“The most provoking part of the whole business was this,” said Dick Langdon. “After Bob and I became satisfied that the masked parties, whoever they were, had come there for no good purpose, we opened fire on them and drove them away. And what did the old miser do to repay us for the assistance we rendered him?”
“Did he ask you in to breakfast?” inquired George, who knew very well that he had done nothing of the kind.
“Not much!” was Dick’s reply. “If he had, we wouldn’t be as hungry as we are now. We went to sleep on the hay, after we had frightened the robbers away from the house, and the first thing we heard this morning was a war-whoop, and the first thing we saw, after we had got our eyes open, was old Stebbins, who was standing in the barn door, with a shotgun in his hands.”
“It was pointed straight at my head, too,” said Bob; “and I really thought, by the way the old fellow talked and acted, that he was going to turn loose on me. I believe he would, too, if it hadn’t been for Dick, who—You don’t understand it, do you?” he added, seeing that George was greatly surprised and bewildered. “Sit down here, and I will begin at the beginning, and tell you all about it. Breakfast can wait.”
Bob settled back into an easy position on the bench, while George seated himself by his side, and listened with much interest to the story of his friends’ adventure, which was related substantially as follows:
When Dick and Bob returned to the village, with the fine string of bass they had caught on the preceding Saturday, they quickly found themselves surrounded by a crowd of their schoolmates, who asked a thousand and one questions regarding their experience in the woods, and demanded the privilege of accompanying them on their next excursion.
There were some in the crowd whom the lucky fishermen would not have taken out to the lake with them under any consideration whatever—mean, overbearing fellows, who always wanted their own way in everything, and who would not have seen any pleasure in the trip themselves, or allowed their companions to see any.
Others there were, whose presence would have added to everybody’s enjoyment; but George’s quarters were small, and, as he had not told them to bring any of their friends with them when they came again, the boys did not feel authorized to issue any invitations. They gave away the most of their bass, the principal, of course, coming in for the lion’s share.
It is probable that the good man enjoyed his Sunday morning breakfast, or else Dick and Bob behaved themselves better and gained a greater number of credit marks than the rest of the students, for they were the only ones among a dozen or more applicants who received permission to spend the next Saturday at the lake.
They packed their baskets on Friday morning, gave their guns and fishing-rods a good rubbing up, and at a quarter-past four in the afternoon they were on their way to the woods; but they got lost before they were fairly out of sight of the village.