that you may never see it again.”
“Then I’ll see some more just like it, you may depend upon that,” said Lester, walking nervously up and down the floor and shaking his fists in the air. “I was robbed in the superintendent’s house, and he is bound to make my loss good.”
“There’s where you are mistaken. You took your own risk by disobeying the rules——”
“The money was mine and the superintendent had no more right to touch it than you had,” interrupted Lester. “My father gave it to me with his own hands, because he wanted I should have a fund by me that I could draw on without asking anybody’s permission.”
“Well, you see what you made by it, don’t you? How do you know that Huggins has run away?”
“He told me he was going to. I offered to give him a dollar to help him along, and so did Jones and Williams.”
“You ought not to have done that.”
“I don’t care; I did it, and this is the way he repaid me. I’ll bet he had my money in his pocket when he refused my offer. I thought he acted queer, and so did the other boys.”
“Do you know which way he intended to go?”
“He said he was going to draw a bee-line for Oxford, and ship on the first vessel he could find that would take him to sea. Are you going after him?” inquired Lester, as Bert turned toward the door. “Look here: if you will follow himup and get my money back for me, I’ll—I’ll lend you five dollars of it, if you want it.”
Lester was about to say that he wouldgiveBert that amount, but he caught his breath in time, and saved five dollars by it. He knew very well that Bert would never be obliged to ask him for money.
The sergeant hurried down to the superintendent’s office, where he found the officer of the day, who had just been making his report.
“I understand that Private Huggins abused my confidence, and that he stayed out all night on the pass I gave him yesterday,” said the superintendent, after returning Bert’s salute. “Perhaps you had better take a corporal with you, and look around and see if you can find any traces of him.”
Bert was delighted. Here was an opportunity for him to win a reputation.
“Shall I go to Oxford, sir?” said he.
“To Oxford?” repeated the superintendent, while the officer of the day looked surprised.
“Yes, sir. There’s where he has gone.”
“How do you know?”
“His room-mate told me so. He has run away intending to go to sea.”
“Well, well! It is more serious than I thought,” said the superintendent, while an expression of annoyance and vexation settled on his face. “He must be brought back. Was he going to walk all that distance or steal a ride on the cars? He has no money, and his father took pains to tell me that none would be allowed him.”
“He has plenty of it, sir,” replied Bert. “He broke into Private Brigham’s trunk and took a hundred dollars from it.”
The superintendent could hardly believe that he had heard aright.
“That is the most disgraceful thing that ever happened in this school,” said he, as soon as he could speak. “I didn’t suppose there was a boy here who could be guilty of an act of that kind. Sergeant,” he added, looking at his watch, “you have just fifteen minutes in which to reach the depot and ascertain whether or not Huggins took the eight o’clock train for Oxford last night. Learn all you can, and go with the squad which I shall at once send in pursuit of him.”
“Very good, sir,” replied Bert.
“Can I go?” asked Sergeant Elmer, as Bertran into his room and snatched his overcoat and cap from their hooks.
“I hope so, but I am afraid not. The superintendent will make up the detail himself or appoint some shoulder-strap to do it, and it isn’t likely that he will take two sergeants from the same company. You will have to act in my place while I am gone.”
“Well, good-by and good luck to you,” said the disappointed Elmer.
Bert hastened down the stairs and out of the building, and at the gate he found the officer of the day who had come there to pass him by the sentry. As soon as he had closed the gate behind him, he broke into a run, and in a few minutes more he was walking back and forth in front of the ticket-office, conversing with a quiet looking man who was to be found there whenever a train passed the depot. He was a detective.
“Good morning, Mr. Shepard,” said Bert. “Were you on duty when No. 6 went down last night?”
No. 6 was the first southward bound train that passed through Bridgeport after Huggins left the academy grounds.
“I was,” answered the detective. “Was that fellow I came pretty near running in last night on general principles one of your boys?”
“I can’t tell until you describe him,” said Bert.
“There was nothing wrong about his appearance, but I didn’t like the way he acted,” observed the detective. “He looked as though he had been up to something. He didn’t buy a ticket, and he took pains to board the train from the opposite side. He wore a dark-blue overcoat, Arctic shoes, seal-skin cap, gloves and muffler, and had something on his upper lip that looked like a streak of free-soil, but which, perhaps, on closer examination might have proved to be a mustache.”
“That’s the fellow,” said Bert. “Did he go toward Oxford?”
“He did. Do you want him? What has he been doing?”
“I do want him, for he is a deserter,” replied Bert. He said nothing about the crime of which Huggins was guilty. The superintendent had not told him to keep silent in regard to it, but he knew he was expected to do it all the same.
“Then I am glad I didn’t run him in,” said Mr. Shepard. “You boys always see plenty of funwhen you are out after deserters. But you can’t take that big fellow alone. He’ll pick you up and chuck you head first into a snow-drift.”
“There are one or two fellows in that squad whom he can’t chuck into a snow-drift,” said Bert, pointing with his thumb over his shoulder toward the door.
The detective looked, and saw a party of students coming into the depot at double time. They were led by Captain (formerly Corporal) Mack, who, having been permitted to choose his own men, had detailed Curtis, Egan, Hopkins, and Don Gordon to form his squad. A long way behind them came the old German professor, Mr. Odenheimer, who was very red in the face and puffing and blowing like a porpoise. The fleet-footed boys had led him a lively race, and they meant to do it, too. They didn’t want him along, for his presence was calculated to rob them of much of the pleasure they would otherwise have enjoyed. He was jolly and good-natured when off duty, but still pompous and rather overbearing, and if Huggins were captured and Lester Brigham’s money returned to him, the honor of the achievement would fall to him, and not to Captain Mack and his men.
“Young sheltemans,” panted the professor, stopping in front of the squad which Captain Mack had halted and brought to a front preparatory to breaking ranks,“I use to could go double quick so good like de pest of you ven I vas in mine good Brussia fighting mit unser Fritz; but I peen not a good boy for running not now any more. Vere is Sergeant Gordon?”
“Here, sir,” replied Bert, stepping up and saluting.
“Vell, vere ish dat young rascals—vat you call him—Hukkins?”
“He has gone to Oxford, sir,” said Bert, who then went on to repeat the substance of his conversation with the detective. Now and then his eyes wandered toward the boys in the ranks, who came so near making him laugh in the professor’s face that he was obliged to turn his back toward them. They were indulging in all sorts of pranks calculated to show their utter disapproval of the whole proceeding. Don was humped up like old Jordan, the negro he had so often personated; Hopkins was mimicking the professor; Egan, who had assumed a very wise expression of countenance, was checking off Bert’s remarks on his fingers;Curtis was watching for a chance to snatch an apple from the stand behind him; while Captain Mack held himself in readiness to drop a piece of ice down his back the very moment he attempted it. These boys all liked the professor in spite of his pomposity and his constant allusions to his military record, but they would have been much better satisfied if he had remained at the academy. If they had taken time to consider the matter, they would have seen very clearly that the superintendent had acted for the best, and that he would not have showed any degree of prudence if he had left them to pursue and capture the deserter alone and unaided. There was no play about this, and besides Huggins was something worse than a deserter.
Just then the whistle of an approaching train was heard; whereupon Captain Mack was ordered to break ranks and procure tickets for himself and his party, Bert included. This done they boarded the cars, and in a few minutes more were speeding away toward Oxford.
“I don’t at all like this way of doing business,” observed Captain Mack, who occupied a seat with Bert. “I am not personally acquainted with Huggins,but if there is any faith to be put in his appearance, he is nobody’s fool. He’ll not go to Oxford after stealing that money. If he went this way, he will stop off at some little station, buy another suit of clothes and keep dark until he thinks the matter has had time to blow over.”
“Perhaps you had better say as much to the professor,” suggested Bert.
“Not I!” replied Captain Mack, with a laugh and a knowing shake of his head. “I have no desire to give him a chance to turn his battery of broken English loose on me. He has done it too many times already. While I am very anxious that Huggins should be caught and the money recovered, I can see as much fun in riding about the country as I can in drilling; and if the professor wants to spend a week or two on a wild-goose chase, it is nothing to me. I put in some good solid time with my books last vacation, and I am three months ahead of my class.”
The captain was right when he said that Huggins did not look like anybody’s fool, and he wasn’t, either. When he first made up his mind to desert the academy, he laid his plans just as he told them to Lester Brigham; but one morning an incidentoccurred that caused him to make a slight change in them. He saw Lester go to his trunk and take a five-dollar bill from a well-filled pocket-book which he kept hidden under his clothing. The sight of it suggested an idea to Huggins—one that frightened him at first, but after he had pondered upon it for a while and dreamed about it a few times, it became familiar to him, and he ceased to look upon it as a crime.
“It is easier to ride than it is to walk,” he often said to himself. “Lester doesn’t need the money, and I do, for I don’t know what I shall have to go through with before I can find a vessel. Oxford is a small place, and I may have to stay there a week or two before I can secure a berth, and how could I live all that time without money? I am not going to steal it—I shall borrow it, for, of course, my father will refund every cent of it. I know he will not like to do it, but he ought to have let me go to sea when I asked him.”
After reasoning with himself in this way a few times, Huggins finally mustered up courage enough to make himself the possessor of the coveted pocket-book. Unfortunately, opportunities were not wanting. Lester was hardly ever in his roomduring the day-time, and it was an easy matter for Huggins to lock the door and break open the trunk with the aid of a spike he had picked up in the carpenter-shop. Then he bundled up some of his clothes, intending to ask for a pass and leave the academy at once. He got the pass, as we know, but found, to his great surprise and alarm, that he could not use it until after supper. It was no wonder that he showed nervousness and anxiety when Jones and the rest offered to lend him money to help him along. If he had not succeeded in satisfying them that he would not accept assistance from them, and Lester had gone to his trunk after the dollar, there would have been trouble directly. He escaped this danger, however, and as soon as he could use his pass, he made all haste to get out of Bridgeport.
“But I’ll not go to Oxford yet,” said he, when he found himself safe on board the cars. “The fellows said they wouldn’t tell where I intended to go, but when they made that promise they didn’t know that I had borrowed Brigham’s money.”
Just then the conductor tapped him on the shoulder and held out his hand for the boy’s ticket.
“What is the fare to the next station?” asked the latter.
“One twenty-five,” was the answer.
Huggins produced the money, and then buttoned his overcoat, settled back into an easy position on his seat, and tried to make up his mind what he should do next. Before he had come to any decision on this point, the whistle blew again, and the train came to a stop; whereupon Huggins picked up his bundle, which he had carried under his coat when he deserted the academy, and left the car. The few men he saw upon the platform were running about as if they were very busy—all except one, who strolled around with his hands in his pockets. Huggins drew back out of the glare of the lamps that were shining from the windows of the depot, to wait for an opportunity to speak to him. He had got off at a tank-station, but he did not find it out until it was too late to go farther.
Having taken on a fresh supply of coal and water the engine moved off, dragging its long train of sleeping-cars behind it, the station agent went into his office, closing the door behind him, and Huggins and the unemployed stranger were left alone on the platform.
“Good evening to you, pard,” said the latter, walking up to the boy’s place of concealment.
“How are you?” replied Huggins, who did not like the familiar tone in which he had been addressed. “Can you tell me which way to go to find a hotel?”
“Hotel!” repeated the stranger. “There’s none around here.”
Huggins started and looked about him. Then he saw that he had got off in the woods, and that there were only one or two small buildings within the range of his vision.
“Is there no house in the neighborhood at which I can obtain a night’s lodging?” asked Huggins, growing alarmed.
“I don’t suppose there is,” was the encouraging reply.
“Where does the station-agent sleep?”
“In his office.”
“How far is your house from here?”
“Well, I can’t say just how many miles it is.”
“What is your business?” asked Huggins, growing suspicious of the stranger.
“I haven’t any just now. I am a minister’s son, traveling for my health. I’ll tell you whatwe might do, pard: if you are a good talker you might coax the agent to let us spend the night in the waiting-room. There’s a good fire there——”
Huggins waited to hear no more. The man was a professional tramp, there was no doubt about that, and the idea of passing the night in the same room with him was not to be entertained for a moment. He started for the office to have a talk with the agent, the tramp keeping close at his heels.
“I made a mistake in getting off here,” said Huggins to the agent, “and I would be greatly obliged if you will direct me to some house where I can put up until morning.”
“I should be glad to do it,” was the answer, “but there is no one right around the depot who can accommodate you. There is a boarding-house for the mill-hands about a mile from here, but I couldn’t direct you to it so that you could find it. The road runs through the woods, and you might miss it and get lost.”
“Why, what in the world am I to do?” asked Huggins, who, having never been thrown upon his own resources before, was as helpless as a childwould have been in the same situation. “Must I stay out doors all night?”
“Not necessarily. Where did you come from?”
“I came from Bridgeport and paid a dollar and twenty-five cents to go from there to the next station.”
“Well, the next station is Carbondale, which is three miles from here. There is where you ought to have stopped.”
“Could I hire a horse and cutter to take me there?”
“I don’t think you could.”
“I am able and willing to pay liberally for it.”
“Oh, you would have to go out to the mills to find a horse and a man to drive it for you, and you might as well walk to Carbondale at once as to do that.”
“When is the next train due?”
“The next train won’t help you any, for it is the lightning express, and she doesn’t stop here. You can’t go on the next one either, for she is the fast freight, and doesn’t carry passengers. You’ll have to wait for the accommodation which goes through here at six fourteen in the morning.”
“Then I suppose I shall have to pass the night in your waiting-room,” said Huggins, who was fairly at his wits’ end.
“Well, I suppose you won’t,” said the agent in emphatic tones. “I shall have to ask you to go out now, for I am going to lock up.”
“Don’t you leave a room open for the accommodation of passengers?” exclaimed Huggins, wondering what would become of him if the agent turned him out in the snow to pass the night as best he could, while the thermometer was only a degree or two above zero. If it had been summer he could have bunked under a tree; but as it was—the runaway shuddered when he thought of the long, cold hours that must be passed in some way before he would see the sun rise again. Here the tramp, who stood holding his hands over the stove, put in a word to help Huggins; but he only made a bad matter worse. The heart of the station agent was not likely to be moved to pity by any such advocate as he was. He carried a very hard-looking face, he was rough and unkempt, and his whole appearance was against him. Besides, he did not speak in a way calculated to carry his point.
“I don’t see what harm it will do for us to sit by your fire,” said he, in angry tones.
“I don’t care whether you see any harm in it or not,” said the agent, taking a bunch of keys from his pocket. “I know what my orders are, and I intend to obey them. Come now, move; both of you.”
“I wish you would tell me what to do,” said Huggins, as he turned toward the door. “I am not in this man’s company, and neither am I interceding for him. I am speaking for myself alone.”
“I can’t help that. If I let you in I must let him in too; but my orders are to turn everybody out when I lock up. The best thing you can do is to strike out for Carbondale at your best pace. The night is clear, and you can’t miss the way if you follow the railroad. There are no bridges or trestle-works for you to cross, and no cattle-guards to fall into. If you make haste, you can get there before the hotels shut up. Go on, now!”
The agent arose from his chair as he said this, and Huggins and the tramp opened the door and went out into the cold.
“You’re not in my company, ain’t you? You didn’t speak for me but for yourself, did you? You think you’re too fine a gentleman to be seen loafing about with such a fellow as I am, don’t you?” growled the tramp, when he and Huggins were alone on the platform. “I’ve the best notion in the world to make you pay for them words, and I will, too, if I find you hanging about here after the agent has gone to bed.”
There was no doubt that the man was in earnest when he said this. The light from the agent’s window shone full upon his face and the runaway could see that there was an evil look in it.
“If you had stood by me I would have given you a good place to sleep, for I know where there is a nice warm hay-mow with plenty of blankets and buffalo robes to put over you,” continued the tramp. “I slept there last night, and I’m goingthere now, after I see you start for Carbondale. Go on, be off with you!”
“I’m not going there,” replied Huggins, who was so badly frightened by the man’s vehemence that he was afraid to show any of the indignation he felt at being ordered about in this unceremonious way. “I shall stay right here on this platform until daylight.”
“No, you won’t. I’m not going to have you staying around here watching for a chance to follow me to my warm bed. You went back on me, and now you can look out for yourself.”
“I have no intention of following you,” said Huggins.
“I’ll believe that when I see you dig out for Carbondale. Go on, I say, or I’ll help you!”
The man took his hands out of his pockets, and Huggins believing that he was about to put his threat into execution, jumped off the platform, and started up the railroad track at a rapid pace, the tramp standing in the full glare of the light from the agent’s window, and keeping a close watch over his movements.
“That was a pretty good idea,” said he to himself, as he saw the boy’s figure growing dim in thedistance. “He said he was able and willing to pay liberal for somebody to take him to Carbondale, and that proves that he’s got money. I’ll just look into that matter when he gets a little farther away. I’ll take that fine cap, muffler, and them gloves of his’n, too. They’ll keep me warm while I have ’em, and I can trade ’em off or sell ’em before the police can get wind of me.”
So saying the man stepped down from the platform and moved leisurely up the track in the direction in which Huggins had disappeared, shuffling along in a supremely lazy and disjointed way, that no one ever saw imitated by anybody except a professional tramp.
“The insolent fellow!” thought Huggins, looking back now and then to make sure that the man was still standing on the platform. “What right had he to tell me to go on to Carbondale if I wanted to stay at the depot until morning? He must think I am hard up for a night’s rest if he imagines that I would be willing to sleep in a hay-mow. I’ll have a good bed while I am about it, for now that I am on the road to Carbondale, I shall keep moving until I get there. How lonelyand still it is out here, and how gloomy the woods look! I wish I had somebody to talk to.”
When the darkness had shut the station-house, the tank, the upright, motionless figure of the tramp and every thing else except the light in the agent’s window out from his view, Huggins broke into a run, and flew along the track at the top of his speed. He kept up the pace as long as he could stand it, and then settled down into a rapid trot which carried him easily over one of the three miles he had to cover before he could find a roof to shelter him and a bed to sleep in.
“I think I am all right now,” soliloquized the runaway, slackening his pace to a walk and unbuttoning his heavy muffler, which felt too warm about his neck. “I tell you I am glad to see the last of that tramp, for I didn’t at all like the looks of him. I believe he’d just as soon——”
The runaway’s heart seemed to stop beating. He faced quickly about, and there was the tramp whom he hoped he had seen for the last time, close behind him. He had easily kept pace with the boy, stepping so exactly in time with him that the sound of his feet upon the frosty snow had not betrayed his presence. He held some objectin his hand which he flourished over his head, and Huggins, believing it to be a pistol, stood trembling in his tracks and waited for him to come up. The object was not a pistol, but it was a murderous looking knife, which made the boy shudder all over as he looked at it.
“I’ve concluded to make you pay for going back on me so fair and square while you were talking to the agent,” were the tramp’s next words. “Put your hands above your head while I go through your pockets and see what you’ve got in ’em.”
“Do you want my money?” asked Huggins, who could hardly make himself understood, so frightened was he. “If you do I will give it to you, but don’t hurt me.”
He carried his money in two places. The greater portion of it was in Lester Brigham’s pocket-book; and in one of his vest pockets he had the small amount of change the conductor gave him when he paid his fare. As it was all in small bills and made a roll of respectable size, he hoped he could satisfy the robber by handing it over, but he was doomed to be disappointed. When he made a move as if he were about to unbutton his overcoat, the man raised his knife threateningly.
“None o’ that!” said he, in savage tones. “You can’t draw a barker on me while I am within reach of you, and it will be worse for you if you try it. Put your hands above your head, and be quick about it.”
Huggins was afraid to refuse or to utter a word of remonstrance. He raised his hands in the air, and the robber, after dropping the knife into his coat-pocket, so that it could be readily seized if circumstances should seem to require it, proceeded to “go through” him in the most business-like way. He turned all the boy’s pockets inside out, and when he had completed his investigations, Huggins’s money was all gone and he stood shivering in the tramp’s hat and thread-bare coat, while the tramp himself looked like another person. He had appropriated the runaway’s cap, coats, muffler and gloves, and would have taken his boots and Arctics too, if they had been big enough for him.
“Now, then,” said he, as he buttoned the muffler about his neck and drew on the gloves, “I believe I am done with you, and you can dig out.”
“But where can I go?” cried Huggins. “I have no money to pay for a night’s lodging, and I am almost a thousand miles from home.”
“You are better off than I am, for I have no home at all,” answered the tramp. “It won’t hurt you to sleep out of doors; I’ve done it many a time. Now skip, for I have wasted words enough with you. Not that way,” he added, as Huggins reluctantly turned his face toward Carbondale. “Go back to the station. Step lively now, for if you don’t, I shall be after you.”
The boy dared not wait for the command to be repeated, believing, as he did, that it would be emphasized by a prod with the knife which the robber still held in his hand. Scarcely realizing what he was doing he hurried along the track toward the station, and when he ventured to look behind him, the tramp was nowhere in sight.
“Now what am I going to do?” said Huggins to himself; and it was a question he pondered all the way to the station, and which he could not answer even when daylight came. The station-agent was just locking up as he stepped upon the platform, and he resolved to make another effort to obtain a seat by one of his fires.
“Won’t you please let me sit in the waiting-room until morning?” said the boy, in a pleading voice.
“No,no!” was the angry response. “Clearout! You are the third one who has asked me that question to-night. I don’t keep a hotel. If I did, I’d have a sign out.”
“That man who followed me into your office a little while ago, has robbed me,” gasped Huggins, choking back a sob.
“Well, I should say he had!” exclaimed the agent, after he had taken a sharp look at Huggins. “I thought I knew your voice, but I didn’t recognize you in those clothes. If I had had the chance I should have told you to shake him as soon as possible. He has been hanging around here all day, and I was afraid he would be up to something before he left. Why didn’t you call for help?”
“He was armed and savage and I was afraid to say a word,” replied the runaway. “Besides it would have done no good, for I was a long distance up the track when he overtook me.”
“Did he take all your money?”
“Every red cent. He didn’t even leave me my pocket-knife or note-book.”
“Your case is a hard one, that’s a fact, and I will do what I can for you,” said the agent. “You may sit in this room to-night. That fellowwill probably go to Oxford, and if I can get the operator there to respond to my call, I’ll tell him to put the police on the look-out. To-morrow I will send an alarm all along the line.”
“I am much obliged to you,” said Huggins, gratefully. “I may some day be able to repay you for your kindness.”
“That’s all right. Good night.”
The agent went out, and the runaway drew one of the chairs up in front of the stove and sat down in it. He was provided for for the night, but what should he do when morning came? Should he stay there at the tank-station and look for work, or would it be better for him to start for Oxford on foot, begging his meals as he went like any other tramp? That was what he intended to do when he first made up his mind to desert the academy, and he could not see that there was any other course open to him now. While he was thinking about it, he fell asleep. He did not know when the lightning express and the fast freight went through, but he heard the whistle of the morning train, and hurried to the door to see the accommodation approaching. He saw something else, too—something that put life and energyinto him, and sent him around the corner of the building out of sight.
“They are after me already,” said he, as he hurried along a road that led from the station into the woods. “I saw their uniform caps sticking out of the window.”
If he had waited a few minutes longer he would have seen Captain Mack and Sergeant Gordon step upon the platform and run toward the agent’s office.
“Did you say he was a tall young fellow with a little mustache, and that he wore a dark-blue overcoat, Arctic shoes and seal-skin furs? He’s the very chap. Come with me. He was fast asleep in a chair in the waiting-room not more than half an hour ago. There is his chair,” said the agent, as he opened the door, “but he has skipped out, as sure as the world.”
“Have you any idea where he is?” asked the young captain.
“I think he must have gone to Carbondale,” replied the agent. “But see here, boys: you needn’t waste any time in looking for a fellow in a blue overcoat and seal-skin furs, for the police will take care of him. You want to keep youreyes open for a chap in a patched and torn broad-cloth coat and a slouch hat without any brim to it. You see——”
Here the agent went on to tell how Huggins had been robbed and compelled to exchange clothes with the tramp. The boys listened attentively, and when the agent finished his story, they hastened back to the train to report to the professor. Captain Mack did the talking, and wound up with the request that he might be permitted to take a couple of men and go up the wagon-road toward Carbondale to see if Huggins had gone that way. To his great surprise as well as delight the request was granted, the professor adding that he and the rest of the squad would keep on with the train until he thought they had got ahead of the runaway, and then they would get off and come back on foot.
“If you seen any dings of Hukkins or de veller vot robbed him, you will gatch all two of dem and rebort to me py delegraph,” said the professor, in concluding his instructions. “I shall pe somveres along de road, and as lightning can dravel so much fasder dan shteam, you can easy gatch me.”
“Very good, sir. I wish I could take you with me, Bert,” he added, in a whisper, “for I am bound to carry off the honors of this scout; but you will have to stay and act as lackey to the professor. Gordon, you and Egan come with me.”
The boys obeyed with alacrity, smiling and kissing their hands to Hopkins and Curtis, who frowned fiercely and shook their fists at them in return. They stood upon the platform until the train moved off, and then Captain Mack said:
“Business before pleasure, boys. I move that we go somewhere and get a good, old-fashioned country breakfast. I speak for a big bowl of bread and milk.”
The others were only too glad to fall in with this proposition. Having left the academy almost as soon as they got up, they began to feel the cravings of hunger, and their appetites were sharpened by the mere mention of bread and milk. They held a short consultation with the station-agent, and then started leisurely down the wagon road in the direction of Carbondale, stopping at every house along the route with the intention of asking for a bowl of bread and milk, but always,for some reason or other, coming away without doing it. They were not inclined to be fastidious. When it came to the pinch they could eat pancakes or bacon that were seasoned with nothing but ashes and cinders with as much zest as anybody; but they had become so accustomed to the strict and rigidly enforced rules regarding personal cleanliness, that any violation of these rules shocked them. To quote from Don Gordon, who generally expressed his sentiments in the plainest possible language, they had no use for children whose faces and hands were covered with molasses, nor could they see anything to admire in an unkempt woman who went about her cooking with a well-blackened clay-pipe in her mouth.
“There’s the place we are looking for,” said Egan, directing his companions’ attention to a neat little farm-house a short distance in advance of them. “If we can’t find a breakfast there, we’ll not find it this side of——”
At that instant the front door of the house was suddenly opened, and a lady appeared upon the threshold. She looked anxiously up and down the road, and, seeing the students approaching, beckoned to them with frantic eagerness, at thesame time calling out, “Help! help!” at the top of her voice.
“Come on, boys,” cried Captain Mack. “Her house is on fire.”
The officer and his men broke into a run, discarding their heavy overcoats as they went, but before they had made many steps they discovered that it was something besides fire that had occasioned the lady’s alarm. All on a sudden a back door was jerked violently open, and a man bounded down the steps and ran across a field toward the railroad track.
“He’s been doing something in there,” shouted Captain Mack. “Take after him, boys.”
“That’s one of the fellows we want,” observed Egan. “He’s got Huggins’s overcoat on.”
“So he has,” said the captain. “Never mind the lady, for she is safe now. Catch the tramp, and we’ll find out what he had been doing to frighten her.”
Don Gordon, who had already taken the lead of his companions, cleared the high farm gate as easily as though he had been furnished with wings, and ran up the carriage-way. He lingered at a wood-rack he found in front of the barn longenough to jerk one of the stakes out of it, and having thus provided himself with a weapon, he continued the pursuit.
The tramp, who had about fifty yards the start, proved himself to be no mean runner. His wind was good, his muscles had been hardened by many a long pedestrian tour about the country, and Don afterward admitted that for a long time it looked as if the man were going to beat him; but when the latter got what school-boys are wont to call his “second wind,” he gained rapidly. Another hundred yards run brought him almost within striking distance of the fugitive, and while he was trying to make up his mind whether he ought to halt him or knock him down without ceremony to pay him for frightening the lady, the tramp suddenly stopped and faced about. Then Don saw that he carried a knife in his hand.
“Keep away from me,” said he, in savage tones, “or I’ll——”
“You’ll what?” demanded Don, leaning on his club and casting a quick glance over his shoulder to see how far his companions were behind.
“Do you see this?” said the tramp, shaking the knife threateningly.
“Yes, I see it,” answered Don, coolly. “You had better throw it away. You might hurt yourself with it.”
The tramp was astonished. Here was a boy who could not be as easily frightened as Huggins was, and he began to stand in awe of him. He was old enough to know that a cool, deliberate antagonist is much more to be feared than one who allows himself to go into a paroxysm of rage and excitement.
“Drop that knife,” commanded Don, who had suddenly made up his mind that the tramp ought to be disarmed before his companions came up; and as he spoke, he raised his club over his head.
A year’s hard drill, added to faithful attention to the instructions he had received from Professor Odenheimer, had made Don Gordon very proficient in the broadsword exercise, but he had never had an opportunity to test the value of the accomplishment until this particular morning. Seeing that the man had no intention of dropping the knife he proceeded to disarm him, and he did it in a way that was as surprising to him as it was to the tramp. Bringing his club to the first position, hemade a feint with it as if he were going to give a No. 1 cut. If the weapon had not been arrested in its progress through the air, and the tramp had stood motionless, he would have received a sounding whack on his left cheek; but seeing the club coming he ducked his head at the very instant that Don changed from the first to the third cut, thus receiving squarely between the eyes the full force of a terrific blow that was intended for his right forearm. He fell as if he had been shot. The knife fell from his grasp, and before he could recover it, Captain Mack had run up and secured possession of it.
Without saying a word Egan proceeded to explore the tramp’s pockets, and the first thing he brought to light was Lester Brigham’s money. It was all there, too, for the tramp had had no opportunity to spend any of it. He had reasons of his own for desiring to go to Oxford, but he did not intend to start immediately. He slept in a barn that night, and intended, as soon as he had begged a breakfast, to strike back into the country and make his way to Oxford by a round-about course, avoiding the railroad and all the villages along the route. He hoped in this way to eludethe police who, he knew, would be on the watch for him. When he reached the farm-house from which he had taken his hurried flight, and found that the male members of the family were absent, he began to act as though he had a right there. He demanded a warm breakfast and a seat at the table; and when the lady of the house objected and tried to oppose his entrance into the kitchen, he frightened her nearly out of her senses by producing his knife and threatening to do something terrible with it if his demands were not complied with on the instant. Some of these things Captain Mack and his men learned from the tramp himself, and the rest of the story they heard from the lady, into whose presence they conducted their prisoner without loss of time. The latter came very near meeting with a warm reception. The farmer and his two stalwart sons had just come in from the wood-lot where they had spent the morning in chopping, and it was all the old gentleman, aided by his wife and Captain Mack and his men, could do to keep the boys from punching the tramp’s head.
“What are you going to do with him?” demanded the farmer, when quiet had been restoredand Captain Mack had told what the tramp had done to Huggins the night before.
“I am going to take him back to the station and telegraph to Professor Odenheimer for orders,” answered the captain. “Those are my instructions.”
“Haven’t had any breakfast, I reckon, have you? I thought not. Well, I haven’t either. Come in and sit down. It’s all ready.”
“Thank you,” said Mack. “A bowl of milk would be——”
“Oh, we’ve got something better than that.”
“You haven’t anything that would suit me better,” said Mack, with refreshing candor. “I am a city boy.”
“Oh, ah! Well, you shall have all the milk you can drink.”
When Captain Mack and his men had satisfied their appetites and listened to the grateful words of the farmer, who thanked them for their prompt response to his wife’s appeals for assistance, they put on their overcoats, which one of the boys had brought in from the road during their absence, and set out for the station with their prisoner. The latter’s face began to show the effect of Don’sblow, but the tramp did not seem to mind it. He ate the cold bread and meat which the farmer’s wife gave him just as he was about to leave the house with his captors, and even joined in their conversation.
When the students reached the depot they were met by the agent, who laughed all over when he saw the tramp, and drew Captain Mack off on one side.
“You got him, didn’t you?” said he. “Some of you must have given him a good pounding, judging by his countenance. Now, if you are at all sharp, you can capture the other.”
“Who? Huggins?”
“Yes. He went out to the mill and got a job there at hauling wood. He was in here not ten minutes ago, and I had a long talk with him. He saw some of you looking out of the window when the accommodation came in, and that was the reason he took himself off in such a hurry. I told him that you had gone on toward Oxford. He’ll be back here with another load in less than an hour, and then you can catch him.”
“I am much obliged to you,” said Captain Mack. “Now will you see if you can ascertainwhere the professor and the rest of the boys are?”
The agent said he would; but his efforts to find them met with no success. The operators of whom he made inquiries had all seen them, but couldn’t tell where they were.
“They haven’t left the train yet,” said he. “The accommodation will be at Munson in a quarter of an hour, and then I will try again.”
Of course the captain could not make his report until he knew where the professor was, so he and his men went into the waiting-room, accompanied by the tramp, and sat down there—all except Don Gordon, who was ordered to hold himself in readiness to capture the deserter when he came back with the next load of wood.