The Boys of Columbia High on the River/Chapter 22
CHAPTER XXII
LANKY LIFTS THE VEIL OF MYSTERY
"Ahoy, there, Lanky!"
The boy at the wheel of the racing launch looked quickly toward the head of the island. He must have seen and recognized the group, for he waved his hand.
"Come ashore! We want you to give us a tow home!" called Frank, making a trumpet of his cupped hands.
Another wave told that Lanky understood. Immediately the course of the Red Fox was changed, so that she began to circle around.
"What ails the fellow? Looks as if he'd been up against trouble!" said Paul.
"That's certainly a fact, for his face is smeared with patches of blood. I wonder"
"What?" demanded Paul, as his friend and chum stopped short.
"If he did it," remarked Frank, with a peculiar smile.
"Suppose you explain; none of us are mind readers, are we girls, and we like to know what all this mystery is about?"
"I beg your pardon, ladies; I forgot that you weren't in the secret. The truth of the matter is Lanky has been making a very solemn vow; and from present indications I imagine he's also been keeping the same," Frank went on.
"I see, and to make a guess myself I should say that Lef Seller had something to do with that same vow. Anyhow, the fact that Lanky is pushing up the Harrapin in Lef's pet motor-boat makes it look that way," smiled Paul.
"You're a champion guesser, my boy, for that is a fact," laughed Frank; "when we were run down so maliciously the other night. Lanky declared he would never rest until he had learned who held the wheel at the time, and whose boat did the trick. The coming of the race kept him back in his hunt, but I think he took it up this morning, for he gave me to understand as much."
"But how could he learn, if the other fellow refused to tell?" asked Helen.
Frank gave her a pitying look.
"Wait a minute more and perhaps the hero of the occasion will condescend to remove the scales from your eyes. I can give a pretty good guess myself, but the facts belong to Lanky, and I'll let him tell," he remarked.
"Well, here he is to speak for himself," declared Minnie, as the launch gently ran up on the shelving beach, or rather as close to the water's edge as was possible.
The boy who had been driving the Red Fox immediately sprang ashore.
"Hello! folks! I saw you here before you signaled, but didn't want to butt in," he exclaimed, cheerfully.
His face was streaked with dried blood, and when he grinned there was a trace of pain in his action.
"Whatever have you been doing, Lanky, to get such a scratched face?" asked Helen, surveying him in dismay.
"I suppose I do look kind of tough; but I didn't take the time to wash up after the circus, you see," he explained.
"Circus?" echoed Minnie, a puzzled expression upon her pretty face.
"Sure, and it was a jim dandy one, too. If you think I look bad you just want to take a peep at the other fellow, that's all. He's a screamer!"
Frank saw the direction of Lanky's glance, and had a sudden idea. He sprang forward so that he could look over the gunwhale of the motor-boat. Something lay in the bottom, partly covered with a rug. A face glared up at him, and despite the marks upon it, and the look of disgust, he recognized the seemingly bound individual.
"Why, it's Lef," he ejaculated.
"Sure!" agreed Lanky, with a nod of assent; "who else would you suppose, when I was speeding his game little boat up the river? Oh! it's Lef, all right, and he's feeling left, and pretty punk just now, I warrant you, eh, Lef?"
The boy in the bottom of the launch snapped back at once:
"I tell you I'll have the law on you for this disgrace, Lanky Wallace! Think because your dad's a banker you can maul a feller just like you please. You'll get yours good and hard for this, see if you don't!"
Lanky did not appear to be alarmed at this dire threat. On the contrary he grinned as though he considered it a compliment.
"Tit for tat, my boy; I'm giving you back all you passed me, and with a little interest, that's all. Tucked me away nicely, you and your two cronies, didn't you? Well, I'm only returning the favor, leaving Bill and Tony to stump it home, if so be they ain't got enough bones in their jeans to pay for car-fare from Bellport up."
"What's it all about, Lanky?" demanded Paul, eagerly.
"But first, before you tell us, please wash your face. I'm almost afraid to look at you, Lanky, you seem so fierce and bloodthirsty!" exclaimed Helen.
"Well, I'm not a bit bloodthirsty just now, thank you, Helen; that feeling has all passed away, and I'm in the best of humors. But I reckon I'm not quite presentable before ladies, and if you'll excuse me I'll make my twilight."
Stooping down by the river's edge, he proceeded to dash water in his face at a great rate; then he deliberately wiped his cheeks dry with a pocket handkerchief, while the girls turned their backs upon the scene.
"Say, that does feel better, fellows; I can even smile now without it hurting so much. My nose bled some, after Bill gave me a love tap that made me see a peck of stars. But all's well that ends well, and anyhow, I'm the last one to laugh," saying which Lanky took a peek over the side of the boat, jeered at the growling bound boy who was still breathing out threatenings galore, and then walked up to where the others awaited him.
"Now, what do you want to know, Frank?" he asked, dropping down beside them.
"First tell us what you learned this morning at the time you made that gesture to me, and said 'green paint,'" began Frank.
"Just what you supposed—that I'd skirmished around among the motor-boats, and found plain marks of green paint on the bow of one. Just take a squint yourself, Frank, and you'll discover it there before your eyes," declared Lanky, pointing to the bow of the Red Fox.
While the craft had her body painted a bright red, to conform with her name, still it required no microscope to see the very evident green upon a certain portion of her bow about the water line, where it had undoubtedly come in contact with the emerald planking of Frank's boat when the mixup occurred on the river.
"Then you positively knew that it was Lef's boat that did the mischief, before you went into the eight-oared race?" asked Paul, admiringly.
"Shucks! of course I did. Knew it all along, only I wanted to get hold of some positive evidence before I jumped him. Didn't want to run chances of getting hurt before the race, and so I put it off, and tried to forget all about it."
"But you heard the decision of the referee, and knew the race was to be run off again day after to-morrow; why didn't you wait still longer?" asked Frank.
"It was too much for human nature to stand. I was all worked up, and needed some exercise, you see," answered Lanky.
"And you got it, all right!" shouted Lef, who must have been listening to all that was being said.
"Sure I did; but then three against one showed what cowards you all were," replied Lanky, promptly, and smiling as usual at the recollection.
"Look here, do you mean that you actually sneaked away and tackled Lef while he was with those two chums of his—that you didn't have the sense to take me along to see fair play? Well, you are a caution, I declare! But they say that a little cherub aloft always looks out for fools and innocent babes," remarked Frank, in pretended reproach, though his eyes were twinkling with amusement.
"You're sure complimentary, Frank; the only complaint I've got to make is that you don't specify which class I belong in. But we did have a rough-house time of it down there on the river bank, with not a solitary witness. I did all I could to play the David part, but the Philistines were too much for me. They gave me a warm session, and when finally I caved in they must have trussed me up and bundled me into the boat, for when I opened my peepers I found that we were afloat, and myself lying just like Lef is now."
Frank uttered an exclamation of surprise.
"What an outrage! Carried you off as though they were pirates of the raging Spanish Main, did they? What did they mean to do to you, Lanky?" he burst forth, indignantly.
"Oh! they liked my company so much they didn't want to let me go out of their sight, I reckon. First they sailed down river and landed. Bill went away and came back with some grub, bought with money Lef gave him. They joked me about the hunger cure for indigestion, and never offered me a bite. Then they ran around some more and played a trick on some feller, I guess, because they seemed to be tickled to death about it. I heard 'em mention Frank's name, and had an idea he was mixed up in it somehow."
"They thought so too, but it was only my boat they stole and sunk, believing they had left me on this island to swim ashore; when it was the girls, taking a picture of a bird on its nest, or rather feeding its young," explained Frank.
"That was it, eh? Well, down below a mile or two they went ashore again to build a fire in Cragin's woods on the point. I heard Lef sending the others off, Bill to get some cigarettes in town, and Tony for some gasolene, for they were going to run down the river twenty miles or more, to see a friend and stay over night. They joked some about what they would do to me before kicking me loose; but I wasn't worrying about that a bit. I had my plans all laid by then."
Lanky stopped to indulge in a series of chuckles, after which he went on.
"You see, while I was lying there like a mummy I was soaking the string they'd tied around my wrists. There was some water in the bottom of the boat; splashed in during that fast time Lef made in the race, I guess. And the more I soaked the cord the better I was able to stretch it."
"You waited until Lef was alone?" questioned Frank, suggestively, during another pause.
"I sure did. And when I'd managed to get rid of the string around my hands, my little pocket knife did the needful to the other they'd wrapped around my legs. Say, you just ought to have seen that feller when I jumped him! He was the most surprised boy on earth, without exception."
"Aw! you took a mean advantage of me, that's what; jumped on my back when I wasn't looking. Even then I'd have got you only for a slip," growled the one who lay in the bottom of the motor-boat.
"That's your way of looking at it, Lef. You're welcome to your opinion. All I know is that we fought for all of ten minutes, and that I hammered you enough to feel satisfied that I'd paid you back for all I owed you. Then a notion came to turn the tables, and carry Lef back to town. That's all, folks. I'm here, and you saw how I looked. The score is wiped out now."
"But what will you do with him?" asked Helen.
"Cut him loose when I'm good and ready. I didn't want to give him a chance to say I'd run away with his old boat; that's one reason he's a passenger."
"But he threatens to have you arrested?" said Minnie, nervously.
Lanky laughed uproarously.
"That would be too good a joke. I've got proof of all I charge against him. He kidnapped me, he did, and any feller's got a right to break loose. Frank, show the green paint to some one when we get in, so as to have outside witnesses. Then you make Lef get your smashed boat and have it put in apple pie order, or else see his dad."
"Just what I mean to do. He'll pay for the damage or his father must," replied the other; while Lef growled and said ugly things to the effect that never would he so demean himself.
But he did, all the same, knowing that Frank would keep his word.
The little party soon left the island, the two row-boats in tow of the launch, for the pull up the river was nothing to be envied. Frank made sure to call the attention of several parties to the green paint on the bow of the motor-boat; and Lef, who had been cut free by Lanky after they landed, was left in possession of his recovered craft, as ugly-tempered a boy as could be found in seven counties.
Doubtless the four young people enjoyed the balance of that eventful day after their own fashion. The river was an attractive place after the sun sank low, and with good company in each boat, time passed on fleeting wings. But Frank occasionally laughed silently as he remembered the appearance of Lanky's "fighting face" when he came ashore, after turning the table on Lef Seller and his crowd.
It might be a lesson for Lef; but Frank was not confiding enough to believe that it would cure the prank lover of his evil pastime.