Frank was outside, pretending to be at work in the field, and waiting for the Indians to creep on him, and when Jake shouted for Dave to hurry, he looked over his shoulder and saw a white figure, naked like his own, flit round the left-hand corner of the barn. Then he had to stoop over, so that Dave could tomahawk him easily, and he did not see anything more, but Jake yelled from the barn: “Oh, you got that fellow with you, have you? Then he’s got to be settler next time. Come on, now. Oh, do hurry up!”
Frank raised his head to see the other boy, but there was only Dave Black, coming round the right-hand corner of the barn.
“You’re crazy yourself, Jake. There ain’t nobody here but me and Frank.”
“There is, too!” Jake retorted. “Or there was, half a second ago.”
But Dave was busy stealing on Frank, who was bending over, pretending to hoe, and after he had tomahawked Frank, he gave the scalp-halloo, and Jake came running out of the barn, and had to be chased round it twice, so that he could fall breathless on his own threshold, and be scalped in full sight of his family. Then Dave pretended to be a war-party of Wyandots, and he gathered up sticks, and pretended to set the barn on fire. By this time Frank and Jake had come to life, and were Wyandots, too, and they all joined hands and danced in front of the barn.
“There! There he is again!” shouted Jake. “Who’s crazy now, I should like to know?”
“Where? Where?” yelled both the other boys.
“There! Right in the barn door. Or he was, quarter of a second ago,” said Jake, and they all dropped one another’s hands, and rushed into the barn and began to search it.
They could not find anybody, and Dave Black said: “Well, he’s the quickest feller! Must ’a’ got up into the mow, and jumped out of the window, and broke for the woods while we was lookin’ down here. But if I get my hands onto him, oncet!”
They all talked and shouted and quarrelled and laughed at once; but they had to give the other fellow up; he had got away for that time, and they ran out into the rain again to let it wash off the dust and chaff, which they had got all over them in their search. The rain felt so good and cool that they stood still and took it without playing any more, and talked quietly. Dave decided that the fellow who had given them the slip was a new boy whose folks had come into the neighborhood since school had let out in the spring, so that he had not got acquainted yet; but Dave allowed that he would teach him a few tricks as good as his own when he got at him.