"How will now do?" roared Fred Ripley, throwing the shack door open before Greg could drop the bar in place. "So you young smarties managed to free yourselves, did you? And you thought you'd find a way to put a trick over on us? You'll have to take to getting up earlier in the day, if you expect to get the better of any crowd that I'm leading."
Ripley's crew were now all of them in the shack, crowding the little place.
"What is it that you're scheming to do, anyway?" leered Fred, enjoying the looks of dismay on the faces of Dick & Co. "See here, don't you little boys think that it's about time for you all to line up and start a footrace out of these woods?"
"No; we don't," Dick retorted defiantly. "We think it's high time, though, for your crowd to start just such a race."
"Hold your tongue, freshie!" ordered Fred roughly.
"Not for you!" Dick snapped, his temper going up as the mercury climbs on a hot day.
"Then I'll make you!" offered young Ripley, making a spring at Dick.
But Dick & Co. were now all together, standing in a firm fighting line. Fred received punches from the fists belonging to three different school boys, and fell back, red and panting.
"Sail in, everybody!" ordered Fred. "These simpletons haven't sense enough to stand a good joke on themselves."
It was an unmanly thing to do. Some of the boys in Ripley's crowd had no idea of going further than having rather rough "fun." However, the shack, in an instant, was the scene of a lively mix-up. In the midst of the excitement Bert Dodge drove Harry Hazelton against the stovepipe. It came down, showering soot all over Fred's face and down his neck. In the excitement that followed, and during the rush of some of the boys to get out of the flying cloud of soot, the stove itself was overturned. Red embers flew about in every direction. The door being open, the wind helped to set the cabin ablaze.