CHAPTER II.

BRUCE’S LIVELY NIGHT.

Bruce really was tired. Big, strong fellow though he was, his laziness overcame the energy it seemed natural he should possess, and a day of hustling quite exhausted him.

He was glad to have a room by himself, and he rolled into bed with a satisfied grunt, muttering:

“Now, nothing will disturb me till morning.”

In a short time, he was asleep, and snoring. His slumbers, however, were rudely disturbed. At first, it seemed like a dream. He fancied he could hear the gong of a fire-engine that was thundering down upon him, while he seemed helpless to get out of the way and escape. The gong pounded furiously, and he struggled with all his might to flee. In the midst of the awful effort, he awoke, sweat starting from every pore. The infernal clatter and bang of the bell continued, and it sounded right there in that room.

With a snort, Bruce sat up.

“Fire, I’ll bet a hundred dollars!” he blurted, as he made a dive to get out of bed.

His feet became entangled with the bedclothes, and he landed sprawling, with a terrible thud that knocked the breath from his body.

Clatter! bang! ding! bang! clatter!

That bell was keeping it up at a fearful rate, and Browning floundered around on the floor, becoming more and more helplessly entangled in the bedclothing.

“This is awful!” he groaned. “I’m tying myself all up here, and I’ll be burned to death! The old hotel is afire, and that’s the alarm!”

He was tempted to uplift his voice, and roar aloud for aid, but refrained from doing so, and forcibly tore himself free from the entangling clothing.

“Keep cool, old man!” he said, as he got upon his feet. “The people who lose their heads at fires get burned. The ones who keep cool escape.”

Then he found the gas, and turned it on, but could not find a match. He rushed round the room, bumping against chairs, barking his shins, and bruising himself generally. Over one of the chairs he fell, and he got so tangled up with it that it really seemed that the chair was clinging to him, like a living creature.

“Oh, yes!” he snarled. “Throw me down, and then pile onto me, will you! Try to hold me down, so I’ll be burned to death, will you! Punch your legs into my ribs, will you! Hit me in the eye, and upper-cut me on the chin, will you! Get out!”

He flung the chair from him, with great violence. There was a crash, a thud on the floor, a whirring sound and the alarm-bell ceased to ring.

Rather dazed, Bruce got up. He was still trembling, but he made a search for his vest, found it, and secured a match.

The stillness which followed the racket of the bell and the frantic gyrations of the big Yale man seemed awful, and he was more frightened than ever. If he had wished to shout then, it is doubtful if he could have raised a cry that would have been heard outside his door.

The first match he struck spluttered and went out. With the second, he lighted the gas, the odor of which filled the room. Then he looked around, and the sight that met his eyes filled him with wonder.

The chair he had flung across the room had struck a small shelf, and knocked down a clock of the forty-nine-cent variety, smashing it, and scattering its works over the carpet. As he stood there, glaring at its ruins, the truth began to dawn upon him.

“It was that thundering alarm-clock!” he snorted. “The thing went off, and spoiled my slumbers! There is no fire and no danger! I’ve been fooled by a bargain-counter alarm-clock!”

He felt like jumping on the ruins of the poor time-piece, but remembered that he was barefooted, and it would be sure to hurt him. Then his eye caught sight of a slip of paper attached to a ring in the case of the clock. He picked it up. On the paper were these words, written in English:

“Good night! Sleep tight!”

Browning flung the clock-case into a corner, uttering a “woosh” of indignation.

“That’s what I call a pretty cheap joke!” he exploded. “My first night by myself, and they couldn’t let me rest in peace! Oh, I’ll have revenge for this!”

He gathered up the clothing, and piled it back onto the bed, then turned out the gas, and rolled in once more.

“It’s like one of Merriwell’s old tricks,” he thought, as he buried himself under the twisted clothing, and prepared to make up for lost time.

Being really tired, it was not long before his nerves quieted down, and he began to snore once more. He was dreaming a very pleasant dream, when there was a repetition of the former racket. Browning groaned, and stirred. Then, with a snort, he sat up.

“Murder!” he gurgled. “I thought I’d smashed the old thing so it couldn’t go off again!”

He flung himself out of bed, saying some very ugly words, and lighted the gas once more. The remnants of the clock he had smashed lay quietly in the corner, but the racket of an alarm-bell came from another part of the room. Furiously he began to search for it, and, in about five minutes, he found it in the top drawer of the dressing-case.

To the clock was attached a card, on which was written:

“Excuse me, please. I hope you are resting well.”

Mad? Browning almost frothed at the mouth. He opened the window, and flung the clock out with great violence. Then he slammed down the window, turned off the gas, and went back to bed.

“I’ll get even for this, if it takes me the rest of my life!” he grumbled, as he settled down, and tried to make himself comfortable in the twisted bed.

Being exhausted, it did not take him long to doze again. Then another clock began operations. Bruce made a flying leap from the bed, striking the floor before he was fairly awake.

“Ten thousand furies!” he roared, as he chased around the room about twenty times, and broke the world’s record for the two-mile dash. “It’s another one! Where is the fiendish thing? Let me get my hands on it! Oh, I won’t do a thing to it!”

In the course of four or five minutes, he found it, hidden behind a picture. A tag was attached to it, and on the tag was written:

“You must be very, very tired.”

“Tired!” howled the big fellow. “I should say so! This is enough to make anybody tired!”

He dropped the clock to the floor, but it continued to rattle away. With an exclamation of anger, quite forgetting that his feet were not encased in boots, he drew off and kicked the clock up against the wall, with all his strength, breaking his great toe-nail, and knocking the skin off the two neighboring toes.

“Yow!” he howled, as he held onto his injured toes with both hands, and hopped around the room on the other foot. “Oh, my goodness! I’ve maimed myself for life! I’ll be a helpless cripple as long as I live!”

The clock gave a sort of derisive rattle, and stopped.

Bruce sat down on the edge of the bed, and examined his injured foot. After awhile, he bound up his toes with a handkerchief, and turned in again.

“I guess this is the end of it,” he decided. “They’ve spoiled my night’s rest! It’s an outrage!”

His nerves were not near the surface, so they soon became quiet, and, despite what had happened, despite the injury to his foot, he began to snore again. Then the fourth clock started out to get in its work. When Browning awoke, and realized what was taking place, he was wild. He made another jump, to get out of bed, caught his feet in the bedclothing again, and struck on his forehead and nose, barking the latter, and causing it to bleed slightly.

“All the fiends of the hot place couldn’t devise greater torture!” he frothed. “It’s villainous! It’s criminal! I’ll be a raving maniac before morning!”

He began to fling things around at a furious rate in his mad search for the clock. At last, he found it in his grip, where it had been carefully tucked. When he yanked it out, it flew from his fingers, and rolled away. He scrambled after it on his hands and knees, upsetting a marble-topped table, which struck him a terrible thump on the back of the head, producing a swelling almost as large as a hen’s egg.

When Browning got hold of the clock at last, he was the maddest man in all France. He rushed to the window, and slammed it open. Then he hurled the clock into the street, with a fearful violence, barely missing a passing pedestrian, who shouted something about bombs, and took to his heels.

In yanking the clock from the grip, he had torn off a bit of paper. On the paper he read these words:

“Hope this doesn’t disturb you, old man.”

It must be confessed that Bruce Browning made a few “dark-blue” remarks, which would not look well in print. Then he searched all around the room for another clock, but could not find one.

“It’s the last of them,” he decided, looking at his watch. “A quarter to three, and I haven’t slept ten minutes thus far to-night. Oh, I’ll be in fine condition to-morrow!”

But he felt that the trick must be worn out, and he went back to bed. Exactly twenty minutes later, just as he was beginning to breathe heavily, another clock began to bang away. Browning awoke, and groaned.

“What! again?” he almost sobbed.

He got up, and searched for the clock. It took him four minutes to find it hidden among the slats of his bed.

As in the other cases, a slip of paper was attached to the thing, and he read:

“Don’t you care, old man—it’ll soon be daylight.”

He dropped the clock, and it went bounding merrily under the bed, keeping up its cheerful racket.

“Come out here!” he roared, thrusting himself after it. “Don’t try to dodge me! Don’t try to hide from me!”

He touched it, with a frantic sweep of his arm, but knocked it still farther away.

Then he tore a slat from the bed, and struck at the clock, knocking it out on the farther side. When he tried to back out from beneath the bed, the frame had him pinned across the shoulders, and he was forced to lift it before he could get out. In a burst of anger, he turned it over on its side. Then he got at the clock with the slat.

“Oh, I’ll settle you!” he roared, making a crack at the clock, but missing it entirely. “I’ll destroy you! I’ll hammer the stuffing out of ye! I’ll annihilate ye! Take that—and that! Yow!”

A piece of glass from the clock flew up and cut his face. The coil-spring hopped out, sailed through the air, and settled around his neck.

He dropped the slat, and caught at the spring.

“Come off, here!” he snarled, yanking at it. He cut his neck, and nearly tore his left ear from his head in getting the spring off.

Bleeding, perspiring, furious, he sat there in the middle of the floor, and looked around. The room was a spectacle. Furniture was smashed and scattered all about. The bed was upset, and the battered cases and scattered works of three clocks lay around, and a mirror showed him that he was almost the greatest wreck in the room.

“To-morrow,” he hissed, through his clenched teeth, “to-morrow, I shall be a murderer, for I shall kill the fiend who devised this piece of business!”

He decided that it was useless to try to sleep. He filled his pipe, and sat in an easy chair by the window. On the chair he planted himself in a comfortable position, prepared to wait for the next outbreak, and nip it in the bud. Exhausted nature, however, conquered. He smoked ten minutes, perhaps, and the pipe fell from his mouth.

It was fortunate for him that the next clock got “into gear” just when it did, for it aroused him so that he realized something was burning. He jumped up, with a yell, for his pajamas were afire. With frantic haste, he tore them off, smothering the fire, which had been caused by a spark from his pipe, by the aid of a rug. And the clock played a merry accompaniment while this was taking place.

He found the thing beneath the grate in the fireplace, and it was tagged. On the tag was written:

“Isn’t it just perfectly lovely in Paris!”

Once more he used the window, taking care this time not to hit anybody upon the street. It was near daybreak, and Bruce Browning had spent a very lively night. As the gray streaks of dawn crept in at his window, he gathered some of the bedding in the middle of the floor, and lay down there, where he fell asleep in the midst of the mess.

In the morning, three young men stopped before Bruce Browning’s door, and listened.

“I can’t hear anything,” said Rattleton, with his ear against a panel.

“I can’t see anything,” said Diamond, with his eye to the keyhole.

“Then we will investigate, and find out if he has passed a pleasant night,” said Frank Merriwell, taking a key from his pocket, and preparing to fit it to the lock of the door.

“Eh?” exclaimed Rattleton, staring at the key. “What’s that?”

“Hey!” cried Diamond. “Is that the key to the door?”

“Yes,” nodded Frank, with a smile.

“Where did you get it?”

“Took possession of it last night, after we’d distributed the clocks,” Merry explained. “There’s a spring-lock on all the doors in this hotel, and Browning never missed the key.”

Frank softly inserted the key in the lock, and turned it.

“I’ll bet a cannon wouldn’t arouse him now,” grinned Harry. “Needn’t be so easy, Frank.”

Merry pushed open the door, and the sight that met their gaze filled them with astonishment.

The room was a scene of disorder. Everything was upset, even to the bed. The furniture was scattered about in confusion, and the floor was strewn with the débris of shattered clocks. On the floor beside the overturned bed, Browning was wrapped in a mass of twisted and tangled bedclothing. A sheet was twisted round his throat, and his face was covered with cuts, bruises, and blood. There was blood on the bedding, and it looked as if a sanguinary encounter had taken place there. They came in, and stood looking down at him.

“Wheejiz!” snickered Harry. “It’s plain he had a lively time of it!”

“Looks like he’d fought for his life!” muttered Diamond.

“And he’s still enough to have lost the battle,” said Frank.

“You don’t suppose he was driven to suicide?” gasped Rattleton, in sudden alarm.

“Oh, no,” assured Frank. “Look—he is breathing. Listen—he is muttering some words in his sleep.”

Browning groaned, and thickly muttered:

“Fiends! You have ruined my sleep, but I’ll get square, if I——”

Then the words became an incoherent jumble.

Rattleton grinned.

“Scrate gott, but he did have a lively time of it! Look at this room! It’s a sight!”

“Look at him!” directed Frank. “He’s a sight! How in the world did he get battered and cut up like that?”

“Merriwell,” said Diamond, “he’s sure to be pretty ugly about this when he wakes up.”

“Oh, he’ll get over it. But I don’t believe he’ll forget his second night in Paris as long as he lives.”

“It’s retribution,” declared Rattleton. “Night after night he has tortured me, and kept me awake by his beastly snoring, and he’s been mad enough to eat me when I kicked about it. I didn’t think the clocks would disturb him at all.”

“But it seems that they did,” observed Diamond, with a faint smile.

Rattleton was for sneaking out of the room as quietly as possible, without disturbing Browning, but Frank could not think of leaving without letting Bruce know they had seen him. So they all stood around the big fellow, and sang “Kathleen Mavourneen.”

The big fellow grunted, groaned, kicked—awoke!

For a few moments it was evident he did not catch on to the situation. He lay there, amid the tangled bedding, staring up at the laughing lads, and blinking in a comical manner, so that Rattleton broke down, and began to laugh.

“Huah!” grunted Bruce.

Then Frank and Jack stopped, and Merry said:

“Excuse me, please. I hope this doesn’t disturb you.”

“Waugh!” Bruce struggled to a sitting posture, with the bedspread twisted about his neck like a muffler.

“I hope you are resting well,” snickered Rattleton.

Browning began to tear at the bedspread, a look of rage coming to his bruised and lacerated face.

“You must be very, very tired,” observed Diamond seriously.

A howl of fury escaped Browning’s lips. He looked around the room, and saw the overturned furniture, and the shattered clocks. In a moment, he remembered all the horrors of the previous night.

“You imps of Satan!” he thundered, making a floundering jump to get upon his feet. “I have sworn an oath of vengeance! My time has come! Not one of you leaves this room alive!”

Then his tangled feet tripped him up, and he sprawled on the floor, with a crash, causing the three lads to shout with laughter.

“You seem to be excited, Bruce,” said Frank. “I hope nothing happened in the night to disturb you.”

“Excited!” exploded Browning, tearing at the bedclothes, and ripping a sheet from end to end. “Oh, no, I’m not excited! Let me get my hands on you, Frank Merriwell! You’ll never put up another job like this!”

“You should take something for your nerves,” advised Frank. “It’s plain you have bad dreams. Why don’t you try Mrs. Soothlow’s Wynsling Syrup?”

Browning got hold of a chair, and threw it at Frank, who dodged, and the chair knocked down a mirror.

“You’ll have a nice little bill to pay when you settle for things here,” said Diamond.

“You go to blazes!” cried the enraged giant. “You come round here and grin at me, and you never had sense enough to think up a good practical joke in all your life! Get out of here! Get out lively, if you want to escape with your life!”

“Alas! alas!” exclaimed Frank, with a tragedy pose. “He is mad!”

“You bet I’m mad!” agreed Bruce. “I’m madder than a wet setting hen! I’ll get back at you for this job!”

He got onto his hands and knees, for the purpose of rising, but Merry promptly pushed him over with his foot, causing the big fellow to gnash his teeth.

“Fellows,” said Merry, “we must commit him to an asylum for the violently insane. It is plain that he’s dangerous.”

Browning tore off the baffling bedspread, and again struggled to get up, actually intending to wreak vengeance on them by personal violence; but Merry caught hold of two ends of the spread, and tripped him up with a loop of it, while Rattleton basted him on the head with a pillow, and Diamond picked up all the clothes and flung them on top of him. To finish the job, Merry turned the bedstead over upon him.

“Now, will you be good?” chirped Rattleton.

“We must leave you, Bruce,” said Diamond.

“And we hope you will be feeling better when we return,” laughed Merriwell.

Browning protruded his head from one side of the mass that was piled upon him, and gasped:

“This—settles—it!”

He would have said more, but they shouted with laughter again, and left him there to extricate himself as best he could, closing the door behind them as they went out.