Chapter V: Preface (3)

However, Stephen searched his pockets carefully, and lighted on a new and strong fish-line, with a fish-hook affixed. The fish-line was not long enough to reach down to Pat; but by noosing the end to one of the handspikes that difficulty was removed. There was now direct communication between the two boys. Pat was rather fidgety when he saw the fish-hook dangling under his nose, but he caught it fast to the rope, which Stephen carefully and fearfully drew up.

If that fish line had parted, those boys and the writer would have been placed in a sorry plight.

The rope was no sooner made fast than Pat scrambled up it, caught up his shabby coat, and exercised his limbs of locomotion so nimbly that he was nearly out of sight before Steve could recover from his amazement. This was a whimsical way of manifesting gratitude!

“How he scampers!” Steve muttered. “What a pack of little wretches, and what a mean man Jackson is! I wanted to slide down into the well myself; and those boys know I agreed to let Pat do it on purpose to please him. Well, I’ve done with ragamuffins!--I say,” he bellowed to the nimble runaway, “you needn’t run so fast; _I_ don’t want you: you’re no good, anyway.”

Pat knew that Stephen longed for his help; he knew that a boy, when left in the lurch, speaks somewhat as Stephen had spoken, and yet Pat hurried on.

Poor Pat! he was not aware that his unique and valued button ring, the fruit of several hours’ toil with boiling water, a broken-bladed knife, and a spoilt file, had been fractured in the well. Unconscious of his loss, he clapped his hands over his mouth, and bleated playfully and hideously.

Stephen now racked his brains to hit upon some feasible plan of taking the donkey out of the well. Suddenly a happy thought struck him. His eyes sparkled with joy. “My stars!” he exclaimed, “I see the very way to do it! I can manage it after all.”

Then he mused on Jackson’s behavior, and another thought occurred to him. “I suppose he believed I couldn’t get either of ’em out of the well. Yes, of course he did; and he thought I should have to go to the village for help. And then I wonder if he’d have set the magistrate and folks after me! Ten to one. Well, I can beat ’em all, and keep out of trouble, too.”

Yes, that was the point. If he had been necessitated to seek help, he would have been taught a wholesome lesson; but when his own precocity suggested a way out of the difficulty, he was only hardened in his mischievousness, and he admired his great cleverness.

Without further deliberation the deserted and frustrated avenger slid down the rope, took the halter and a few straps off the donkey, coiled them around his own neck, and then clambered up.

This was a foolhardy thing for him to do; for if the fastenings of the rope had given way, he and the donkey world have been left to their own resources. But the generality of boys delight in doing such things. With a careless “I’ll risk it,” they rush headlong into danger, day after day.

Then Steve set about carrying his plans into effect. He sidled up to the other donkey and chased it over the pasturage till the moon rose. This was weary work for him, but at length he caught the donkey, slipped the halter over its head, and led--or rather coaxed--it up to the well.

“Well, old fellow,” he said, addressing his first captive, “I didn’t make any preparations to haul you out, but so much the better. Now, keep your mouth shut, and don’t be afraid, and you’ll be kicking around this field before no time. Now, heave away, boys! Ho! Heave ’er!”

He then pitched on the two lightest planks, exerted all his remaining strength, and placed them so as to form a floor or platform, extending from the transverse bars of his engine to the curb of the well. Thus half the well’s mouth was covered.

Next, the donkey last caught was hitched to the rope, and by dint of entreaty, induced to draw its yoke-fellow out of the gloomy prison.

“Saved!” cried Stephen, in tragic accents, as he turned both donkeys loose. “Saved! And I have saved you!”

And then he fell to turning summersets, chuckling, and disporting himself like a noodle. “_Oh! this is fun!_” he said.

A heavy fall brought the boy to his senses; and without more ado he gathered up his belongings and began to whistle “Yankee Doodle,” as only a boy whose conscience is tranquillized can whistle it.

The would-be avenger had expended so much of his strength that he was not in a condition to attempt to replace the rest of the planks, or to carry home his beloved pulley.

“Mr. Jackson may arrange those planks himself,” he muttered. “As for the pulley--well,” with a last fond backward glance, “I suppose he’ll knock it up into kindling-wood.”

It was late when Stephen reached home that night. Notwithstanding his proneness to be mischievous and to play monkey tricks, he was free from deceit and he was not deficient in moral courage. As soon as he and his mother were alone, he made a clean breast of it, then walked off to bed, with tears in his eyes, but loving his mother better than ever.

Although Mr. Jackson, while returning through the field that night, should have precipitated himself into the half-open well, there to perish miserably, yet he did not. The writer does not thirst for the blood of his villains; but--lest he should be accounted utterly devoid of common sense--the following statement is offered, by way of consolation, for the punctilious readers perusal:--

Whilst replacing the planks, which were permeated with humidity, he contracted a catarrhal cold, which did not yield to the apothecary’s patent medicines till the next spring.

When Mr. Lawrence heard the particulars of Stephen’s prank, and the “motive,” he laughed heartily.

Of course the peace-officers did not gain or lose by the affair; and Steve observed oracularly, “I knew he was only fooling. He didn’t scare me a bit!”

It is not necessary to waste time in tracing Jackson’s career further--in fact, as he never annoyed our heroes again, he may as well be formally thrown overboard now.

It was hoped that this experience would have a wholesome and lasting effect on Stephen. Alas, no! Stephen Goodfellow was one of the many irrepressible incorrigibles that flourish in this country.

_Chapter VII._

THE YOUNG MORALIST.--A CLEVER SCHEME.

As the school was now closed for “summer holidays,” the boys were free to do whatever they pleased.

One bright forenoon the heroic six, full of merry jokes, set out on a stroll to the woods. Charles and Will led the way, and _why_ they made for the woods will be seen further on.

“Now, boys,” said Charley, “wouldn’t it be fun if we should have a real adventure to-day? something romantic; something worth while--eh, Marmaduke?”

Marmaduke’s eyes flashed like a persecuted hero’s whose case appears hopeless. However, he did nothing desperate, he simply said, “Boys, some day or another we shall light on something romantic--something awful! I’ve always felt it. Then we will pry into the mystery until we unravel it.”

Will, Charles, and Stephen, furtively exchanged glances. If their designs should succeed, Marmaduke would have a mystery to pry into sooner than he bargained for.

Just as they entered the woods they heard voices; and on looking about they caught sight of three little boys sitting astride of a decayed log. One seemed to have a paper of raisins, from which he was helping himself and the other two.

“Hush!” Charley whispered. “They haven’t seen us yet; so hide behind the bushes, and I’ll play a pretty trick on them.”

Without the least hesitation, without looking to see whether they were sitting on grass or thorns, they crouched down. Charley “knew himself,” and the boys obeyed him promptly.

Seeing that they were all concealed, he advanced boldly towards the three small boys.

“Hollo, Tim!” he exclaimed. “What have you got there?”

“Raisins,” Tim answered laconically.

“Where did you get them?” was the next question.

“Maw sent me fur ’em.”

“Oh, I thought so. Now I can go to work,” Charley muttered, in a theatrical “aside.”

“What do you want of me, and what are you a-saying to yourself?” demanded Tim, becoming questioner in his turn.

“I’ll give you a whistle for one of them, Tim,” Charley said, so eagerly that the boys in hiding wondered. Why should such a boy as Charley wish to purchase a single raisin? Was _this_ a mystery? It seemed so mysterious that they pricked up their ears, and impatiently waited for further developments.

Tim’s thoughts are unknown. He replied indifferently, “Well, if your whistle’s a good one, I guess I don’t mind; but I’ve give these here boys so many raisins that Maw’ll think that there new store-keeper cheats worse’n the old ones. Let’s see yer whistle, anyway.”

Charles turned his back to Tim, and searched his pockets for the whistle, a scrap of paper, and a forlorn lead pencil that had once done duty as the bullet of a popgun. Having found these articles, he scrawled a few words on the scrap of paper.

“Can’t you find the whistle?” Tim inquired unsuspectingly.

“I’m coming,” was the answer.

Then the gaping ambushed five saw him slip the battered pencil into his pocket, take the paper in one hand and the whistle in the other, and step briskly up to Tim.

Tim reached out the bag, and Charley ran his hand which secreted the paper far into it. Then he drew out his hand--empty.

“No, Tim,” he said, “I think you have given away enough already. But here’s the whistle, all the same. Now, run home, like a good boy.”

Young Tim tried his whistle somewhat doubtfully, for he was at a loss to know why it should be given to him for nothing. Big boys did not make a practice of throwing away good whistles on him, unless they looked for some return. Generosity so lavish astounded him.

But the first toot assured him of the soundness of the gift; a smile of pleasure flitted over his grimy face; and he exclaimed joyously, “Man! It’s bully, ain’t it?”

“Oh, it’s a good one,” Charley averred.

“I--I was afraid p’r’aps it was busted,” Tim acknowledged.

Then young Tim rose to his feet and wended his way homeward, piping melodiously on his whistle, unconscious of the bomb-shell hidden in the bag; while hard behind him, licking their daubed lips as they went, trotted the two parasitical boys who had been junketing on his mother’s raisins.

Charley, grinning and chuckling, hurried back to his comrades.

“I hope I’ve taught that thieving little sneak-thief a lesson he will remember,” he said, with a smile intended to be exceedingly moral.

“Why, what did you do? What on earth’s the matter? Tell us all about it,” cried a chorus of voices; “we could see something was up, but we didn’t know what.”

“Well, boys,” Charles began, “I have often caught that rascal feeding little boys, and big ones, too, from parcels of raisins, sugar, and other things; and I thought I would make him smart for it some day. So to-day, when I saw him at it again, I thought of writing something on a scrap of paper, and getting a chance to slip it into his bag. You saw me do that, perhaps. What I wrote was, ‘O, mother! please to forgive me! I stole your raisins and things, but I won’t do it no more.’ When his mother empties out the raisins, she will find that, and it will be enough for her. Then she’ll put two and two together, and then, most likely, she’ll put Tim and his skate-straps together. That is all, boys.”

“Good for you, Buffoon!” exclaimed Stephen, to whom this knavish trick was highly amusing. “Mr. Tim will ‘pay dear for his whistle’ this time--unless your confession should slip out of the bag!”

“No, I put it down nearly to the bottom,” Charley replied. “He won’t be likely to open his bag again, either, for he has eaten and given away about half of the raisins.”

“I say, boys,” said Stephen, “isn’t that what they call _philanthropy_?”

“What?” Charles asked eagerly.

“Teaching a boy that it’s wicked to steal.”

“No; it’s the vice of perfidy!” George replied, so promptly that a keen observer would have said, “This boy is impelled by envy; he wishes he had been guilty of the same vice.”

But George was in the right; Charley’s trick was inhumanly treacherous.

“Did you intend to take one of his raisins?” Jim faltered, a wolfish look in his eyes.

Charles’ lips curled with disdain; his nostrils dilated; virtuous indignation strove for utterance. But he knew that he could not look so injured that the boy would hang his head in shame; so he resolved to annihilate him by a single word. To gain time to hit on an expression sufficiently awful, he demanded threateningly:

“What do you mean, Sir?”

Jim’s nerves were always weak, and this jeering question so unstrung them that he spoke the first words that occurred to him. (By the way, the phrase was a favorite one of his, one that he used on all occasions; and according to the tone in which he said it, it implied either doubt, indifference, petulance, fear, or _profanity_!)

“I don’t know, I’m sure,” is what he said.

“You hadn’t better!” Stephen thundered with lowering brow.

The reason why Steve espoused Charley’s cause so readily was because the boys still teased him about the donkey; and he rejoiced to find that another--that other his schoolfellow Charles--could be guilty of the misdemeanor of playing tricks. Truly, the abusive adage, “Misery loves company,” is right.

“It is bad enough for the store-keeper to handle the poor woman’s raisins; and Charley’s fingers don’t look so clean as a store-keeper’s, even;” George observed tauntingly.

“I guess Charley’s fingers are cleaner than Tim’s” retorted Stephen, always eager to play the part of champion to some aggrieved wight, especially so now.

But Charles perceived that his joke was not appreciated as it should have been; and he turned beseechingly to Will, his firm upholder in all things. “Will,” he said, “what do _you_ think about it? Did I do wrong?”

Thus appealed to, Will made answer: “Capital joke, Charley; but you have begun your career as a reformer rather early in life.”

This did not satisfy Charley, and he took to his last expedient.

When a renowned general becomes entangled in a snare which he himself has spread; when he is caricatured and lampooned in all the newspapers, and without a friend in all the world, he makes an impassioned and well-punctuated declamation in his defence, in which he sums up the difficulties that lay in his way so eloquently; sets forth the rightfulness of his cause so manfully; represents the disinterestedness of his actions so carefully; discourses on the purity of his designs so volubly; harrows up the feelings of the audience, and the disguised editors so subtly; exposes the fallacies under which his defamers labor so jocosely; and reiterates his asservations so persistingly, that all except the most malevolent and perverse are brought to coincide with his views.

Charles was now “on his defence.”

“‘The end justifies the means,’ you know. Now,--”

“That’s what the Jesuits profess, and they are--” George interrupted. But, not knowing exactly what the Jesuits are, he stopped short, and Charley went on without further interruption.

“Now, that Tim was a rascal, but this will reclaim him. He has been cheating his mother on a small scale for more than a year. She has sent him to all the different stores for her groceries, but with the same results. He is the only one she has to send, and he has a chance to steal at his leisure. Now, if I had informed her that her son does the cheating, what would have become of me? Ten to one, she would have called me a sneaking talebearer, and told me to march off home and get my father to belabor me. As it is, _Tim_ will probably get the drubbing. There now, wasn’t my ‘confession’ plan just the thing? Of course it was. You boys must be blind, or crazy, or silly.”

No oratory here, gentle reader. But the speaker was only a boy; if he had been older and more experienced, he would not have omitted to remark, incidentally, that he had acted “on the impulse of the moment.”

However, his reasoning, especially the latter part of it, was conclusive. “Quite right;” said all the boys. Then, as time is _very_ precious to a schoolboy during the holidays, Stephen added, “Now let us go on; we’ve fooled away too much time doing nothing.”

Will and Charles taking the lead, the explorers advanced deeper into the woods; and taking an obscure pathway, soon found themselves in a quarter scarcely known to some of the boys. Heaps of brush-wood blocked up the way, making their progress very slow. But this only exhilarated their adventurous spirit; and they tore through the brush with smiling contempt for sundry bruises and scratches.

All except George, whose mind was still exercised about Charley’s “vice,” and who took no interest in squeezing through underwood, and stumbling over heaps of loose and rough brush-wood.

“Look here, boys,” he said, “why should we overstrain our limbs and muscles here, when a little way to the north there is a capital spot to rest? We can learn nothing here, and by floundering about like top-heavy goblins we shall improve neither our minds, nor our morals, nor our garments. At any rate, _I_ am going back; _I_ am not going to make an Amazon of myself.”

Sooner or later, the most inattentive of readers will be struck with admiration at the artifice which Charles displays in working on the feelings of his comrades.

In this instance, though George had actually turned back, he paused irresolute on hearing Charles exclaim sarcastically, “George, I’m afraid you will never become an explorer. Why, if you only knew it, we are penetrating a jungle now! Think of that! _We_ in a jungle!”

Though coaxing would not have influenced the sage, this happy expression did. He cast a sweeping glance in search of Charley’s “jungle,” and then went on with the others.

Charles was satisfied, for he knew that however much the boy might grumble, he would not turn back again.

A certain word George had spoken, excited Steve’s curiosity. False pride never restrained Stephen from asking for information, and he said eagerly, “George, what’s a namazon?”

George’s smiling face discovered that the right cord had been struck at last, and, always willing to enlighten the ignorant, he answered benignly, “Steve, an Amazon is a West African woman warrior, who fights instead of men. And she fights with a vengeance--harder than a sea-serpent that I read about the other day. Why, she wears a sword called a razor, and it’s so strong and heavy that she can chop off an elephant’s head at one blow with it!--At least” truth obliged him to add, “I guess she could, if she chose. And she will scale a rampart of briers and thorns,--no, _brambles_ the book said,--of brambles, all in her bare feet, and come back all covered with blood and chunks of bramble, but with her arms full of skulls!”

Steve’s look of horror only encouraged George to make greater exertions. But he was forced to pause for want of breath, and his hearer inquired in alarm, “Where do they get the skulls? Do they kill folks for them?”

Now, it was very inconsiderate, very disrespectful, very _wrong_ in Stephen to put such a question. George was wholly unprepared for it; and it rather befogged his loquacity. After a doubtful pause, he began blunderingly: “Why, as I told you, they scale a rampart of bri--_brambles_,--sixty feet high, sometimes--and come off with those skulls. I--I believe they are put there beforehand; and the feat is to pounce on them.--I mean, the feat is to scramble over the brambles barefooted. It is a valiant achievement!”

Then a bright idea occurred to him, and he continued impetuously, “Why, Steve, you must be crazy, crazy as an organ-grinder! You don’t know what a skull is; you don’t know a skull from a dead-head. Why, I’m astonished at you!”

“Oh, of course. I see what you mean now; yes, of course they do;” Stephen assented with alacrity.

“I might lend you my book about all these things,” George graciously observed.

“Oh, thank you!” said Stephen with sparkling eyes.

Meanwhile, the heroes had been pressing deeper and deeper into the “jungle,” and would soon be at their journey’s end. But at this critical juncture the sage’s evil genius again preyed upon his spirits, and he muttered with filial concern: “A boy’s first duty ought to be to take care of his clothes, and--”

“But it never is!” Steve broke in.

“--and here we are destroying ours!” the sage continued, disregarding Steve’s impertinent interruption.

“Never mind the ‘garments,’ George,” Charles replied. “Your old coat looks as if it might survive the frolics of a hurricane; so, ‘banish care and grim despair,’ as the second page of our new copy-book says.”

This was indiscreet in Charles. The aggrieved George was but a boy, and, naturally, he was angered. “Look here,” he exclaimed, “what is your object in dragging us through this dismal place? Where are we going? If you should lead the way to a python’s lair, should I be bound to tag blindly after you?”

This reasoning was forcible, and for a schoolboy, poetical. Will--knowing that their scheme would be disconcerted if George should turn back, and fearing that he would--bounded forward a little way, and then flung himself plump into a certain pile of brush.

“Oh!” he screamed. “Come here! Boys, hurry! Something rattles all around under me!”

The others quickly urged their way towards him, some in real, some in pretended alarm.

George now proved himself a hero. The vigour of his intellect overawed the others, and they made way for him respectfully. At length he was about to derive some advantage from the ponderous tomes whose pages his grimy thumbs had soiled so often.

“Yes,” he said, “I know just what you heard. Don’t be excited, Will; keep very cool. _It’s a rattlesnake!_ The great naturalist says they skulk around brush-heaps and tangled bushes, ready to pounce on their prey. I know, for I’ve read all about it; and luckily, I am prepared for the worst. Now, where are you bitten, and I’ll cauterize it.”

And the speaker busied himself by stripping his pockets of their treasures, which he dropped on the ground at random.

Jim, however, did not view the matter so philosophically. At the bare mention of the word _rattlesnake_, he turned and tore wildly through the “jungle,” crying piteously: “Oh! I’ve got the chills! I’ve got the chills! the chills! the chills! awful chills!”

_Chapter VIII._

GEORGE COMES OUT AHEAD.

Meanwhile, Will stepped out of the pile of brushwood and said, somewhat foolishly, “Now, George, don’t be foolish; you know well enough there are no rattle-snakes in this part of the country. Put up your instruments of cauterization, and let us all take a squint under these ‘brambles.’”

Poor George looked so crestfallen that Will almost relented. “Didn’t you get bitten?” the former asked blankly.

“What could bite me, George!” Will asked mildly.

“Well, _I_ don’t know what,” George said savagely, “But Charles Goodfellow declares this is a jungle; and we all know, I hope, that poisonous lizards, and reptiles, and centipedes, and tarantulas, and all hideous creatures, live in just such a place as this--I mean in jungles. So, _what_ disturbed you in that brush-heap! Answer that question!--Botheration!” he continued furiously, “here you’ve led me into this horrible place, made fun of me, and contradicted me--you, who have no practical knowledge. And now, to cap it all, I’ve lost my jack-knife, the best jack-knife in these regions, and I got it only yesterday!”

Poor George! One thing after another had happened to irritate him, and he was now in a savage mood. In fact, he was really angry, and the boys had never seen him angry before.

Charles felt a pang in the region of his heart, and Stephen was very uneasy.

“Never mind George,” Will said soothingly. “I’ll help you to look for your knife as soon as we see what is under the brush.”

He stooped over the brush-heap, groping, and then said with awe, as _he_ supposed: “Boys, here are bones! It was bones that rattled under me!--George,” conciliatingly, “what does that mean?”

“Well, I don’t care what it means. My knife is worth more than all the bones you can find in a whole summer; and I intend to look for it in spite of everything. You boys may squabble over those bones till--till--any time you choose.”

Charley was dismayed. George was too sullen to catch at the bait, and their little scheme seemed likely to end ingloriously. Was it for this that they had toiled and plotted?

But Marmaduke, who had hitherto held his tongue, now came to the front, saying eagerly, “Bones! Bones! Let me see!”

He rummaged among the branches, and while Will, Charles, and Stephen, crowded around him, George looked on “askance.”

“O-o-h!” gasped Marmaduke, “what a horrible discovery we have made! Bones! Bones of a mortal! Boys,” with emotion, “SOME ONE WAS FOULLY MURDERED HERE.”

“O-o-h!” echoed all the boys, as in duty bound.

But Steve gave a horrible chuckle, and whispered to Charles, “It works already with _him_; and,” pointing his elbow at George, “_he’ll_ come around.”

The pain in Charley’s heart was not very deep-seated, and it now made room for exultation. The searcher was left to his own musings, and the rest were absorbed in the discovery.

Marmaduke paused a moment, to realize the awfulness of the word _murder_; then, snatching up the branches, he nervously tossed them out of the way.

A little heap of white substances was disclosed which--to Marmaduke’s heated imagination--were all that remained of a human skeleton.

Now, the writer has so much respect for the feelings of his readers that he herewith warns them, in all honesty, that what is immediately to follow, borders upon the grisly; and that consequently it would be well for the queasy reader of fashionable fiction to skip the rest of this chapter and all of chapter the twelfth.

Marmaduke was now in his element; he felt somewhat as a philosopher does when a new theory in science bursts upon him; he was happy. All boyish bashfulness forsook him, and he began rapturously:--

“Yes, boys, we have made a great, an _appalling_, discovery! We have certainly stumbled on a dreadful mystery! It now remains for us to solve this great problem, and gain immortal renown. In the near future, I see us sitting in the courts of law, with the ferret-eyed reporters; the grim lawyers; the shrill-voiced foreman keeping order among the honest and eager jury; the gaping multitude; the venerable judge; and the quaking murderer, found at last, and his crime unearthed and fastened on him by _us_. Then the grand old judge, in solemn tones, will turn to us and say, “You are now called upon to give your conclusive evidence, and charge the crime--long hidden, but brought to light at last--upon the trembling, cringing wretch--this murderer!” Oh! what a proud day it will be for us! Now, boys, an unpleasant duty lies before us, and if any of you wish to withdraw, do so at once. As for me, I will not drop the matter till the mystery is cleared up, and the murderer gibbeted. But who ever wishes to take a bold part with me, must continue in it till justice is satisfied. Then together we shall reap the fruits of our zeal.”

This neat little speech amply repaid the boys for all the perils they had encountered in penetrating into Charley’s jungle. Their delight is beyond our description. Charley, Will, and Steve, exchanged winks most recklessly.

Marmaduke, however, paid no attention to them, but drew a scrap of paper and a lead-pencil, which he always carried, from his pocket.

“What are you going to do now?” Steve queried of the romance-stricken boy.

“I am going to make a memorandum of this affair,” was the answer.

“Where is Jim?” Will asked, thinking that youth would enjoy the scene.

“Oh,” said Steve, “his old and convenient disorder seized him when George spoke of rattle-snakes, and he skedaddled.”

“Yes,” supplemented George, who was recovering his temper, “there is a good deal of philosophy in his complaint; for, like most things cold, it vanishes away when heat is applied; and, to generate heat, Jim sets out on a run.”

“Good for you!” Charley said promptly, hoping to induce the boy to examine and pass an opinion on the bones.

But George still felt too sore--perhaps, too obstinate--to yield.

“Look here, Marmaduke,” he said, “how are you going to prove that somebody was _murdered_ here? Perhaps he was gobbled up by an unprincipled and broken-down quadruped--say, a shipwrecked gorilla.”

“Yes,” chimed in Steve, “perhaps a devouring monster of a famished sea-cow fell on him, and gnawed him, and wallowed him around, and extinguished him!”

Marmaduke was now being jeered in his turn. Considering that he was only a boy, he put up with their banter with stoical unconcernedness; but his quivering lips and humid eyes betrayed that he felt it, and turning to Will, he said, “In such a case as this, you always find something to discover the guilty one,--a pet dog’s collar, a monogrammed metal tooth-pick, an old card case, a seal-ring, a gold watch-key, a book-mark, a--a--or something else.”

“Why, have you found anything?” Steve asked quickly.

No answer. Silence, in this instance, was peculiarly golden; more, it was sufficient.

“Then how do you know, and how are you going to prove it was murder?”

Then Marmaduke’s indignation was roused, and he scowled upon Stephen so malignantly that this worthy quailed, unable to bear up under that “steady gaze of calm contempt.”

Turning to Will and Charles, the persecuted boy thus explained himself: “Not long ago, I read in a story how an awful murder was cleared up, simply because a cast-off wig, that had fallen into the murderer’s pocket by accident, and belonged to nobody in particular, fell out again at the fatal moment, and proved the whole crime. You boys might read about such things from to-day till your hair turns gray; and you would find that some little trinket, some trifle, turns the evidence one way or the other, and decides the verdict. Why, where would the romance of romances be, if it wasn’t so?” excitedly. “I mean to hunt for that lost trinket when I get ready; it has been here all this time, and it isn’t going to disappear forever now.”

“How long has it been here?” asked George, laying stress on the word _how_.

“When we stumbled on this mystery,” pursued Marmaduke, too much absorbed to regard George’s incivilities, “it was about ten o’clock.”

Having made a note of this, he went on, “the scene was a tangled glade in a thick jungle.”

Another note.

“Fit scene for such a tragedy!” Charles commented.

“The bones were hidden under brush-wood, which _I_ removed,” and again his pencil was heard to scribble a note.

We say, _scribble_. The boy intended to “polish” his notes at a more convenient season.

“I say,” interrupted Stephen, “it isn’t _your_ place to take all these notes; you ought to inform a constable, or, a bailiff,--or, better still, a detective!”

Marmaduke scowled at him again, but held his peace.

“Oh, I see,” continued Stephen, bent on teasing the poor boy; “you’ll hand your notes over to some detective, so that he’ll see how clever you are.”

Then Marmaduke spoke. “Boys,” he said, “I’m astonished at your levity and indifference in such a case as this.”

With that, he laid down his pencil and paper, and again examined the bones, handling them with reverence, and muttering what he supposed to be their names.

For some time a fierce conflict had been raging in George’s mind--curiosity battling with wounded vanity. Which would triumph?

While Marmaduke mumbled, George took mental notes. Soon a broad grin spread over the latter’s face, and he said, “Look here, boys; Marmaduke has named five thigh-bones, and thirty-one ribs! I know, for I’ve kept count. Now, the skeleton of a common man has no business with so many thighs and ribs; and Marmaduke isn’t supposed to know the name of a bone as soon as he sees it. Now, I’ve studied into the matter, and I ought to know something about it. I’m just going to see them for myself.”

Curiosity had triumphed!

This disconcerted poor Marmaduke. He made room for George, and sat down beside Charles. A look of dismay appeared in his face, and he pondered deeply. “Boys,” he said, “did you ever hear that anybody was ever murdered in this neighborhood?”

“Never!” shouted all four in a breath.

“I don’t care; it _is_ a skeleton!” doggedly. “I know as much about it as _he_ does,” glaring at George, “and I will stick to it, it was a skeleton.”

“Whatever it _was_ it’s not a skeleton _now_!” roared George.

Do not take alarm, gentle reader: this history is not the register of any squabbles among savants: the writer is too tender-hearted to inflict such a punishment on you.

George resumed: “That is a foolish conclusion; for there are no human bones here at all! Not a skull, nor a radius, nor a--, a--”

At this point Charley interrupted the osteologist by saying, “George, don’t tell off the parts of a skeleton with such disgusting gusto; have a little respect, even for bones.”

“Well, I will;” George assented--the more willingly because he found himself less versed in the matter than he had imagined. “But it was very foolish to think of murder. Boys, do you want to know what it is? _I_ know; _I’ve_ solved your mystery: _I’ll_ reap all the glory!” he cried, so excited that he lost control of his voice.

“Well, what is it?” Will asked sharply, perhaps afraid that George had detected the fraud.

Groundless fear; George was quite as credulous as Marmaduke.

Wild with excitement, his voice rang out loud and discordant. He shouted, at the top of his voice, “Boys, _it’s a fossil_!”

“A _what_?” Charley demanded.

“A _fossil_! An _extinct animal_! A _mastodon_! A _gyasticütûs_! (If this word is new to the reader, let him raise his voice and pronounce it according to the accents.) Yes; here is a field for a geologist or naturalist; not for a humdrum, cigar-puffing, bejewelled detective!”

And the Sage’s form dilated with pride and complacency. His day had come. He could have it all his own way now; for what did the others know about geology?

Poor George! his imagination was as powerful as Marmaduke’s; but he could not equal him in oratory.

As for the boys, they were thunder-struck; this exceeded their utmost expectations.

Steve was the first to speak. “Don’t yell so loudly, George; there are no geologists near to hear you;” he said.

Then again the boys, Marmaduke excepted, huddled around the bones, and expressed unqualified astonishment.

“What will you do about it, George?” Will inquired.

“Travel them around the country for a show;” Marmaduke sneered.

But George was too much elated to regard such gross indignities. Let the envious little simpleton rave; hadn’t he read that every great man has his enemies and detractors? He would ignore the mean wretch and his insulting words.

But for all his philosophy, the words did rankle in his breast.

“Well, what will you do?” Will inquired again.

“Ship them to a geologist, I suppose;” George said jocosely.

“Excuse me, George,” Charles broke in, “but I always used to think they found those old mastodons under ground; and these bones are _on_ the ground.”

“EH?”

“Yes; don’t they dig all those horrid old telegraph poles of bones out of the ground?”

George rose, looking very black and wretched. That important fact had escaped him. His castle in the air toppled down as Marmaduke’s had done, and all his grand ideas were buried in its ruins.

“Perhaps I’m wrong,” Charles continued; “but,” proudly, “I’ve read a little about such things, and I believe they come out of the ground. But you know better than I do, George; so, which way is it? Which of us is right?”

It was cruel for him to ask such a question. George, however, was not a boy obstinately to persist that he was right, when common sense said that he was not. In justice to the boy, it must be observed that, although he was fully aware of his own cleverness, he did not consider himself infallible, but was at all times open to reason. To be still more explicit, he was apt to change his opinions very abruptly.

“No, Charley,” he said, “you are right enough. But I’m astonished to think we should take those paltry bones for a fossil! Why--”

“I never did!” Marmaduke interrupted furiously.

“Why,” he continued, “of course not! A real fossil would be ashamed to look at such bones; they would be to him what a minnow’s bones are to ours. I--I didn’t think, boys; I know what a fossil is, of course.”

George was miserable if he fancied any one thought him ignorant in any matter; and he was about to give the natural history of the mastodon, when Steve diverted the train of his thoughts by asking, “If it ain’t a fossil, what is it?”

“Well, it’s part of the remains of some very rare animal, I should say,--a bison; or a wolverine; or a jackal; or--or----”

It is the needle that breaks the camel’s back. Will, Charles, and Stephen could suppress their laughter no longer; they shouted and guffawed like a desperate villain who fancies that he has married the heroine and lodged a bullet in the hero’s heart.

“What’s the matter?” George asked in astonishment.

Another roar of laughter was the only answer vouchsafed. Steve lay on the ground, and enjoyed the joke heartily; Charles and Will endeavoured to take it more moderately.

Then George’s suspicions were excited. “You boys are fooling me!” he cried angrily. “Why did you coax Marmaduke and me to look at these bones? Why did you make us speak about them? Why didn’t _you_ have anything to say about it? Boys, _why_ did we come here at all?”

After these direct questions an explanation could be delayed no longer. The three looked guilty and ceased from laughing. “We never coaxed you to look at them; and you arrived at your own conclusions. You know you did, George,” said Charles.

Will explained as follows: “George, we fixed those bones ourselves, on purpose to draw you and Marmaduke out. We gathered up a heap of bones of all kinds, from all over, and brought them here, and covered them up with boughs. Then we six came here to explore the jungle--we found them--and you did the rest.”

The victimized boys did not swoon away, but they were more or less exasperated. That was the worst feature in the “trick”--it provoked anger in George and Marmaduke, and lessened their faith in human nature.

“What a mean, hateful, nasty set of fellows!” was George’s natural comment. “They must be fond of prowling around bone-heaps; and handling them; and carrying them up and down the country; eh, Marmaduke? They ought to be told off--clapper-clawed--bastinadoed--soused in hot water! We’ll fix them some day; won’t we?”

“Only,” Steve observed, “_we_ didn’t finger the bones as you two did; _we_ put them into a basket, and then brought ’em here, and dumped ’em out--without _once_ touching ’em! Therefore, I advise you both to lather and scrub your paws with all the soap you can find. Scrub ’em hard, boys, if you know what is good for ’em.”

“Yes,” put in Will, “it is polite to handle skeletons and fossils, but not vulgar bones like these.”

“Oh! what scurvy boys!” was all poor George could say.

As for Marmaduke, he held his tongue, being too sulky, too horrified, to do more than gurgle out a few dismal moans.

“Well, boys,” said Charley, “it will soon be dinnertime; so let us cover up these mysterious old bones, and start for home and the soap-barrel.”

But George was recovering his equilibrium, and he thirsted for revenge. A light that boded no good to his deceivers shone in his eyes; he was bent on mischief.

“Look here, boys,” he began, “how do you know these are the same bones you accumulated? We stumbled around in the woods just as it happened; we found ourselves here; and Will suddenly found himself floundering in this brush-heap. Can you _prove_ this is the place you think it is?”

“It is not likely that there are bones under all these bushes, George;” said Charley. “Besides, we took notice where we were going, and we’ve often been here. I’m certain its the place.”

“No; you can’t be _certain_; absolutely _certain_;” George replied, so positively that Will, who lacked firmness, wavered, and helped George’s cause by saying, “Well, the place has a different look, I believe! But these _must_ be the bones, surely!”

“It looks different, because we generally came in from the south;” Steve returned. “Any boy with two eyes isn’t going to get so far astray in these woods.”

“Well, what if it isn’t the place we think it is?” Will asked.

“Oh, you will have to give in that it’s murder,” Marmaduke said. “I knew it was murder all the time. How do you know that nobody was ever murdered here? You don’t know anything about bones; George is most likely right.”

“Don’t make a fool of yourself again, Marmaduke; let us go home,” Steve growled, and he had taken a step homeward, when a long and doleful cry, followed by a hideous and piercing scream, electrified all the boys.

They conjured up all sorts of horrors, and the bravest turned pale with fright. Suddenly the “glade” became gloomy and awful; bugbears lurked in the shadows; ghost stories flitted through their heads; the “Phantom Ship” loomed before them.

“Don’t talk about murder, boys; I can’t stand it so coolly as you can,” Will entreated, with a quavering voice that told of abject terror.

“Oh, what is the matter?” Steve gasped. “What could yell like that?”

At that instant another shriek, more appalling than the first, rang out, rose and fell in grating discord, and then died away in the distance.

It was sufficient; Charley himself believed that they had made a mistake, and had been desecrating a human skeleton. Was this the ghost of the murdered one, or was it the perpetrator of the deed?

Instinctively the demoralized heroes huddled together, and Marmaduke found comfort in whispering hoarsely, “Now the mystery is going to be solved. I knew it was mur--”

One more shriek! The ghost was very near them now, and its lungs were strong. But it labored under the disadvantage of a cracked voice; or perhaps it was not “in practice.” At all events, the sound was so wild, so awful, that they shuddered with horror--they felt their flesh crawl--cold chills ran down their back.

This is not exaggeration; the boys were not easily frightened; but the ghost--who was at an age at which the voice is subject to changeable and discordant utterance--was exerting himself to the utmost.

“I won’t budge, no matter what happens!” Steve declared heroically.

“No, we must stick by each other, boys,” Will added.

Once again the ghost found voice This time, however, it spoke--spoke in tones of fury. “Who dares to say there was not murder here!” was thundered forth. “Who dares to touch my bones! Let--him--be--ware!”

This was too much. With a yell of horror and dismay, four boys started to their feet and tore out of the “jungle,” morally certain that a band of furious demons was hard behind them.

“Its dangerous to stay,” Marmaduke said, “for that is poetry!”

_Four_ boys fled; George lagged behind. “They’ve caught Jim’s disease!” he chuckled ecstatically. “I’ll teach ’em not to palm off old bones on me! Perhaps they’ll find that I can play a trick that knocks theirs all hollow!”

He performed a jig, and then set out in mad pursuit of his comrades.

We assign no reason for this act; but if the reader was ever a boy, he will understand.

George gave a yell of triumph; but it savoured so strongly of fear that Will, who had gained an open space, called out cheerily, “Don’t be afraid, George, if it’s you. Come straight ahead; here we are.”

“What on earth made such a rumpus?” demanded Stephen, already recovered from his fright.

“It must have been something; but of course we were not frightened;” said the others, whose fears the bright sunshine and the twittering birds had dispelled.

“The idea of saying I was afraid!” George roared. “I did that myself.”

“You made that noise?” gasped the four, in one breath.

“Yes, boys; I was the ghost;” George said complacently.

“And the murder--?” Marmaduke began.

“Never was!” George declared. “Boys, last night I was reading about ventriloquism; and I set to work and practised it. The man that wrote it said, ‘After five minutes’ practice, the veriest tyro will find himself able to rout a coward;’ and I guess he was right.”

“Botheration! we are sold!” Charles exclaimed, in surprise and mortification.

“Yes; you fooled me, and I fooled you all. We’re even now.”

Steve winced when the Sage again made reference to the learned ventriloquist’s weighty observation, and demanded indignantly, “Why didn’t you tell us all that before? Why didn’t you ventriloquism as we came along?”

“I was only waiting; I intended to do it before night,” George said honestly.

“You read too much, George;” Will commented sorrowfully. “We won’t try to fool you any more.”

“The worst of it is,” Charles said, with a droll smile, “is that one of us can’t make fun of another, for we all made fools of ourselves.”

“There’s Jim,” Steve suggested.

“So there is! Well, what about the murder?”

“It certainly is a skeleton,” Marmaduke said grimly.

“Well, to please you, let us call it an ‘open question,’” George, who was now in jubilant spirits, observed.

“Let us go back and look for the lost trinket; that will solve the problem;” Stephen proposed.

“Never mind the trinket, boys;” said Charley; “it will keep till another day. But give me a scrap of paper and a more respectable pencil than my own ruinous one, and I’ll write something worth while.”

Wonderingly, Marmaduke handed out the articles asked for, and Charley wrote as follows:--

ONE SLATE PENCIL REWARD.

DEAD OR ALIVE!

This reward will be given to anybody who revives a ghost, dead
or alive, to claim these bones and solve this mystery.