"He did, did he?" asked Bob. "What was he sore about?"
"Oh, he's had a grouch ever since the day of the fire," replied Jimmy. "You remember that when he spoke of the work he'd been doing to help put out the fire, I spoke up and said that he hadn't done a thing. He's had it in for me ever since. He bumped against me on purpose to-night just as I was coming in the gate, and when I called him down for it he said he was going to lay for me and change my face."
"The big bully!" exclaimed Bob. "Just wait here a minute while I go into the next room."
The adjoining room was dark and commanded a view of the street in front, while Bob himself could look out of the window without being seen. Some large shade trees were on the other side of the street, and as Bob's eyes became accustomed to the darkness, he could dimly descry three forms lurking in the shadows. One of them he felt sure was Buck, and he felt reasonably certain that the others were Carl Lutz and Terrence Mooney, Buck's boon companions.
"I guess Buck and his gang are hanging around all right," he announced, as he returned to the other room and reported his discovery. "But he's going to get a little surprise party. I tell you what we'll do. You go out of the front door alone, Jimmy. Joe and I will stand there in the light from the hall lamp and say good-night. Then we'll close the door, and you stand on the stoop a minute, buttoning your coat, and then go slowly down the walk. That will give Joe and me a chance to slip around through the back in the darkness and get behind the bushes near the gate. Leave the rest to us."
"And what we'll do will be a plenty," added Joe.
Jimmy thought well of this plan, and agreed to do his part.
They followed out this program to the letter. As Jimmy came down the walk, the lurking figures across the street came out from the shadow of the trees and over toward him.
"I've got you now, Jimmy Plummer," snarled the voice of Buck Looker. "I told you I was going to take some of the freshness out of you, and now I'm going to tan your hide."
"Does it take three of you to do it?" asked Jimmy.