CHAPTER VIMAKING PLANS
Franklooked queerly at his companion as Lanky said this.
“But, say, didn’t I hear you make a remark a minute or so ago that there were plenty of girls?” he said; at which the other chuckled.
“That’s what you did, Frank; but then this is a different thing,” he replied.
“Oh! is that so, Lanky?”
“Because, you see, Bones laughed at the idea of such a thing happening in these times—as a child bein’ stolen. And when I ran across that story in an old paper over at our house, I cut it out, just to show you that every little while something like this does happen.”
“Have you got it along with you?” demanded Frank.
“Sure I have, and I want you to read it,” with which Lanky produced a long slip of paper, about three columns of newspaper matter.
Frank let his eye run along it hastily; but he had a faculty for gleaning all the points of a story almost at a glance. Some of the boys declared that Frank Allen would make a great reporter; but then there were many other positions in life in which he could make his mark, if half they said of him were true.
“Well, it’s an interesting story, I see,” he remarked; “and I hope that the poor mother, Mrs. Elverson, has found her little Effie long ago. For I notice that this is cut from a paper that’s two months and more old, Lanky.”
“That’s right, Frank,” the other answered, promptly.
“This account tells of how the nurse took the little girl out walking and never turned up again,” Frank went on to say.
“Just what it does, Frank, and I know what you’ve got on your mind.”
“They traced her to the train, and she set out for another city not far away, where the detectives lost the trail; and although a week had gone by when this account was printed, not a single thing had they learned. The nurse had disappeared just as if the ground had opened and swallowed her up, this reporter says.”
“His words, just like you say, Frank,” admitted Lanky, nodding his head encouragingly.
“But, Lanky, from start to finish of this storythere isn’t a single mention of gypsies,” Frank continued.
“Huh, not a peep, sure’s you’re born, Frank.”
“Then what makes you bring it to me to read, just as if you felt dead sure this little dark-faced child in the gypsy van might be the golden-haired Effie Elverson?”
“Now, hold on, Frank,” interrupted the other, with a sudden change of front. “You know I didn’t say a word about that. Fact is, I explained in the start I only fetched this paper for you to see that what Bones said isn’t true. Right in these up-to-date times childrendodisappear once in a while. Yes, and I wouldn’t put it past a gypsy tribe to steal a little girl, and even dye her hair! Laugh, if you want to, Frank.”
“No, I’m not laughing, Lanky,” replied the other. “To tell the honest truth, somehow you’ve gone and got me worked up more than a little about this business. And since I promised to help you out, if I could, I’ll go along when you visit that gypsy camp. But we must lay our plans first.”
“How’s that?” demanded Lanky, eagerly; for when it came to mapping out a campaign he was always willing to yield the palm to his wide-awake chum.
“If you go to nosing around that camp without some good reason, I’m afraid you’ll get in a peck oftrouble right away,” Frank went on, quietly. “Those gypsies are a hot-blooded crowd, and they don’t like being spied on. And it would be all the worse if it happened that there was any truth in what you suspect, and the queen kept a stolen child inside her big painted van.”
“Yes, you’re right there, Frank. What had we better do?” Lanky asked.
“I’ve been thinking that part of it over, and struck an idea that might pan out all right,” Frank remarked.
“I’d wager it was a good one before you said a word; but put me wise, Frank.”
“Why,” Frank began, “I remembered that the gypsies always made their camp at Budd’s Corners every year; and I hear they’ve settled down for a week’s stay this time at the old place. So I went over to see Mr. Budd.”
“Yes?” Lanky observed, in what he meant to be an encouraging tone.
“I told him all about it, Lanky; and, although he laughed at your idea, he was willing enough to make me a messenger, to do some business with the head of the tribe, who, you must know, is the old queen herself!”
“Say, you do beat anything I ever saw for getting down to business,” declared Lanky, proudly. “Why,that’ll just give us the chance of our lives to see what’s inside that big van of hers; won’t it?”
“It would, if she invites us in,” replied Frank; “you see, she might act suspicious. Perhaps she even noticed what you did when we passed the caravan Saturday. You turned your head, and stared straight at that particular van. I saw the driver look sour at you, just like he wanted to tell you to mind your own business. As to getting a look-in; as Jack Eastwick would say, ‘maybe, maybe not.’”
“But no matter,” persisted the determined Lanky, “even if we don’t get an invite to come in, you can be talking to the old lady to beat the band, while I just meander around the camp, and see what’s doing. Mebbe I might even run across the little girl somewhere. Just give me a chance to say ten words to her, and it’ll settle the business whether she’s bein’ kept there against her will.”
“Well, when shall we go—to-night, or in the morning early before school?” Frank went on to ask.
“I’ll see you after we get out this afternoon, and we can settle it then,” replied the tall boy, after reflection. “You see, seems to me the night time isn’t the best for what I want. She’s only a little mite of a girl, and chances are she’d be asleep by then. I’d rather take the mornin’, when she’d be wide-awake.”
“That’s where you show a wise head,” commented Frank, as they turned once more toward theschoolhouse at the other end of the campus, where scores of boys and girls were gathered in groups, or walking back and forth, laughing, talking and altogether making merry.
Frank pretended not to notice, but he saw Lanky suddenly stiffen up, and turn his head toward a certain point where a rather handsome, though proud-looking, young fellow was sauntering with a very pretty girl, who had just come to high school that year.
Of course this latter was the fickle Dora, about whom so much had been said, and who was surely pretty enough to turn the head of even a plain, sensible fellow like Lanky Wallace. And the boy could be no other than the “city fellow,” Walter Ackerman, toward whom half the maids in Columbia were friendly disposed, since he certainly was the best-looking boy in town.
Just then was heard a great shouting from the basement and a crowd of boys came trooping forth, laughing uproariously.
“There’s Bill Klemm and his bunch, with a few decent fellows in the bargain,” remarked Frank. “Soggy is having a fierce time with them right now. He threatens to complain to Professor Tyson Parke if they keep going on as they are; and you know, when good, old Soggy says that, he must be prettywell rattled, because he does hate to see the boys punished.”
“There he comes out, Frank, and he looks as mad as a wet hen,” remarked Lanky, glad to have his attention turned from the sight of Dora walking with the good-looking newcomer in Columbia; perhaps Lanky may have begun to fear that it had been partly his fault that unlucky quarrel had come about; but he would never admit it now, since she had taken to teasing him by openly encouraging the attentions of a fellow he was jealous about.
“I wouldn’t be surprised if that Bill Klemm had been smoking again in the basement,” Frank suggested. “You know it’s against the rules; but little he cares for that. Some fine day they’ll be setting the school afire.”
“Yes,” went on Lanky, “and then good-bye to Bill Klemm, just the same as we got rid of Lef Sellers. It’ll have to be a skip-out for Bill, though, because his folks haven’t got the cash to send him to a military academy to get the training he needs.”
“Here comes Minnie Cuthbert and my sister, Helen; and they look like they wanted to speak to us, Lanky,” remarked Frank.
Two very attractive girls hurried up. One was Frank’s only sister, of whom his chums, Ralph Langworthy and Paul Bird, were both very fond. The other was a lively girl, whom Frank himself hadtaken to all the class dances, singing schools, as well as church choir meetings, for a long time.
The deposed town bully, Lef Sellers, had once hoped to be Minnie Cuthbert’s first choice, and the fact that Frank had stepped in between had been the main cause of his enmity toward our hero.
“It isn’t true; is it, Lanky?” demanded Minnie, as they came up. “He didn’t throw you over a tree, and then pound you with his hoofs as you lay on the ground?”
“Whatever are you talking about?” demanded Frank; but at the same time he smiled and thus betrayed his knowledge.
“Why, some of the boys have been telling us the greatest stories you ever heard, all about that terrible beast Farmer Hobson has out at his place. They say he chased Lanky around a tree in the pasture, and with his horns just tossed him—well, one said the tree was forty feet over, but Jack Eastwick modified it and called it thirty. But even that is a high jump for anyone to make!”
At that Frank exploded with laughter, and even Lanky grinned.
“Say, aren’t they the limit, now, giving the girls all that taffy?” the latter remarked. “I did meet with the farmer’s bull, Minnie, and he chased me around a tree, all right, because I couldn’t sprint as well as Frank and Bones, being too far from thefence at the time. So I climbed that tree. And in the end they got a rope to me, which I fastened to a high limb, and went hand over hand, till I was over the fence and out. And now they all say I’ve got to enter the athletic meet as the champion tight-rope walker, and performer on the high trapeze.”
Just then the bell rang for school to begin, and laughing at Lanky’s good-natured description of his wonderful adventure, the girls set out on a run toward the entrance of the fine building of which Columbia people were so proud.