University of Virginia Library

CHAPTER XXVII.
READY FOR THE TEST.

COLONEL PEPPER came out of the door just as they sauntered up. Rod thought that he gave them a sharp look; but on the whole he did not wonder at it; for if the other were, as appearance indicated, engaged in such a dangerous practice as coining imitations

of the money of the Government, he must be living under a daily strain, and could not see a stranger in the neighborhood without his guilty conscience causing him to anticipate all sorts of terrible things.

Either he must be in the power of the sly Silas Goober; or else the profits of the risky game caused him to defy all these chances of arrest by the authorities.

Elmer immediately commenced to speak of what he had seen in the neighborhood, to remind him of old days, and in this way soon caused the other to lose any uneasy feeling he may have entertained.

The boys presently trooped away to their rooms, in order to wash up for supper. Rod saw the oily Goober appear on the scene just as soon as they left.

"It's just as well that we made up our minds to keep on guard all the time, and not show any sign of knowing anything wrong," he suggested to Elmer; "because I believe that man was watching us from somewhere, all the time we stood talking with the colonel. A single exchange of looks might have told him enough to upset all our plans. 'Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty,' we've been repeating at school ever so long now, Elmer, and it's so right now and here."

"I agree with you, Rod," was what the other replied. "We must remember that when Mistah Goober isn't in sight the chances are he's somewhere

around watching us, as a cat would a mouse. But we'll fool him yet, see if we don't."

"Who's that you're talking about?" asked Hanky Panky, "suspicious Silas mebbe. He's sure the limit, ain't he? But we're agoin' to pull the wool over his eyes; all the same; that is, if Rooster c'n only keep that headache racket up, so he won't want to chirp, and say somethin' he hadn't ought to."

"'Speak for yourself, John Alden,' said Priscilla," chuckled the said Rooster.

"Every tub's got to stand on its own bottom in this thing, ain't it, Rod? And let me tell you right here, Hanky Panky, when I make out to have the awfullest toothache ever, nobody ain't agoin' to bother thinkin' I'm fakin', either. I c'n do the same to the king's taste. I've had practice, I have. Stayed home from school many a time just that way. Ouch! there she jumps again," and Rooster certainly did give every indication of passing through a most severe infliction, as he propped up one side of his face with his hand.

"That's all very fine, Rooster," remarked Josh, with a chuckle, "but if I was you I'd make sure to remember which side it was that ached. Just a little while back it was the left; and now you're makin' out it's the right side."

Hanky Panky at this commenced to laugh, as though he rather enjoyed seeing the other picked on in this way. Rooster, however, simply looked at Josh in a supercilious way.

"Huh!" he grunted, "what's the matter with you, anyway? Didn't you hear me say right in the beginnin' that this here was a jumpin' toothache. One time she's on the right side, and then on the left; and I never do know where it's likely to hit me next. Huh!"

"Oh! excuse me, Rooster," grinned Josh; but after that it was noticed that the accommodating toothache always came along on the left side; showing that Rooster at least had taken the hint; which was just as well, for one of the two men might have thought it an uncommonly queer ache that struck in first here and then there, as though all the teeth in his two jaws were on the rampage.

A short time afterwards a bell sounded, and the five boys trooped into the dining-room, chatting and laughing together as though they did not have a care in the wide world.

The colonel was already on hand, but no Silas Goober. Upon Rod asking, he was assured that just before supper-time an urgent message had come from the city requiring the presence of the great lawyer there on a matter of importance, and he had started off. The colonel's car had indeed gone away, but Rod chanced to notice that besides the chauffeur there was not another person in it. Hence he now believed that this report of the Goober's going was a deception, given out for a purpose, possibly to cause the boys to be careless, and when the colonel did not seem to be looking, to exchange signs.

Rod knew that he must put the others on their guard. Accordingly he made a certain sign that they could understand. It was only to blow his nose four separate times, and very loudly; but in so many words it told each of the others what his suspicions were, and that he did not believe the man had left at all, but at that very moment might be where he could observe them, without any one being the wiser.

It warned Rooster that he must play his little part to perfection, just as if a real jaw-racking toothache had fallen to his portion; and that when Hanky Panky started in to show what he could do along the line of magic, he must give a genuine exhibition, and no humbug.

The black "mammy" who cooked for Colonel Pepper certainly did know her business, and Rooster's eyes fairly seemed to stick out of his head as he saw the great piles of tasty food which she proceeded to spread before them.

A hungry boy is hard to hold in, and just as soon as he could, Rooster started to make sad inroads on that supply, as though he was afraid it might vanish before his appetite had been half-way appeased.

Then all of a sudden he would remember that he had a treacherous tooth concealed somewhere about one of his jaws. And the savage way in which Rooster would clutch hold of the lower part of his face, and at the same time allow an expression of agony to steal over his whole convulsed face, was

enough to "wring tears from a stone," Rod thought.

It caused Hanky Panky to grin; but then, boys as a rule are singularly heartless when a companion is suffering pain; and if the colonel noticed that broad smile, he did not think it anything odd.

"Does it hurt as bad as that, son?" asked the colonel, as though he really felt sorry for the fellow who seemed to be writhing in such agony. "Now, if so be you cared to trust it to me, I've got a pair of pincers upstairs, an' I've yanked out teeth before now for pet dogs, yes, and coons too. I wouldn't mind going up with you, and trying to ease you some that way, if you say the word. And let me tell you, I pulled the last coon I tackled all around the room; but I got that tooth, remember that!"

But apparently Rooster shrank from having the offending molar touched, as a good many strong men have been known to do under similar conditions; he shook his head in the negative, and refused to utter a single word; but proceeded to once more do justice to the heaping plate before him, as though determined to try and forget his misery, or rather swallow it.

This was very humorous for the others, and they could not keep from nudging each other; but then that was just what they would be apt to do under normal conditions.

"Don't bother about him, Colonel," said Hanky Panky; "he's the biggest 'fraid-cat ever. I don't

beliebe he'd let you even look at his old tooth, no sir, not if you was to offer him ten dollars," and then Hanky Panky suddenly closed up, for his accidental mention of "money" had given him a thrill, as he recollected that in all probability he and his four chums were right then and there sitting at table with a desperate bogus money- maker, who, if he but knew how close he was to arrest at that minute, would be ready to show his ugly teeth, and do something awful.

Rod, to fill in the awkward gap that followed this sudden halt in Hanky Panky's talk, mentioned the fact to the colonel that one of their number chanced to be a fairly clever sleight-of-hand performer, and an enthusiastic student of the Black Art of legerdemain or necromancy.

This immediately interested the colonel, and he begged that Hanky Panky would favor him with some little exhibition. No one ever had to ask that favor twice of the same Hanky Panky; he was a little vain of his knowledge concerning the field of magic, and only too willing to oblige, if given half a chance.

It would hardly pay us to follow that meal to its long delayed conclusion. Let it be enough to say that the amateur magician gave a splendid demonstration of his powers, and gained much applause, both from the colonel, and also his comrades, who could appreciate a good thing when they saw it.

Why, there was Rooster so taken up with watching his friend Hanky mystify them all, that for nearly ten minutes his silly tooth actually forgot to pain him; and then, as if to make up for neglect, it seemed to give him a wicked jab that caused the poor chap to half jump up from his chair with agony, and go through a series of contortions that might have put him in the class with professional performers in the side show of a circus.

Finally the meal was ended, and they all adjourned to the living-room, where they sat around, and chatted for several hours. At the request of the colonel, who seemed to be enjoying this treat of having a lot of lively high-school boys under his roof, and willing to entertain him, they sang lots of songs; Hanky Panky entertained them to more wonderful "stunts" in the way of magic; and from time to time Rooster would caress his seemingly swollen jaw -- he had thrust a wad of cotton in his left cheek after supper was over -- and either groan dismally, or else look unspeakable things; but whenever the colonel gave him a nod, as though asking if he were ready to take the cure, the sufferer would immediately act as though his pain had miraculously disappeared.

Finally the boys began to yawn, for they were in one way really sleepy; and Rod declared that the colonel would have to excuse them, since they must get some rest so as to be in fit condition for the run

of the next morning; when they expected to start for Chattanooga, and put in a day or so exploring the famous battlefields by which the Tennessee city is surrounded.

"Good-night then, all of you!" said the colonel, rather genially; though Rod wondered whether he really meant it.

So they went away to their rooms. These were two in number, and connecting. They were also on the first floor, which both Elmer and Rod believed to be a good thing for the carrying out of their little scheme.

"We'll make out to turn in," whispered Rod, as they found themselves in the solitude of the rooms; "and later on, when the house seems to be quiet, why, I promise to wake you all up; for it's just as well that we put ourselves on our guard, so as to be ready for the worst that can happen. Better that five of us meet the trouble, than one, or even two."

"That suits me to a dot, Rod," declared Rooster, as he stretched himself; "and as some time will have to crawl past till then, why, p'raps a fellow might work in a little sleep -- that is, I mean, if this plagued toothache will let me. Ouch!"