Part 2

After the tyrants had stamped upstairs, Bert, who during the momentous period had reclined calmly on the brocaded divan, sat up, thrust his hands into his pockets and frowned thoughtfully. “I guess we made a mistake, fellows,” he said. “We ought to have been upstairs. They’ll think now that we’re afraid of them. And we aren’t.”

“Not a bit!” declared Lanny stoutly, glancing apprehensively at the hall door.

“N-no,” murmured Small nervously.

“So let’s go up now and face them, eh?” Bert said.

Dead silence greeted this suggestion. Lanny whistled softly and seemed to be giving the plan careful consideration. Small became deeply interested in the snow-covered and lamp-lighted drive and Kid, catching Bert’s eye, winked mischievously.

“Sure,” he said, “let’s go up and defy them!”

“That’s all well enough for you,” said Small. “You’re such a little fellow that they won’t hurt you!”

“I’m only a year younger than you are,” replied Kid warmly, “and I’m ’most as big. You’re afraid, that’s what’s the matter with you!”

“Cut it out, you two,” said Lanny. “What time is it?”

Bert peered at the ornate clock on the mantel. “’Most six,” he answered. “We’ve got to go up pretty soon, whether we want to or not.”

That couldn’t be denied.

“Perhaps we’d better go now,” said Lanny. “It will look better. I kind of wish, though, we hadn’t added that postscript at the last; it sounds awfully cheeky.”

“Well, whose idea was it?” demanded Small. “I told you not to do it.”

“Oh, we might as well be killed for sheep as lambs,” remarked Bert cheerfully. “Come on, fellows; brace up; they can’t kill us. But remember, now, no shacking!”

“Let’s talk about something on the way up,” said Lanny. “It――it’ll sound as though we weren’t scared.”

“Talk about me,” chirped up Kid pertly. “I’m awfully interesting.”

“Talk about the skating races Saturday,” said Lanny. “There’s a race for juniors, you know. Who’s going in for it?”

With that Bert opened the door and the four crossed the hall with a bit of a swagger and mounted the stairs, talking volubly but very much at random.

“It’s a quarter of a mile,” said Lanny, “and I think that’s too short, don’t you?”

“I must have my skates ground,” said Kid.

“Why don’t they have a handicap race?” asked Bert.

“The mile is sure to go to Ben,” said Small. “He’s a peach of a skater.” Small’s voice was unnecessarily loud and Bert turned to him with a frown.

“Quit swiping, Frye,” he hissed, adding in an equally penetrating voice: “I shouldn’t think Holden could skate much; he looks so awkward.”

Small shuddered. Then they parted to seek their own rooms.

“Well, where have you been?” growled Ben as Bert entered Number 2. “I’ve been waiting for you for half an hour.”

“Oh, just around,” replied Bert vaguely.

“Well, find my slippers for me.”

“Oh, no,” answered Bert. “We’re not doing that any more. It’s out of fashion.”

Ben glared fearsomely. “We’ll see whether it’s out of fashion, my fresh young kid!” He arose and started around the table after Bert. Bert held his ground, although I’m not pretending that he was quite easy of mind.

“You touch me, Holden,” he said evenly, “and I’ll kick your shins. I’ve given you fair warning.”

Then Ben seized him, Bert kicked him and there was a very pretty little fracas for a minute or two, from which Bert emerged somewhat breathless and unscathed and Ben with one painful contusion on his left shin. For Ben, in spite of his bullying proclivities, was not cruel, and had only sought to tweak Bert’s ears. Still, it wouldn’t do to acknowledge defeat, and so as he drew off he said in a fierce tone: “Now, then, find those slippers!”

But Bert shook his head. “Can’t, Holden; I’ve joined the union. Didn’t you read the proclamation?”

“I don’t care about any proclamation,” replied Ben wrathfully. “_You get those slippers!_”

“No, I won’t. What’s more, Holden, I’m through running errands and waiting on you. I didn’t come here to be any fellow’s servant.”

“It’s the――the custom here, Bryant, and you’ve got to do it!”

“I don’t approve of the custom,” answered Bert coolly. “It’s a very silly one. Why should I wait on you any more than you on me?”

“Because you’re a junior and I’m a senior. I’m older than you, and――――”

“If you’re older you’re also stronger,” said Bert, “and so you’re better able to do things than I am. Anyway, I’m through. And so are the others. We’ve struck.”

“We’ll see about that, you fresh kid! Once more, now; I shan’t ask you again; will you get those slippers?”

“For the last time, Holden, I won’t.”

“Very well. You’ll be mighty sorry, though.” Ben took refuge in dignity. “It isn’t likely that we’re going to stand for having a new boy come in here――and disrupt the school. We――we’ll deal with you later.”

Bert, without replying, washed for supper, and a moment later the bell rang. Ben went down to the dining-room in his shoes. The twelve boys sat at two tables, the seniors and upper middlers at one, presided over by Mr. Folsom, and the lower middlers and juniors at the other, under the supervision of Mr. Crane. Doctor Merton, with his wife and daughter, occupied a small table at the end of the room. Whispering was not countenanced, and so the mutineers could not compare notes. Lanny looked flustered and defiant, Kid excited and happy and Small worried. Once Bert encountered Nan’s eyes across the room and received a look that he couldn’t fathom, not knowing that Nan had learned of the mutiny and was doing her best to convey to him that she was just terribly excited and was dying to hear all about it. Then Mr. Crane, helping the last portion of cold roast beef, remarked:

“Well, you boys want to eat plenty, you know. There’s hard work ahead this evening.”

This pleasantry elicited no response and he pretended to be surprised. As a matter of fact, Mr. Crane had found the proclamation on the mantel, had laughed over it with Mr. Folsom and had subsequently taken it to Doctor Merton.

“Eh?” he went on. “Isn’t this the night we fix the slide, Crandall?”

“Yes, sir, I believe so,” replied Crandall.

“I thought so. Well, there’s plenty of snow. Last year you had rather hard work, if I remember.”

“Yes, sir, we did.”

“How are you with a snow shovel, Bryant; pretty husky?”

“Only fair, sir. No good at all after dark.”

“How’s that?”

Bert shook his head. “I hardly know how to explain it, sir,” he replied, “but I can’t seem to hold a shovel in the evening.”

“Dear, dear! Quite remarkable, Bryant. You must have a new sort of disease.” Kid was grinning delightedly. “Well, you haven’t any trouble of that sort, have you, Fairchild?”

“I’m afraid I have,” piped the boy. “The thought of a snow-shovel makes me quite ill, sir.”

“Good gracious! The disease is catching! And you, Grey? Are you experiencing the symptoms, too?”

“Yes, sir,” muttered Lanny.

“What? Why, this is――is surprising! I must ask the Doctor to look into it. Frye, you――don’t tell me you have it, too!”

Small looked at his plate and nodded silently. Mr. Crane leaned back in his chair astounded.

“Well, well! But let’s learn the worst, Crandall?”

“No, sir,” replied Crandall with a grin.

“Ah! And Cupples?”

“Not yet, sir.”

“Good! There is hope! But what about the slide? You don’t think, Bryant, that you could――ah――overcome this――this aversion?”

“No, sir,” answered Bert cheerfully. “It has a firm hold on me.”

“Really! And I can see by your countenance, Grey, that you, too, are past recovery. And Frye, and Fairchild. Why, it looks to me as though Crandall and Cupples would have to do all the work. That’s too bad.”

“I’m willing to do my share,” said Crandall, “but I don’t propose to go out there and cover that slide alone.”

“But you’ll have Cupples to help you.”

“Not much, Mr. Crane. What’s the matter with the upper grade fellows doing it?”

“Tut, tut, Cupples! You surely wouldn’t propose that seriously? Why, they might get their feet cold!”

“I guess they have the same disease we have,” said Kid.

“Um; maybe; perhaps another form of it. Well, things look bad for the slide, don’t they? Perhaps the Doctor and Mr. Folsom and I will have to attend to it this time.”

Kid grinned at the idea. “I’d like to see you,” he said.

After supper, in the hall, Pierce remarked pleasantly:

“Well, juniors and lowers, this is the night we fix the toboggan slide, you know.”

“Do you?” asked Kid interestedly. “May I come and watch you, Dick?”

A roar of laughter greeted this, even Ben being obliged to smile.

“You may come and get busy with a shovel and pail, little smarty,” responded Gardner. “And all the rest of you. Now get a move on, for you’ve only got about an hour before prayers.”

But Kid shook his head. “No, thanks. It’s too cold out there, Dick. The doctor said I must be very careful of my health and avoid night air.”

Gardner frowned and glanced inquiringly at the others. Ben came to his support.

“You fellows think you’re awfully smart, I suppose,” he said, “but you’re making fools of yourselves. Either you go out and get that slide ready or you keep off it altogether. It’s either work or no tobogganing for you chaps.”

“I’d like to know when we’d get a show at it, anyway,” said Lanny. “You fellows would be using it all the time. It would be just like the rinks. A lot of fun we juniors get there!”

“You’re entitled to use the rinks whenever we aren’t practising,” said Ben.

“What of that? You always are practising!”

“Then you can use the slide,” said Steve Lovell. “Come on, Lanny, don’t be silly.”

“No, sir, we aren’t going to fix that slide,” responded Lanny, emphatically. “We aren’t going to do any more errands for anyone, or any more shacking.”

“You mean you won’t fix that slide?” demanded Ben.

“That’s what I mean!”

“We’ll be glad to go out and help,” remarked Bert calmly, “if you fellows will do your share. That’s fair enough, isn’t it?”

“You’ll do it all or it won’t be done,” snapped Ben.

“Then it won’t be done,” said Bert.

The upper grade fellows went into secret session in front of the fireplace. Crandall and Cupples attempted to persuade the youngsters to give in, but without success. Then Ben announced the ultimatum.

“We are going to fix that slide ourselves,” he said sternly, “and if we catch any of you juniors sliding on it we’ll wallop you good and hard. Come on, fellows!”

IV

THE FIRST SKIRMISH

The war was on.

The juniors may be said to have won the first skirmish, for the upper grade fellows, assisted by the two lower middlers, labored the better part of an hour that night, shoveling and carrying snow to the wooden part of the toboggan slide and subsequently sprinkling it with water so that it might freeze over night into a good foundation for further improvements; and this without help from the mutineers, who from the darkened windows of Small’s room, watched the work in warmth and comfort.

“First blood for our side,” murmured Kid gleefully.

When the workers returned with benumbed fingers and ice-coated boots it was evident that their attitude toward the offending juniors was to be one of silent contempt. Bert, Lanny, Small and Kid were absolutely ignored by all save Cupples and Crandall, who, so far, observed a difficult neutrality. During study hour Bert and Ben sat at opposite sides of the green-topped table and exchanged never a word, Bert deciding ruefully toward the end of the evening that much of that sort of thing would probably become very tiresome.

In the morning the revolutionists gained a convert. The convert was Nan. Nan was greatly excited and very enthusiastic. And she assured Bert and Lanny, who had gone out after breakfast to slide down the short coast afforded by the sloping driveway, that she was heart and soul with the Cause. They must never give in, she declared. She also said many other things about Tyranny, the Despot’s Heel, Right and Justice and Suffering for a Principle. The latter phrase misled Lanny until Nan explained that she was not referring to her father. Her words sounded very fine and the two boys were quite heartened. They had not thought of the thing as a Cause before and now Lanny began to look quite noble and heroic, or as noble and heroic as it is possible to look with a green plaid Mackinaw jacket and ear-muffs.

“What you must do, though,” continued Nan, sinking her voice to a sort of frozen whisper, “is to form a Society!”

“What sort of a society?” asked Bert.

“Why, a――a Society for Mutual Help and Protection.”

“Oh!” murmured Lanny, much impressed. “How would you do it?”

“Just――just do it, silly! I tell you what; come to the stable after morning school and organize. And meanwhile I’ll think up a good name for the Society. You must bring Small and Kid, too, you know. And you must have a password and――and a grip.”

“We’ll have the grippe all right if we sit around the stable long,” said Lanny. “It’s as cold in there as――as――――”

“A barn,” suggested Bert. “All right, we’ll be there, Miss Merton, right after school.”

“What do you call her Miss Merton for?” asked Lanny after Nan had hurried indoors again. “Her name’s Nan; except when you want to get her mad, and then it’s Nancy.”

“Well, I don’t know her very well yet,” answered Bert in excuse. “She seems a pretty good sort.”

“She is. She’s all right――for a girl. Girls always want to stick their noses into things, though. Just as though we couldn’t get up a society without her help!”

“Well, we wouldn’t have thought of it, I guess. And I’m glad she did. It’ll be rather fun, won’t it?”

“Sure. It must be a secret society, too. And we’ll vote for officers.”

This settled, they went on with the matter in hand, which was to start at the corner of the house and see how far they could make their sleds go around the corner into the road.

At ten minutes past twelve the four crept into the stable with appropriate stealthiness and found Nan already there. She led the way into the harness room, closed and locked the door and took command of the situation. There was a stove in the harness room, but as there was no fire in it it couldn’t be said to help the situation much. It was undoubtedly cold and Small remarked sarcastically that he didn’t see why the hall wasn’t good enough.

“Because,” replied Nan scathingly, “you can’t form a Secret Society with the whole world hearing every word you say. You’d be surrounded by your enemies in the hall.”

“I’d be surrounded by some heat, anyway,” muttered Small ungraciously.

“Dry up, Small,” commanded Lanny. “Now, then, what’s the first thing, Nan?”

“Choose a name. I’ve thought of several that might do. What do you think of ‘The League of Emancipators’?”

“Um,” said Bert. “But I think something shorter would be better.”

“Well, then, there’s ‘The Secret Four.’”

“What’s the matter with ‘The Four’?” asked Small.

“‘The Junior Four’ sounds pretty well,” Bert suggested. And the rest agreed that it did, Nan concurring and nobly striving to hide her disappointment over the fact that her names had been rejected.

“‘The Junior Four’ it is, then,” said Lanny briskly, breathing on his fingers to warm them. “Now what?”

“A password,” said Nan. “I couldn’t think of anything very――very striking.”

“Justice!” suggested Lanny.

“No surrender!” said Small.

“Non plus ultra!” piped Kid.

“You’re a goose,” laughed Nan. “That means ‘None better.’”

“I know what it means,” replied Kid. “I guess I’ve studied as much Latin as you have.”

“I guess you haven’t!” responded Nan indignantly. “The idea!”

“I’ve got a good one,” interrupted Lanny, who had been scowling ferociously at the stove. “‘All for one, one for all!’”

“You got that out of ‘The Three Musketeers,’” charged Small. “And, anyway, it’s ‘One for all and all for one.’”

“It is not! Is it, Bert?”

“I don’t know, but it sounds all right. ‘One for all and all for one.’”

“It’s fine!” declared Nan. “Now you must have officers.”

“What kind of officers?” asked Kid.

“Why, a――a president and a vice-president, I should think, and a secretary, and――and――――”

“A sergeant-at-arms,” said Small.

“I think Bert ought to be president,” declared Lanny, “because he started it all.”

That was agreed to, and finally Lanny was made vice-president, Small sergeant-at-arms and Kid secretary.

“I think,” said Bert, “we’d ought to make Miss――make Nan a member.” Nan clapped her hands, but her face fell the next instant.

“I couldn’t be, though, because, don’t you see, the name is The Junior Four. And I’m not a junior, and I’d be the fifth.”

“You could be an honorary member,” said Lanny. And so Nan was duly elected and with a flattering unanimity. After that Small thought they ought to have a grip and showed them three he knew of. Then Lanny demonstrated one he liked and there was much handshaking and confusion for several minutes. In the end Small won and they all learned his grip. And as by that time the hour for dinner was near at hand the first meeting of The Junior Four was adjourned, subject to the call of the secretary. Kid, still smarting a little under Nan’s aspersion on his knowledge of Latin, wanted to adjourn sine die and had the pleasure of explaining that sine die meant “without day.” Small said it sounded more like “without sense” and refused to adjourn in any such manner. Nan cautioned them that it would be best to avoid suspicion, and to this end they left the stable one by one, at minute intervals; all except Small, who, left the last, refused to freeze to death for any principle or cause and sneaked out long before his time was up.

All this was on Thursday, and for the rest of the day The Junior Four stayed very close together, not knowing at what moment the upper grade fellows might tire of their present attitude of contemptuous silence and indulge in violence. By the time afternoon school was over the day students had learned of the situation and had already begun to take sides, and by the next noon the school was sharply divided into camps. The rivalry between house students and day students was for the time forgotten and upper grade fellows hastened to the support of Ben and his cohorts and lower grade boys flocked to the standard of Bert and Lanny and the others. Being at last forced to choose sides, Cupples and Crandall threw in their lots with the revolutionists, and with their enlistment the last semblance of peace vanished. Every room was divided against itself, for every room was occupied by an upper grade fellow and a lower grade fellow. The second floor of the house these evenings was strangely quiet. To be sure, when study hour was over the lower grade fellows managed to get together somewhere, while Stanley Pierce’s room became the regular meeting place for the enemy. But as these meetings were generally councils of war the usual chatter of voices and ring of laughter were missing. The first real engagement of the opposing forces occurred on Friday afternoon and resulted in a victory for the revolutionists, as you shall see.

Small resided in Number 5 with George Waters. Waters had been, from the first, in favor of strong methods and the heavy hand in dealing with the mutiny, and on this occasion his patience deserted him. Hurrying upstairs after school, he found Small struggling into a sweater. Waters was after an extra skate strap, and, after searching everywhere in vain, he charged Small with having hidden it. Small denied it indignantly, and Waters, having worked himself into a fit of bad temper, insisted that Small should help look for it. Small, inwardly quaking, refused. There was a wordy war, and in the end Waters took the key from the inside of the door.

“You’ll stay here until you find that, Small,” he declared from the doorway. “We’ll see whether you’ll do as you’re told!”

With that Waters departed, locking the door after him and pocketing the key. Left imprisoned, Small merely grinned and shrugged his shoulders. He had promised to go skating on the creek with the other juniors and Nan, but he much preferred a warm room and a book to read. Ten minutes later, his feet on the radiator and a rattling good book in his hands, Small had quite forgotten Waters, his imprisonment, the Cause and all else. Half an hour passed unheeded and then voices called from outside:

“Small! O you Small!”

Small, unheeding, read on. The hero was cutting his way through the jungle of South Africa closely pursued by a band of head-hunters.

“_Small! Where are you, Small?_”

This time Small heard and looked out of the window. Down below in the snow stood Lanny and Bert, come in search of him. Small opened the window.

“Hello,” he said. “I can’t come out. Waters has locked me in.”

Bert and Lanny thrilled. Here was war to the knife!

“Did he take the key?” asked Bert.

“I don’t know; I guess so. It’s all right, though; I don’t mind staying here.”

“Don’t you worry,” cried Lanny, “we’ll get you out.”

They hurried into the house and upstairs. The second floor was deserted. Every key they could lay their hands on was tried, but none fitted. From beyond the door Small begged them not to trouble, assuring them that he was quite resigned.

“One for all and all for one!” cried Lanny, undismayed. “Keep up your courage. We’ll get a ladder.”

“Bully!” said Bert.

“But I don’t want――” began Small. It was quite lost, however, for the others were already halfway down the stairs. Luckily the room was on the back of the house, out of sight of the rink; although it is probable that Waters was much too busy playing hockey to notice what might be happening at the house. It was only a minute’s work to carry the long ladder from the basement and set it up outside Small’s window, one end in a rhododendron clump and the other against the sill. Small viewed it doubtfully.

“I don’t want to climb down that thing,” he demurred. “I might fall.”

“Hurry up,” Bert commanded. “They may come back. Get your sweater and cap.”

“But――but I tell you――――”

“Say,” interrupted Lanny impatiently, “you don’t want those fellows to say that they got the better of us, do you? Get a move on, can’t you? Gee, I never saw such a slow-poke!”

At that moment Nan and Kid, having waited some time for the return of Bert and Lanny, appeared on the scene.

“Hello,” cried Kid, “what’s the fun, fellows?”

The matter was hurriedly explained, while Small frowned down from the open window rebelliously.

“What ho! A rescue!” cried Kid. “Let me go up and carry him down, will you, Lanny?”

Nan was visibly excited. “It’s perfectly lovely!” she declared. “Think how chagrined they will be when they come back and find――find the prey has escaped them! Oh, hurry, Small, hurry!”

“I don’t want to hurry,” growled Small. “I don’t intend to break my neck getting down that old thing.”

“But you’ve got to,” said Bert. “How are we going to rescue you if you don’t?”

“I don’t want to be rescued!”

“You’ve got to be,” declared Lanny. “Out you come, now. If you don’t we’ll go up there and get you. I’m not going to have a perfectly good rescue spoiled by you.”

“Yes, please do,” begged Nan.

“A rescue! A rescue!” chanted Kid shrilly, dancing around in the snow. Small debated with himself a minute and finally disappeared in search of sweater and cap.

“You fellows make me tired,” he growled when he returned to the window. “Why can’t you let me alone? I don’t want to be rescued. I don’t want to go skating. I don’t want――――”

“Cut out the regrets and hurry the job,” advised Lanny.

Small cautiously climbed over the sill and set one foot tentatively on the ladder. Then he looked down. It seemed an awfully long way to the ground. “Some one hold it,” he grumbled. Lanny and Nan obeyed. Small tried the second rung, found that it held and that he was still alive, and essayed the third. His head was below the window sill now and the rescue was progressing famously. At that instant Kid harkened to the voice of the Imp of Mischief.

“Small,” he called, “try that next round with your foot before you put your weight on it. It looks weak.”

Small turned and cast a horrified look at the rung in question, and clung desperately to the ladder.