Читать книгу: «The Outdoor Chums in the Big Woods: or, Rival Hunters of Lumber Run»

CHAPTER I – THE SNOWBALL BATTLE

“That looks like a challenge, Frank.”

“It was well fired, at any rate, Bluff!”

“I should say yes, because it knocked my hat clear off my head. Do we stand for that sort of thing, or shall we accept the dare?”

“There are half a dozen and more of the enemy against four Outdoor Chums, but what of that? This is the first snow of the fall, with a real tang in the air. Say yes, Frank, and let’s get busy!”

“Here are Bluff and Jerry ready to eat up that crowd in a snowball fight. What do you say, Will?”

“Oh, count me in, because I can see they’re just spoiling for it!” exclaimed the fourth boy in the party, who did not look quite so hardy as his comrades, although no weakling.

“Well, I should think it’d be a shame to miss it, when the snow is just soft enough to handle easily,” and Jerry Wellington held up a big round ball he had quickly manipulated in his practiced hands.

“That settles it. Everybody get busy making a supply of ammunition. Then we’ll charge their line, and give them as good as they send!”

The last speaker was Frank Langdon. His three comrades had always been proud to look up to Frank as their leader. They had been through a great many lively adventures together, and up to the present no one had ever found cause to regret the fact that when it came to deciding on their plans Frank’s word carried the greatest weight.

While they are feverishly stocking up with a supply of such ammunition as is required to win snowball battles, it might be well for the new reader to learn a few important facts concerning Frank and his chums, as narrated in previous volumes of this series.

They lived in the thriving town of Centerville, which was situated in one of the Middle States. Coming together in order to encourage the spirit of outdoor life, to their mutual profit, the four lively lads had called their little association the Rod, Gun, and Camera Club. In the initial story, under the name of “The Outdoor Chums; or, The First Tour of the Rod, Gun, and Camera Club,” were given numerous strange happenings that befell them on the occasion of their first camping trip together.

Later on they ran upon a mystery connected with an island that had a bad name in the neighborhood, and of course could not rest satisfied until they solved this puzzle to their satisfaction. In order to understand just what they did you must read the second volume, issued under the title of “The Outdoor Chums on the Lake; or, Lively Adventures on Wildcat Island.”

With the coming of Easter, and another chance to get abroad, the boys formed a plan to visit a section of country some miles from the home town. Here they found an opportunity to clear up a ghost scare that had been giving the country people of the neighborhood the time of their lives. It is all told in the pages of “The Outdoor Chums in the Forest; or, Laying the Ghost of Oak Ridge.”

Fortune was certainly kind to Frank and his chums. At Christmas time they were given a chance to pay a visit to the Sunny South, and had some wonderful adventures on a Florida river that ran to the Gulf. Aboard a motorboat that belonged to a cousin of Frank’s, and which was fully stocked with supplies, with the owner ordered to Europe for his health, they had the time of their lives, as told of in “The Outdoor Chums on the Gulf; or, Rescuing the Lost Balloonists.”

After this came another opportunity for a trip, this time to the Far West, where among the mountains and valleys of that wonderful country they found occasion to call themselves the luckiest of boys. Every one of them had a share in the exciting adventures that came their way, and it would be hard to tell which deserved the greatest credit for true manliness. You will be better able to decide that point for yourself after you have read “The Outdoor Chums after Big Game; or, Perilous Adventures in the Wilderness.”

Again it was summer, and the boys home from college planned a voyage down the great Mississippi on a houseboat belonging to Will’s Uncle Felix, at the time in New Orleans. There was something very queer about the conditions under which he proposed that they make this trip at his expense. The boys could not understand it at all when they started out, though anxious to accept the offer. Of course, during the progress of their cruise, the mystery began to clear up. That Frank and his friends carried their plans through to a climax can be proved by reading the sixth volume, just preceding this, called “The Outdoor Chums on a Houseboat; or, The Rivals of the Mississippi.”

And now we can return once more to the present conditions surrounding Frank and his three chums, Will Milton, Jerry Wallingford and Bluff Masters.

As they had been graduated a year and more previous to this time from private school, and had had one season at college, their presence at home with the advent of early winter needs explanation.

A fire had occurred, and part of the college buildings were in ruins. As the dormitory in which the four chums lodged had been burned to the ground, they lost a good part of their clothing, besides other things. Fortunately no lives were sacrificed in the blaze.

There being no suitable place at hand where their studies could be carried on until such time as hasty repairs were made, a portion of the pupils had to be sent to their homes for a month or two. It was arranged that they keep in touch with their studies and later on extra speed might push them up to their proper standing.

So it came about that they were home and wondering what they should do to pass away the weeks that must elapse before the summons back might be expected. Various projects had been suggested, although they only arrived in Centerville on the previous night; but up to the present nothing had been decided definitely.

There was an old trapper they knew, and with whom they had spent some happy days and nights on a previous occasion, and Frank was favoring a return visit. At any rate, they could settle this later on.

“All ready?” demanded Frank, when he had all the hard snowballs he could conveniently carry. The jeering cries of the six or seven boys anticipating the attack grew more and more strenuous.

“Wait till I make two more, and I’m with you!” begged Bluff, who had even filled his pockets with the hardest balls he could squeeze in his powerful hands.

“There’s our old enemy, Andy Lasher, in that bunch over yonder,” announced Jerry, who from previous fights with the one-time town bully had occasion to know the contour of Andy’s knuckles, since they had been printed on his face more than a few times.

“I wonder when he came back to town?” ventured Frank. “The last we heard of him he had to skip out because of some trouble he got into about taking things that didn’t belong to him.”

“Well, we’ve still an old score to settle with him,” observed Bluff, “so every chance you get, give him your hardest ball. Ready now, Frank!”

Frank led his forces to the attack.

“Hold your fire till we get close up!” he advised.

The consequence of this plan was that while they were greeted with a shower of missiles, some of which hit the mark, when the time came to commence a fusillade on their own account they had a full supply of ammunition, while the other side had more than half exhausted their stock.

It looked lively enough just then, with almost a dozen lads hurling the snowballs with might and main. All sorts of shouts accompanied the encounter, for of course they were pretty well aroused by the excitement of the battle.

The big fellow whom Jerry had called Andy Lasher seemed to be the real leader of the opposing band. Perhaps he had even organized the ambuscade so as to get even with Frank and his chums, because there was a long-standing account between them.

At any rate, it kept him busy dodging the cleverly aimed missiles that flew from the hands of Bluff and Jerry. They had singled him out for their especial attention, and at close quarters their aim was so good that pretty soon Andy failed to move fast enough, so that he found himself struck in the cheek, and as he started to dodge it was only to get another whack fairly in the eye.

Some people who had been passing stopped to watch the fight. Men remembered that they had once been boys themselves, and no doubt their blood tingled with rekindled memories of days long since gone, as they saw the hostile forces fiercely contending on the town street.

For a short time the entrenched battalion held its own, though Frank knew from the way some of Andy’s followers began to look over their shoulders that they were getting ready to retreat.

“Keep it going, boys!” he shouted to his three chums, as he scooped up more of the soft snow and started making fresh balls; “hit hard all along the line! We’ve got ’em wavering! Another rush, and the game is ours! Send in your best licks, and make every shot count!”

All of them were attacking Andy now. They realized that if he could be put to flight there must follow a complete collapse of his line; because these fellows were only held there by the fact that they feared Andy’s anger if they deserted him.

Andy had managed to make one last hard ball. He had even in desperation, as was afterward proven, snatched up a stone and hid it in the middle of the snowball he pressed between his half-frozen hands. This is reckoned a mean trick among most boys and frowned upon as much as hitting below the belt would be in a prize fight.

Frank saw that he had been selected as the victim of the bully. He managed to dodge in the nick of time, and the weighted missile, sailing across the street, smashed through the window of a house.

With the jingling of broken glass Andy Lasher gave a shout, and then with jeers of derision he and his followers vanished from sight, leaving the four outdoor chums to bear the brunt of the householder’s anger.

CHAPTER II – A BROKEN WINDOW, AND GLORIOUS NEWS

“Gee whiz! Look who’s coming out of the house on the rampage, will you!” cried Bluff Masters, as the front door was flung open and an excited man hurried down the steps toward the spot where the four chums stood breathing hard after their recent exertions.

“It’s old Isaac Chase, the meanest man in Centerville!” exclaimed Jerry, in dismay.

“But we didn’t break his old window, you know,” expostulated Will Milton. “Here are lots of witnesses to prove it came from the other side.”

“Little he’ll care about that,” Bluff told him. “He must have seen us in the fight, and that settles it. Frank, you talk with him. I’d be apt to get sassy if he scolded too hard.”

So it usually came about. Upon Frank’s shoulders was laid the burden of extricating them from numerous mishaps. But Frank rather liked being made the scapegoat; he certainly faced the angry old miser of Centerville without showing a sign of alarm.

“Now you’ve gone and done it, you young rapscallions!” cried Isaac Chase, so excited that he could hardly control his trembling voice. “I don’t know what this town is coming to, when a pack of boys are allowed to fight battles right on the public streets, and with stones in their snowballs at that!”

He held up something he had in his hand, so that every one could see. It was a stone, there could be no doubt about that, with some of the snow still adhering to its sides.

Bluff rubbed the side of his head at seeing this, as though wondering whether the missile that had struck him there had also been loaded in that way.

“We’re sorry, Mr. Chase, that your window was broken,” said Frank steadily; “it was an accident, I give you my word about that. I happened to dodge a ball fired from the other side, and it went through the glass.”

“What! You here in this rowdy business, Frank Langdon!” exclaimed the other, as though more than surprised. “I shall have to see your father and make complaint, if the Chief of Police declines to back me up and arrest a few of you.”

“As to that, Mr. Chase, I will tell my father all about it as soon as he comes home from the bank. I know what he will say, though, and it doesn’t frighten me one bit. My father was a boy himself once, not like some people who forget that they once used to play themselves.”

“Don’t be impudent to me, boy!” snapped the old miser angrily.

“I don’t mean to be so, Mr. Chase,” Frank continued; “and as for your window, we will send a glazier around right away to put in a fresh pane, and pay for it, too. I’m sure that is all you could expect from us.”

“That’s a measly shame, Frank!” objected Bluff impetuously.

“When it was Andy Lasher who broke the window,” added Jerry, filled with righteous indignation. “You only ducked, Frank, when you saw it headed your way. Perhaps Mr. Chase thinks you should have stood up and got that snowball with the stone in its heart smashed in your eye. It isn’t fair for you to pay the bill. Let him go after Andy.”

“No, I prefer settling the account myself, and not having any trouble about it,” Frank told his objecting chums. “Besides, we’ve had enough fun out of the business to stand a little expense like that. The innocent often have to suffer for the guilty.”

Some of the bystanders at this point tried to convince Mr. Chase that Frank was entirely innocent of the whole transaction; but the miser, acting on the principle that “a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush,” declined to let the generous offer Frank had made slip from his grasp.

“Someone’s got to pay for my broken window,” he insisted stubbornly, “and these boys admit they were connected with the rowdy crew that made themselves a disgrace to the town in front of my door. I shall expect him to fulfill his offer, which you heard him make, Mr. Jenkins and Mr. Mole. The sooner that window pane is replaced the better I shall be pleased. That’s enough.”

With that he turned his back upon the group and hurried to reenter his house, as though fearful lest some of the spectators might endeavor to shame him out of accepting pay from an innocent party.

Frank and his three comrades stood talking with some of those who had gathered when the crash of broken glass, followed by angry words in the high-pitched voice of the miser, drew attention to the scene of action.

“Come, let’s be moving along, fellows,” Bluff finally remarked. It galled him to think they had been made the scapegoats by Andy Lasher and his set, though he knew only too well that once Frank’s mind was made up to pay for the broken window nothing could change him.

True to his promise, Frank first of all visited the hardware store, and engaged the owner to send a man around at once to the home of the miser, so as to replace a twelve-by-twenty pane of glass.

“I expect to have a good many orders like that, Frank, before the day is over,” remarked the dealer, laughingly. “They always come with the first snow, for you boys must have your fling. A ball went wide of the mark, did it, and picked out the window of Miser Chase’s house to smash?”

“But the trouble is, none of us threw it!” burst out Jerry, determined that the true facts should be known at any rate, even if they did have to foot the bill. “Andy Lasher hid a stone in his last ball, and expected to do Frank damage, for he shied it straight at his head; but Frank dodged, and bang went the glass!”

“Andy and his cowardly bunch pulled out like fun,” Bluff hastened to add; “and so we had to stand for it. But then Frank says we were in the crowd that was fighting, and it wasn’t fair that Mr. Chase, who was an innocent party, should suffer from our fun. So I reckon we’ll have to put our hands in our pockets and pay your bill, Mr. Benchley.”

The hardware man nodded his head. There was a twinkle in his eye as he observed Frank Langdon. He knew the sort of reputation Frank had in Centerville, although the latter had not been a resident there much more than three years, having come from away off in Maine at the time his father took the local bank over.

“Believe me, I’ll let you boys off as lightly as I can, and not lose by it,” was what he told them. “I like the manly way you stand up and take hard knocks. If I had a boy, I’d want him to be just your style, Frank.”

As the four chums went away, Jerry chuckled.

“That was as neat a compliment as you ever had paid you, Frank, do you know it?” he asked the other.

Frank smiled, but he did not look displeased.

“I’m glad Mr. Benchley has such a good opinion of the outdoor chums,” he remarked, “for he meant every one of you, as well as me, when he said that. We try to do the right thing most times; and yet there never were four boys more fond of having a jolly time than this bunch.”

“That’s so,” Bluff declared sturdily, “and we’ve had lots of dandy vacations in the past, too. What’s bothering me is where we ought to go to spend this unexpected time that’s been given to us through the fire at the college.”

“We’ll figure all that out in a day or so, never fear,” Will observed.

“Yes,” added Jerry, “leave it to Frank, and he’ll arrange the details. Chances are we’ll be dropping in to see how old Jesse Wilcox is getting on with his muskrat trapping. I think I’d enjoy another turn up there in the woods.”

“One thing sure,” said Frank, “we must arrange to go away somewhere, and do a little hunting again. Just the thought of it gives me a warm feeling around my heart.”

“Same here,” Bluff told him cheerfully; “I never feel happier than when I smell the woods and get on the trail of game. That glorious spell we had out on Mr. Mabie’s ranch among the Rockies has haunted me ever since.”

They talked it over as they sauntered in the direction of their homes. It happened that Will Milton’s house was the first they came to.

“I saw the postman come out of our gate,” Will commented. “I wonder if he brought Uncle Felix the letter he’s been expecting for some days. You see, he’s got a bad attack of rheumatism; yet he says he must try to get away Down East on some very important business. Between you and me, he never will be able to do it for days or weeks, he’s that doubled up.”

“Run in, if you feel like it, Will,” Frank told him. “We’ll wait out here for you.”

“Yes,” added Jerry, as if it might be an afterthought, “and while you’re about it, Will, just mention to Uncle Felix that there are four husky boys around, with considerable time to burn just now, and if he wants anybody to take that trip for him we might be coaxed into doing it, if he’d stand for expenses.”

At that all of them laughed, as though they considered it a joke. Will left them shying a few snowballs at a tin can Bluff had set on a fence-post.

“If we’re going to get in many affairs like the one we just had with Andy Lasher and his crowd,” the latter remarked, “it stands to reason we want to tune up some in our heaving. My baseball arm is out of practice, and I’m ashamed to say that three out of four balls I fired missed their mark.”

“Oh, well, I noticed a lot of dodging being done,” commented Frank; “and only for that all of us might have made more bull’s-eyes.”

“Chances are that Andy will have a circle around his left eye after that smash he got,” observed Jerry. “A hard snowball can sting like fun when it catches you there.”

“Yes, look at my right cheek, if you want to prove that,” Bluff advised them. “I got caught there, and it keeps on burning like a hot iron. I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a piece of coal or a stone in that ball. They must have fixed up a lot of ammunition that way before they tackled us.”

“Seems to me Will’s a long time coming out again,” complained Jerry. “He’s always so much taken up with that photography of his that any old time he’s liable to remember something and go to work at it, forgetting all about his chums, who may be kicking their heels in the back yard waiting for him.”

“Oh, I don’t think he’s quite that forgetful!” laughed Frank. “You know he said Uncle Felix, who loaned us his houseboat to make that trip down the Mississippi to New Orleans, was expecting some important mail to-day. Perhaps he’s held Will up to tell him about something. You know Uncle Felix thinks heaps of our chum; yes, and of all the rest of us in the bargain.”

“There he comes!” exclaimed Bluff.

“And, say, he seems to be in a terrible hurry,” added Jerry, beginning to show a touch of excitement himself. “Look at him waving his hat over his head? And do you see how he’s grinning from ear to ear? Now what d’ye reckon can have happened?”

“Oh, Uncle Felix, don’t I love you!” muttered Bluff, as if a sudden brilliant idea had come into his mind.

“What’s Uncle Felix got to do with it?” demanded Jerry.

“Hold your horses a minute, and listen to what Will’s going to give us,” was all the other would say; for, to tell the truth, he himself had not been able to more than dimly suspect what was coming.

Will came hurrying up, and when he spoke his words gave them a thrill.

“What d’ye think, fellows,” he exclaimed joyously; “we’re on the highroad to another glorious trip like some of the ones we’ve enjoyed in the past!”

“Is it Uncle Felix?” gasped Jerry.

“Yes,” came the quick response; “he wants all four of us to go up to a logging camp in Maine and do that important business for him!”