"It's just a little trap I've set for a fellow I want to catch," replied Ted, thus adjured.
"Well?" said Will, expectantly.
"Well!" continued the joker. "I've set a tub of 'crick' water--with lots of mud in it--right under the seat up there, and fixed the bushes and vines round it so that it hardly shows. I've sawed the seat almost through, from underneath, so that when a fellow sits down on it--and after climbing the hill, you know, he always sits down hard--well, you can see just what's going to happen."
"O, yes," grumbled the elder boy, "I see just what's going to happen. I'll have to fix a new seat there to-morrow; for you can't make a decent job of it. But, look here, I don't think much of that for a trick: There's nothing clever about it, and you may catch the wrong person. I think you'd better go and fix it, before you do something you'll be sorry for."
"Don't you worry your old head!" answered Ted, determinedly. "I'm watching to see who comes along. Do you suppose I'd let Mrs. Burton, or the rector tumble into the tub? What d'you take me for, you old duffer?"
"Well," said Will, good-humoredly, "whom do you expect to catch?"
"Is your head so taken up with scientific musings that you haven't noticed how, lately, Will Hen Baizley has taken to going home this way every afternoon, instead of by the short cut over the back road? I expect he's got a girl down at the corners, or he wouldn't be coming such a long way round. Anyway, when he gets to the top of the hill he always sits down on our seat, and fills up his pipe. I've been looking for a chance at him this long while!"
Will Hen Baizley was the most objectionable "tough" that Frosty Hollow could boast. He was a bad-tempered bully, cruel in his propensities, and delighting to interfere in all the innocent amusements of the village youngsters. He was a loutish tyrant, and Ted had suffered various petty annoyances at his hands for several years. In fact, the boy was looking forward to the day when he might, without presumption, undertake to give the bully a thrashing and deliver the neighbourhood from his thraldom. As Will Hen, however, was about twenty years of age, large, and not unskillful with his fists, Ted saw some years of waiting yet ahead of him. Such suspense he could not endure. He preferred to begin now, and trust to fate--and his brother Will--to pull him through.
Will raked the hay thoughtfully for a few minutes without replying. He was a clear-headed youth, and he speedily caught the drift of Ted's ideas.
"It'll be good enough for him," said Will, at length, "but you've got a good deal of gall, it seems to me, young one! Why, Will Hen'll pound you for it, sure. He'll know it's your doing."