"Well, I never!"
It was Dick Rover who uttered the remark, as he leaped from the chair in which he had been sitting, newspaper in hand.
"Never what, Dick?" drawled Tom lazily, looking up from a kite he was mending.
"Never saw anything to equal those Baxters. What do you think?
Arnold Baxter has escaped from prison."
"What!" ejaculated Tom, and on the instant the kite was forgotten, and Tom smashed it directly through the middle with his foot as he came to his brother's side.
"Yes, he has escaped, and in the slickest manner I ever heard of.
I tell you, Tom, he is a prize criminal, if ever there was one."
"But how did he get out?"
"How? Why, just shook hands with his jailers, thanked them for their kindness, and then left."
"Oh, pshaw, Dick, is this a joke? Because if it is, I want to remind you that we had the first of April last week."
"It's no joke, although Baxter ought to have played his trick on the first, true enough."