The Rover Boys Megapack

by Edward Stratemeyer

  “What do you cadets mean by coming in here and annoying my daughter?” demanded the storekeeper hotly. “If you can’t behave yourselves, you had better keep away.”

  “We didn’t hurt your daughter,” said Sam.

  “My brother here did what he could to save her from annoyance,” said Tom.

  “Oh, I know you cadets! You are all tarred with the same brush!” muttered the storekeeper. “I want you to get out—and stay out!”

  “Yes, but—” began Dick.

  “No ‘buts’ about it, young man. I want you to get out.”

  “Father, he made the other boy let go of my curls,” explained the girl. “He caught the other boy by the ear.”

  “That may be, Fanny, but these young bloods are all alike. I don’t want their trade. They must clear out, and stay away.”

  “Come on, fellows,” said Dick. “We’ll not stay if we are not wanted.” He turned again to the storekeeper. “But I want you to remember one thing: We had nothing to do with annoying your daughter.”

  “Did they pay for the soda?” asked the man suddenly.

  “No,” replied the girl.

  “Then this crowd has got to pay,” went on the storekeeper, unreasonably. “How much was it?”

  “Ten cents.”

  “We haven’t bought anything and we’ll not pay for anything,” said Sam.

  “Not a cent shall I pay,” put in Songbird.

  “Did vos a outrages!” burst out Hans. “Of you insult us some more I vos call a bolicemans alretty!” And he puffed up his chest indignantly.

  “Well, you get out, and be quick about it!” cried the man, and raised his stick. “Don’t let me catch any of you in here again either!”

  “Don’t worry,—we can spend our money elsewhere,” said Tom.

  “Where we are treated decently,” added Dick, and walked from the candy store.

  Once outside, the boys talked the situation over for all of ten minutes, but without satisfaction. All were indignant over the way the storekeeper had treated them, and Tom wanted to go back on the sly and play a trick on him, but Dick demurred.

  “Let it go, Tom. He is a mean man, that’s all.”

  “Well, I am going to show folks how generous he is,” answered Tom, with a sudden grin. “Wait here a few minutes,” and he darted into a nearby store where they sold stationery. When he came out he had a good-sized sheet of paper in his hand and also several big red seals.

  “What’s that?” asked Sam.

  “It’s a sign for the candy storekeeper’s front window.”

  With caution Tom went back to the store. He saw that the proprietor was in the rear parlor, dishing out ice-cream to several customers who had come in. The girl was also at the back. Swiftly Tom stuck the sheet of paper up under the show window, fastening it with the gummy seals. The paper read as follows:

  FREE BOUQUETS OF ROSES TO ALL YOUNG LADIES BUYING ICE-CREAM HERE TODAY. COME IN!

  “Now let us watch for some fun,” said Tom.

  They had not long to wait. The steamboat had come in and a number of passengers were walking up the street. Soon a party of three girls and a young man espied the sign.

  “Oh, Clara,” cried one of the girls. “Free roses this time of year, just think of it!”

  “Come on right in,” said the young man, and led the way into the store. Then another young man came along with a girl and they also read the sign and entered. Soon two old maids stopped and read the announcement.

  “I do love ice-cream, Angelina,” said one. “Let us go in and get chocolate and get the bouquets, too.” And they followed the crowd inside.

  The store had two side windows to it, which were opened a few inches from the bottom for ventilation, and the cadets stole up to these windows to listen to the talk. Everybody ordered cream and began to eat, and then asked for the bouquets.

  “Bouquets?” asked the storekeeper, mystified.

  “Why, yes,” said the young man who had brought in the three girls.

  “If you don’t mind, I’d like Jack roses,” said one of the maidens.

  “And I like American Beauties,” said another.

  “I don’t care what kind I get so long as it is a big bunch,” added the third girl.

  “What are you talking about?” demanded the storekeeper.

  “We are talking about the bouquets you are giving away,” said the young man. He had eaten nearly all of his cream and the girls had almost finished.

  “I am giving away no bouquets.”

  “Why, yes you are!” cried the girls.

  “Of course!” put in one of the old maids, suspiciously. “And I want just as good a bunch of roses as anybody.”

  “So do I,” added the second old maid.

  “Are you folks all crazy?” demanded the storekeeper. “I am not giving away anything.”

  “What!” demanded the young man who had come in with one girl. “Your sign don’t read that way. It says ‘free bouquets of roses to all young ladies buying ice-cream here today.’ You’ve got to give this young lady her bouquet or I won’t pay for this cream!”

  “Where is that sign?” demanded the storekeeper, and when told rushed out and tore the announcement down and into shreds. “This is a—an outrage! I didn’t put the sign up!”

  After this there was a wordy war lasting several minutes. Nobody wanted to pay for the cream eaten, and as he could not furnish the bouquets the storekeeper could not collect. In a rage he chased the would-be customers out and then started to look for the person who had played him such a trick. But the cadets of Putnam Hall had withdrawn from that vicinity and they took good care to keep out of sight.

  CHAPTER XV

  AN ASTONISHING GIFT

  The steamboat had to take on considerable freight at Cedarville, so she remained at the little dock for the best part of half an hour. During that time the Rovers and their friends saw Tad Sobber and Nick Pell walking around the village, but did not speak to them.

  “Hullo, here is something new,” said Songbird, as they walked past the stores. “A dime museum!”

  “Such a thing as that will never pay here,” was Dick’s comment. “Not enough people.”

  “It is to remain only one week,” said Sam, after reading the sign over the door.

  “Wonder if they really have one hundred snakes in the collection?” mused Tom, also reading the sign. “If so, there would be some fun if the bunch broke loose.”

  “Want to go in and look at the snakes?” asked Songbird.

  “I ton’t,” answered Hans. “Of I look at so many of dem nasty dings I couldn’t sleep for a month or sefen days, ain’t it!” And he shuddered.

  While the boys were walking away they chanced to look back and saw Tad Sobber and Nick Pell come from the “museum,” so called. The bully was talking to a man connected with the show, a fellow who usually stood outside, “barking” as it is called,—that is, asking folks to come up and walk in and see the wonders inside.

  “Sobber must know that fellow,” was Dick’s comment, but thought no more of this until long afterwards. A little later they saw the bully embark on the steamboat, and Nick Pell started back for Putnam Hall alone.

  The boys purchased the things they wanted and returned to the school. They did not see Nick Pell until the following day, and then the latter paid no attention to them. Sobber did not return to Putnam Hall for the best part of a week. Then he appeared very thoughtful and he eyed all of the Rover boys in a crafty, speculative way.

  “He has got it in for us,” said Tom, but how much Tad Sobber “had it in” for the Rovers was still to be learned.

  The boys had not forgotten about the proposed feast, and it was arranged that it should come off in the dormitory occupied by the Rovers and some others on the following Tuesday night as soon as all the lights were o
ut. Word was passed around quietly, and the Rover boys thought that only their intimate friends knew of what was going on, but they were mistaken.

  By pure accident Nick Pell overheard Larry Colby and Fred Garrison speaking of the feast. It had been arranged that Larry and Fred should contribute a big raisin cake and the two boys were wondering how they could get it from the bake shop in Cedarville and up to the dormitory without being seen.

  “Never mind, we’ll manage it somehow, if we have to use a rope,” said Larry.

  “They are going to have a spread,” said Nick Pell, running up to Tad Sobber with the story. “We ought to tell Captain Putnam and spoil things for them.”

  “That won’t do us any good, Nick,” answered the bully. “The captain thinks too much of the Rovers—he wouldn’t punish them much, especially as this is their last term here. I’ll think up something else. I want to do something to ’em that they will remember as long as they live.”

  “You seem to be extra bitter against the Rovers since you got back from Ithaca,” said Pell, curiously.

  “Am I? Well, I have good cause to be bitter,” growled Tad Sobber. “Just let me put on my thinking cap, and I’ll fix ’em, and don’t you forget it!”

  That night the bully asked for permission to go to Cedarville on important business. He went alone, and once in the town hurried directly to the museum already mentioned. The proprietor had done little or no business in the village and was about to move to another place.

  When Tad Sobber returned to Putnam Hall he carried under his arm a heavy pasteboard box which he carried with great care. This box he hid away in a corner of the barn, among some loose hay.

  “I’m ready to fix the Rovers now,” he told Nick Pell. “Keep your mouth shut but your eyes wide open.”

  “What are you going to do?”

  “Just wait and see.”

  At the appointed time the Rovers and their chums assembled in the dormitory for the feast. A large quantity of good things had been procured, including chicken sandwiches, cake, oranges and lemonade. Tom had even had a dealer in Cedarville pack him up several bricks of ice-cream, and these now rested in some cracked ice in a washbowl.

  “Say, but this is a touch of old times,” said Sam. “Do you remember the first feast we had here, when Mumps got scared to death?”

  “Indeed I do!” cried one of the other students. “Here’s to the good old times!” and he raised his glass of lemonade to his lips.

  In a short while the feast was in full swing. There was a hall monitor supposed to be on guard, but Tom had bought him off with a slice of cake, some candy and an orange, and he was keeping himself in a front hallway, where he could not hear what was going on.

  “If it wasn’t for the noise, we might have a song,” said Sam. “As it is, I move Songbird recite ‘Mary Had a Little Cow,’ or something equally elevating.”

  “I can give you an original bit of verse which I have entitled, ‘When the Blossoms Fill the Orchard, Molly Dear,’” answered the doggerel maker.

  “Gracious, that sounds like a new nine-cent piece of sheet music,” murmured Dick.

  “Can’t you whistle it?” suggested Tom. “It may sound better.”

  “Play it out on a fine-tooth comb,” suggested Larry.

  “Who is ready for ice-cream?” asked Tom, after a general laugh had ensued. “This isn’t going to keep hard forever.”

  All were ready, and the bricks were cut, the pieces laid on tiny wooden plates which had been provided, and passed around. Then came more cake and fruit.

  In the midst of the jollification there came a sudden and unexpected knock on the door.

  “Who can that be?” whispered several in alarm.

  “Put out the lights!” said Tom. “Those who don’t belong here get under the beds.” And he began to get the evidences of the feast out of sight, Dick and Sam assisting him.

  With quaking hearts the merry-makers waited for the knock to be repeated, and waited to hear the sound of Captain Putnam’s voice or that of the first assistant teacher.

  “Bartlett might have warned us,” whispered Fred. Bartlett was the monitor who had been bribed.

  No other knock came on the door, nor did anybody demand admittance. The boys waited for several seconds, each holding his breath in anxiety.

  “Who can it be?” asked Sam of his oldest brother.

  “I suppose I might as well go and see,” said Dick. “Maybe some of the other fellows are up to some tricks.”

  With caution he approached the hall door and opened it. Only a dim light was burning, and for the instant he could see nothing. Then he caught sight of a white object on the floor and picked it up. It was a pasteboard box, tied with a strong string.

  “This must be some kind of a joke,” he said, and came back into the dormitory with the box in his hands. “Light up and let me see what this is.”

  The lights were lit and several of the boys began to eat the stuff that had been swept out of sight. They all gazed curiously at the pasteboard box.

  “Here’s a card on the top,” said Dick, and commenced to read it. The inscription was as follows:

  To the Rover Boys From Their Friends, Dora, Grace and Nellie.

  Keep it a secret among you and your chums at the feast.

  “How in the world did they know we were going to have a feast?” questioned Sam.

  “And how did they manage to smuggle the box into the Hall?” asked Larry.

  “Open it and see what’s inside, Dick,” came from Tom. “I’ll wager they have sent us something good.”

  “Maybe it’s a loaf cake,” said Fred.

  “Oder a pudding,” broke in Hans. “I lof chocolate puddings, yah!”

  “You can’t pack a pudding in a box very well,” commented Songbird.

  Holding the box in one hand, Dick undid the string and threw off the cover.

  The next instant he let out a yell of horror and Tom, who was near by, did likewise and fell over a chair in his fright.

  For out of the box glided a real, live snake, fully three feet long, and with beady and dangerous looking eyes!

  CHAPTER XVI

  THE HUNT FOR A SNAKE

  “It’s a snake!”

  “And it’s alive!”

  “Look out, or he’ll bite you!”

  “There he goes on the floor!”

  These and a number of other cries rang through the dormitory as the cadets saw the contents of the box. Several tried to back away, and Hans pitched over Tom and both went in a heap.

  “Ton’t you let dot snake bite me!” roared the German youth.

  “Maybe he’s poisonous!” came from Larry. He had sought safety by leaping on a bed.

  Slowly the snake had lifted itself from the box, to glare at several of the boys. Then its cold, beady eyes were fixed on Dick and it uttered a vicious hiss. This was more than the eldest Rover could stand and he let box and snake drop in a hurry. The snake glided out of sight under a bed.

  “This is a joke right enough,” murmured Sam. “Wonder who played it?”

  “Do you think the girls would send a snake?” queried Larry.

  “Of course not,” answered Tom, who had scrambled up. “This is the work of some enemy.”

  “Look out! The snake is getting busy!” screamed Sam, and he was right; the reptile had left the shelter of the bed and was darting across the room, in the direction of Songbird.

  The would-be poet did not stop to argue with his snakeship, but letting out a wild yell leaped to the top of a small stand which stood in a corner. The stand was frail and down it went with a crash, the wreckage catching the snake on the tail. It whipped around and made a lunge at Songbird’s foot, but the youth was too nimble and leaped on the bed.

  “We’ve got to kill that snake,” observed Dick, after the reptile had disappeared
for a moment under a washstand. “If we don’t—”

  Crash! It was a plate which Sam shied at the snake, as its head showed for a moment. Then down went a shower of shoes, brushes, plates, and a cake of soap. But the snake was not seriously hurt. It hissed viciously and darted from one side of the dormitory to the other, and made all the boys climb up on the furniture.

  “This racket will wake up everybody in the school,” said Dick, and he was right. The boys had hardly time to get the most of the evidence of the feast out of the way when they heard a knock on the door.

  “Look out there!” yelled Tom. “Don’t open that door if you value your life!”

  “What’s the matter?” came in George Strong’s voice.

  “A snake!” answered Dick, and then went on in a whisper: “Quick, boys, get the rest of the stuff out of the way!”

  His chums understood, and the remains of the feast were swept under bed covers in a jiffy.

  “Did you say there was a snake in there?” demanded the teacher.

  “Yes, sir,” said Sam. “He’s right close to the door now.” And what he said was true.

  Thinking the youngest Rover might be fooling, the first assistant teacher opened the door cautiously and peered into the dormitory. Then he, too, let out a cry of alarm, for the snake darted forward and made as if to bite him in the foot. Not to be caught he fell back, leaving the door open about a foot. Through this opening the snake glided and disappeared in the semi-dark hallway.

  By this time Putnam Hall was in an uproar, and boys were pouring into the hallways demanding to know if there was a fire or a robbery. Soon Captain Putnam appeared, wrapped in a dressing robe and wearing slippers.

  “Beware, all of you!” cried George Strong. “It’s a snake and it is loose in this hallway somewhere.”

  “A snake!” ejaculated the master of Putnam Hall. “Where did it come from?”

  “It was in the dormitory over there. I heard a noise and went to see what was the matter and the snake came out of the room and made off in that direction,” and George Strong pointed with his hand.

  “Humph!” muttered Captain Putnam. “This must be looked into. What kind of a snake was it?”