Chapter 19

FOOLING THE ENEMY

Our hero's impulse was to at once spring into the wagon and see if the trunk was still intact.

A natural cautiousness checked him, however, and he was glad of it a minute later as he detected a rustling in the thick undergrowth back of the tree.

A human figure seemed suddenly to drop to the ground, and a little distance to the left of it Bart was sure he saw two sharp human eyes fixed upon him.

He never let on that he suspected for a moment that he was not entirely alone, but, walking over to a tree stump, where, spread out on a newspaper, was the remains of a lunch, he acted delighted at the discovery, picked up a hunk of bread in one hand, a piece of cheese in the other, and, throwing himself on the green sward at full length, proceeded to munch the eatables, with every semblance of satisfaction.

Bart's mind worked quickly. He felt that it was up to him to play a part, and he prepared to do so.

He was morally certain that two persons in fancied hiding were watching his every movement, and they must be Buck and Hank Tolliver.

Bart hoped they had never seen him before; he felt pretty certain that they did not know him at all.

Bart sprang to his feet. He had thrown his cap back on his head in a "sporty," off-handish way, and he tried hard to impersonate a reckless young adventurer taking things as they came, and audacious enough to pick up a handy meal anyhow or anywhere. He paid not the least apparent attention to the wagon or the trunk, although he cast more than one sidelong glance in that direction.

He walked up to the horse, stroked its nose, and said boisterously:

"Wish I had this layout--wouldn't I reach California like a nabob, though!"

Then Bart went back to the stump. He purposely faced the patch of brush where he knew his watchers were lurking.

Ransacking his pockets, with a comical, quizzical grin on his face, he produced a solitary nickel, placed it ostentatiously on the tree stump and remarked:

"Honesty is the best policy--there you are, landlord! and much obliged for the handout."

Then, striking a jaunty dancing step, he started to cross the clearing, whistling a jolly tune.

"Hey!"

Bart half expected the summons. He halted in professed wonderment, looked up, to the right, to the left, in every direction except that from which he was well aware the hail had come.

"Look here, you!"

Bart now turned in the right direction. A man of about thirty had revealed himself from the brush.

He had small, bright eyes, a shrewd, narrow face, and Bart knew from discription who he was--Buck Tolliver.

"Why, hello! somebody here?" exclaimed Bart, feigning surprise and then fright, and he made a movement as if to run for it.

"Don't you bolt," ordered Buck Tolliver, advancing--"come back here, kid."

Bart slowly retraced his steps. Then he manifested new alarm as a second figure stepped out from the brush.

Recalling what the Millville postmaster had told him, the young express agent was quickly aware that this second individual was Buck's brother, Hank.

Buck was the spokesman and leader. He came up near to Bart and looked him over critically.

"What you doing here?" he demanded, with a suspicious frown.

"Nothing," said Bart, with a grin.

"Where do you come from?"

"Me--nowhere!" chuckled Bart, winking deliberately and then, walking over to the horse, he fondled his long ears, with the remark: "If I had a dandy rig like you've got here, I bet I'd go somewheres, though!"

"Where would you go?" inquired Buck Tolliver curiously.

"I'd go to California--that's the place to do something, and make a name, and amount to something."

Bart's off-handed ingenuousness had completely disarmed the men. He pretended to be busy petting the horse, but saw Buck Tolliver slip back to his brother, and a few quick questions and answers passed between them. Then Buck came up to him again.

"See here, kid, are you acquainted around here at all?"

"Did you ever see me around here before?" chaffed Bart audaciously.

"Don't get fresh! This is business."

"Why, yes--I reckon I could find my way from Springfield to Bascober."

Bart had mentioned two points miles remote from the Millville district.

"He'll do," spoke Hank Tolliver for the first time. "Ask him, Buck."

"Do you want to drive that rig a few miles for us for a dollar?" asked Buck Tolliver.

"Me?" cried Bart. "I guess so!"

"Can you obey orders?"

"Try me, boss."

"He'll do, I tell you. What do you want to waste time this way for!" snapped Hank Tolliver irritably.

"Hitch him up," ordered Buck to Bart. "Come on, Hank."

Bart chuckled to himself. He did not know what all this might lead to, but it was a famous start.

While he was putting on the horse's harness and hitching him up, the brothers spread a piece of canvas over the wagon box. This they tucked in, and completely covered trunk and canvas with long grass pulled from the edge of a water pit near by.

Bart had the rig in full starting shape by the time they had concluded their labors.

"What's the ticket, Captain?" he inquired of Buck, looking him squarely in the face.

"You seem to know enough not to answer questions about yourself," observed Buck--"try and be as clever if anybody quizzes you about this wagon."

"Why should they?"

"Oh, they may. If they do, you're from--let me see--Blackberry Hill, remember?"

"All right--with a load of garden truck, eh?" propounded Bart ingeniously.

"You hit it correct. What we want you to do is this: Drive down to the main road, and turn west. Keep on straight ahead, and don't turn anywhere. About nine miles west you'll hit Hamilton. Drive right through the town, but as soon as you get out of it take the first branch south from the turnpike, and keep on till you reach an old mill on the river. Wait for us there."

"Why," said Bart, "aren't you going with me?"

"No," answered Buck Tolliver definitely.

"Why not?"

"None of your business," snapped out Hank.

"Oh!"

"You mind yours, strictly, or there will be trouble," warned Buck, and Bart saw from the look in his hard face that he was a dangerous man, once aroused. "You do this job with neatness and dispatch, and it will mean a good deal more than a dollar."

"Crackey!" cried Bart, snapping the whip hilariously--"maybe this is one of those story-book happenings where a fellow strikes fame and fortune!"

"Maybe it is," assented Buck drily.

Bart climbed up to the seat. He started up the horse, the Tollivers following after the wagon till they reached the main road.

"When I get to the mill--" began Bart.

"We'll be there to meet you," announced Buck Tolliver.

"I don't see," growled Hank in an undertone to his brother, "why we would take any risk riding under that grass."

"You leave this affair to me," retorted Buck. "If the kid gets through all right, then we're all right, aren't we?"

"I suppose so."

"And we've got to wait as we agreed--for Wacker."

Bart had just turned into the main road. At the mention of that ominous name, the young express agent brought the whip down upon the horse's flanks with a sharp snap.