Five Little Peppers at School Part 3

Hi! Hi! Tippety Rippety! Hi! Hi!" rolled out, till there wasn't any other sound to be heard. And a regular tussle of boys were getting in the wildest excitement when it was announced that Pepper and Ricketson had won the second set, the referees trying to quiet them so that the game could proceed.

In the third set, Joel seemed to have it all his own way, and fairly swept Ricketson along with him. The excitement was now so intense that the boys forgot to yell, afraid they would miss some strokes.

David clenched his hands tightly. The net and flying b.a.l.l.s spun all together inextricably before his eyes as he strained them to see Joe's brilliant returns. This was the deciding set, as the cup was to go to the winners of two sets out of three.

Joel's last serve was what finished it; the ball flas.h.i.+ng by Tom with such impetus, that even the St. Andrew's champion said he couldn't ever have returned it.

Everybody drew a long breath, and then the crowd rushed and converged to Joel; surrounded him, fighting for first place, the fortunate ones tossing him up to their shoulders to race him in triumph around the yard.

"Take Ricket!" screamed Joel, red in the face. "Take him!" he roared.

"He beat too, as much as I." So a second group seized Fred; and up he went to be trotted after, the crowd swarming alongside, yelling, tumbling over each other,--gone perfectly wild; Joe waving the cup, thrust into his hand, which would be kept by the winners for a year.

It was the middle of the night. Davie, flushed with the happiest thoughts, had peacefully settled to dreams in which Mamsie and Grandpapa, and Polly and Jasper, and all the dear home people, were tangled up. And Phronsie seemed to be waving a big silver cup, and piping out with a glad little laugh, "Oh, I am so glad!" And now and then the scene of operations flew off to the little brown house, that it appeared impossible to keep quite out of dreamland. Some one gripped him by the arm.

"Oh, what is it, Joe?" David flew up to a sitting posture in the middle of his bed.

"It isn't Joe. Get up as quick as you can."

David, with a dreadful feeling at his heart, tumbled out of bed. "_Isn't Joe!_" he found time to say, with a glance in the darkness over toward Joel's bed.

"Hurry up, don't stop to talk." The voice was Tom Beresford's. "Get on your clothes."

Meantime he was scuffing around. "Where in time are your shoes?" But David already had those articles, and was pulling them on with hasty fingers. "Oh, tell me," he couldn't help crying; but "Hurry up!" was all he got for his pains. And at last, after what seemed an age to Tom, David was piloted out into the hall, with many adjurations to "go softly," down the long flight of stairs. Here he came to a dead stop. "I can't go another single step, Tom," he said firmly, "unless you tell me what you want me for. And where is Joel?" he gasped.

"Oh, bother! in another minute you'd have been outside, and then it would be safe to tell you," said Tom. "Well, if you will have it, Dave, Joe's finis.h.i.+ng up that business with Jenk, and you're the only one that can stop it. Now don't keel over."

David clung to the door, which Tom had managed to open softly, and for a minute it looked as if Beresford would have his hands full without in the least benefiting Joel. But suddenly he straightened up. "Oh, tell me where he is," he cried, in a manner and voice exactly like Polly when she had anything that must be done set before her. And clear ahead of his guide when Tom whispered, "Down in the pine grove," sped Davie on the very wings of the wind.

"Gracious! Joel is nothing to Dave as a sprinter," said Tom to himself, as his long legs got him over the ground in the rear.

The two boys hugged the shadow of the tall trees and dashed across the lawn to the shrubbery beyond. Then it was but a breathing s.p.a.ce, and a few good leaps to the depths of the pine grove. In the midst of this were two figures, busily engaged in the cheerful occupation of fisticuffing each other till the stronger might win.

"_Joel!_" called David hoa.r.s.ely, his breath nearly spent as he dashed up.

Joel, at this, wavered, and turned. Seeing which, his antagonist dealt him a thwack that made his head spin, and nearly lost him his footing.

"That was mean, Jenk!" exclaimed Beresford, das.h.i.+ng up in time to see it. "You took advantage when Joe was off guard," he cried hotly.

"No such thing," roared Jenk, losing his head at what now seemed an easy victory, "and I'll settle with you when I get through with Joe, for being such a mean sneak as to turn tell-tale, Tom."

"All right," said Tom coolly. "Go it, Joe, and pay him up. You've several scores to settle now."

"Joel," gasped Davie. "Oh Mamsie!" He could get no further.

Joel's hands, out once more in good fighting trim, wavered again, and sank helplessly down to his side.

"Oh dear!" Tom groaned in amazement.

"Hoh--hoh! you see how easy I could whip him," laughed Jenkins, raining down blows all over Joel's figure, who didn't offer to stir.

"See here you!" Tom fairly roared it out, perfectly regardless of possible detection. "You beastly coward!" And he jumped in between Joel and his antagonist. "You may settle with me now if you like."

"Stop, Tom." Joel seized him from behind. Tom, in a fury, turned to see his face working dreadfully, while the brown hands gripped him tightly.

"I forgot--Mamsie wouldn't--like--you mustn't, Tom. If you do, I'll scream for John," he declared suddenly.

John, the watchman, being the last person whom any of Dr. Marks' boys desired to see when engaged in a midnight prank, Beresford backed away slowly from Jenkins, who was delighted once more at the interruption, and fastened his gaze on Joel. "Well, I never did, Pepper!" he brought himself to say.

"Tom," said David brokenly, and getting over to him to seize his hand, "don't you know our Mamsie would feel dreadfully to see Joel doing any such thing? Oh, she would, Tom," as Beresford continued to stare without a word.

"Not to such a miserable beggar." Tom at last found his tongue, and pointed to Jenk.

"Oh, yes, she would. It's just as bad in Joel," said Davie, shaking his head. Joel turned suddenly, took two or three steps, then flung himself down flat on his face on the pine needles.

"Well, get up," said Tom crossly, running over to him. "John will maybe get over here, we've made so much noise. Hurry up, Joe, we must all get back."

Joel, thus adjured, especially as David got down on the ground, to put his arms around the shaking shoulders, got up slowly. Then they turned around to look for Jenkins. He was nowhere to be seen.

"Little coward!" exclaimed Tom between his teeth. "Well, we'll have to skin it as best we may back. _Here comes John!_"

They could see his lantern moving around among the trees; and das.h.i.+ng off, taking the precaution to hug the shadow of the trees again, they soon made the big door to the dormitory. Tom reached it first, and turned the k.n.o.b. "It's locked," he said. "The mean, beastly coward has locked us out."

III A NARROW ESCAPE

Joel, in such an emergency, wiped his black eyes and looked up sharply.

David sank on the upper step.

"Oh, no, Tom," cried Joel, crowding in between Beresford and the door, "it can't be. Get out of the way; let me try."

"It is--it is, I tell you," howled Tom in what was more of a whine, as he kept one eye out for John and his lantern. "The mean sneak has got the best of us, Joe." He set his teeth hard together, and his face turned white.

Joe dropped the doork.n.o.b, and whirled off the steps.

"Julius Caesar! where are you going?" began Tom, as Joel disappeared around the corner of the dormitory.

"He's gone to see if John is coming, I suppose," said Davie weakly.

Tom, preferring to see for himself, skipped off, and disappeared around the angle. "Oh--oh!" was what David heard next, making him fly from his step to follow in haste.

What he saw was so much worse than all his fears as Tom gripped his arm pointing up over his head, that he screamed right out, "Oh Joe, come back, you'll be killed!"

"He can't come back," said Tom hoa.r.s.ely. "He'd much better go on." Joel, more than halfway up the lightning conductor, was making good time s.h.i.+nning along. He turned to say, "I'm all right, Dave," as a window above them was thrown up, and a head in a white nightcap was thrust out.

"It's all up with him now; there's old Fox," groaned Tom, ducking softly back over the gra.s.s. "Come on, Dave."