Читать книгу Jerry Todd and the Purring Egg - Edward Edson Lee - Страница 4

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When supper was over I hunted up Scoop, telling him about my job, and the two of us headed for Zulutown. As we turned into the Cap’n’s yard Bid Stricker, who lives close by, came into sight. I don’t remember what he said to us, but it was something smart. That’s the kind of a kid he is. It’s no wonder we have it in for him.

“He’s still out there in the Cap’n’s yard,” said Scoop, when we had gone into the barn where the incubator was.

I got my nose to a crack in the barn’s wooden wall.

“There comes Jimmy Stricker,” I pointed, naming Bid’s smaller cousin.

“I can see Hib Milden, too,” said Scoop.

“One, two, three, four, five,” I counted. “Look! Bid’s telling the gang something about us—he’s pointing this way.”

“Maybe they’re going to attack us,” said Scoop. “Let’s get the door closed and lock ourselves in.”

Pretty soon there was a bang! bang! of rocks on the side of the barn. But that didn’t worry us. We were safe. And we had a lot of fun yelling stuff at the rock throwers.

“I wish, though,” said Scoop, during the bombardment, “that we had some rocks, too. Then we’d show them that this is a game that two sides can play at.”

“I’d rather have a stack of rotten eggs,” I laughed. “Oh, boy! Wouldn’t it be fun to paste Bid with a nice ripe egg! One that had been laying around in the sun for a month or two.”

Five or ten minutes passed. It was quiet outside the barn now. The yard was deserted. Having failed in their attack on us, the enemy had vanished.

“But let’s not be fooled,” said Scoop, using his head. “They may be up to some kind of a trick. You know Bid. Before we open the door we’ll make sure that they’ve gone.”

As I say, the Cap’n’s incubator was in the barn. And now, in the quiet following the enemy’s attack, we gave the home-made egg hatcher some attention. Dad had said that we were to keep the thermometer at a hundred and three. We found that the thermometer was all right. So there was nothing for us to do except to wait around until the old man came home on the ten-thirty train.

Now, ten-thirty isn’t late. Lots of nights I’ve been up until eleven or twelve o’clock. I can remember a few nights when I stayed up even later than that. But watching an incubator isn’t very exciting sport. And as it got close to ten o’clock we had a fight on our hands to keep the sleep out of our eyes.

“Ho-hum!” yawned Scoop, stretching. “I’m pretty near asleep, Jerry.”

“Me, too,” I yawned.

“It looks foolish to me staying here. The incubator’s all right.”

“The Cap’n wouldn’t have asked us to stay,” I said, “if it wasn’t important.”

“Do you suppose he’s testing the incubator?”

“Probably. He’s been working on it for weeks. You know that.”

“Huh!” grunted Scoop, turning up his nose at the home-made egg hatcher. “It doesn’t look like much of an invention to me. All it is is a box with a lamp in it.”

“The Cap’n thinks it’s a very wonderful invention,” I said.

“Yah, he told me how he was going to get it patented and make a fortune.”

“I hope he does,” I waggled.

I was thinking at the moment how very poor the Cap’n was. And I was thinking, too, how bully it would be if he did get a fortune out of his invention.

It was years and years ago that the old man first came to Tutter. He was a canal-boat captain then. That was before I was born. We don’t have canal boats in and through Tutter now. They sort of went out of business. I guess they were too slow. Anyway, the Cap’n found himself out of a job. And because he had lost a leg at the knee he was given a small monthly pension. He lives in one of Dad’s houses in Zulutown.

Scoop and I kept on yawning and stretching. Then the leader went to the door and squinted outside into the moonlit yard.

“I wonder if the Strickers are still laying for us.”

“You don’t see them?”

“No.”

“Anyway,” I said, “they’d be hid.”

“Sure thing. . . . Say, Jerry, I’ve got a notion to do some scouting.”

“If they catch you,” I said, “they’ll paste you good and proper.”

“Oh, I won’t let them catch me. They aren’t smart enough for that. Lock the door when I go out. When I want to come in I’ll whisper ‘eggs.’ See?”

Left alone in the silent, shadowy barn I suddenly got the queer, shaky feeling that I was being watched. I don’t know what gave me that feeling—certainly I hadn’t heard anything or seen anything to alarm me. But, as I say, the feeling came to me suddenly.

I had a lantern. And turning up the wick as high as it would stand without smoking, I took a look around the barn. There was nobody in the lower part of the building. I was sure of that.

The haymow! I looked up quickly, expecting to see a face in the opening at the head of the ladder. But there was no face there. And still the barn, both above and below, was as silent as a tomb. I was shivering now.

I ran to the door when I heard Scoop. But I forgot my scare when I saw what he was carrying.

“Hot dog!” he laughed. “I fooled Bid Stricker that time. Say, I pulled a clever one on him. Brag on me, kid. I deserve it.”

“Is Bid out there?” I whispered.

“Sure thing. The whole gang is parked in the weeds. They’re waiting for us to start for home. Ripe tomatoes! That’s what they had for us. But they haven’t got the tomatoes now. For I crawled up on them and swiped their juicy ammunition. Lookit! Here’s a whole bagful.”

I got a big juicy tomato out of the bag.

“Oh, mamma!” I cried, winding up my throwing arm. “I’d like to squash this in Bid’s face.”

The leader was as eager for a battle as I was.

“That’s the stuff, Jerry,” he laughed. “Get your arm limbered up. Are you ready? Here we go.”

Gee! I like to think of the fun we had that night. We loaded up with tomatoes. I had ten or twelve, I guess. Nice big juicy fellows. I could imagine how they would squash and splatter when they struck. Scoop had a supply, too. And thus armed we let ourselves out of the barn and crawled toward the enemy.

We could hear low voices now.

“I wonder if they’re going to stay in the barn all night,” Bid grumbled to his gang.

Hib Milden snickered.

“They’ll wish they’d stayed in the barn forever when they get our tomatoes. Sweet doctor! I’ve been waiting for this chance to soak Jerry Todd. That kid thinks he’s smart.”

“Huh!” grunted Bid. “How about Scoop Ellery?”

“They both need some tomato soup,” laughed Jimmy Stricker.

“Yah,” said Hib, “and they’re both going to get it, bu-lieve me.”

Scoop nudged me in the ribs.

“Tomato soup, Jerry!”

“They’ll think it’s tomato soup,” I giggled, “when we land on them.”

“You tell ’em, kid.”

“Shall we soak ’em now?” I breathed in his ear.

“No need to hurry,” he whispered back. “Let’s lay and listen to their gab for a few minutes. This ‘tomato soup’ talk of theirs is funny.”

Hib was the next one to speak up.

“What’s their idea in staying in the barn?” he grunted.

“They’re taking care of the Cap’n’s incubator,” Bid explained.

“Why doesn’t he take care of it himself?”

“He isn’t here. He went over to Ashton this afternoon.”

“Huh!” grunted Hib. “They’re his pets.”

“I heard him talking with Jerry’s pa,” said Bid. “That’s how I came to know that Jerry was going to be here to-night.”

There was a moment’s silence. And creeping closer, I got a glimpse of the enemy in the weeds. The moon showed them up. But we were careful that the same moon didn’t show us up.

“How many tomatoes have you got?” inquired Hib.

“A whole bagful,” said Bid. “I swiped all Mrs. Maloney had in her garden.”

Hib got on his knees and moved around.

“I can’t find the bag.”

“It’s there where you are.”

“Like so much mud.”

“It was there a moment ago.”

“Well, it isn’t here now.”

Scoop snickered.

“We know where the bag is. Eh, Jerry?”

“Tomato soup,” I whispered back.

Bid and his gang were stirring around now.

“What do you know about that?” said the leader, excited-like. “The bag’s gone!”

Scoop pinched my arm.

“Get ready, Jerry. I’ll take the Stricker cousins and Hib. You take the other two. Soak ’em good. Then skin back to the barn.”

I took aim. Bing! My man got it square on the back of the head. Boy, did that old tomato ever squash and splatter! In the same moment Bid got one on the neck.

“How do you like that?” yipped Scoop, slamming away with his ammunition. “You will lay for us, hey? Pretty good tomatoes, hey? You took all Mrs. Maloney had, hey? They sure make swell tomato soup.”

“Yah,” I yipped, “how do you like our kind of tomato soup? Pretty good stuff, hey?”

“Sock ’em, Jerry!”

“Bu-lieve me I am soaking ’em,” I cried, pumping away.

There was an awful howl from the splattered enemy.

“We’ll get you for this!” yelled Bid, coughing up a pack of tomato seeds.

“Oh! . . .” gurgled Hib. “I got one in the mouth.”

“Your mouth’s so big we couldn’t miss it,” I yelled.

“Swallow this one,” cried Scoop, letting fly.

“Oh! . . .” howled Hib, clawing at the gob on his face.

Well, we ran the smart Alecks out of the yard. That wasn’t hard to do. For they haven’t much grit. Besides, we had the upper hand of them now. They managed to find a few rocks. But we had ten times as much ammunition as they had.

Coming out victorious in the fight, and proud of it, we scooted back to the barn.

“Lookit!” cried Scoop, in sudden amazement. “The barn’s on fire!”

We dashed inside, finding that the incubator had been tipped over in our absence. It was the escaping kerosene, used in the lamp, that had set fire to the barn floor.

Well, we stamped on the fire and put it out. Then we got the incubator up. Its legs were all right. Nothing was broken or disconnected. So we knew that the incubator hadn’t tumbled over of its own accord. Some one had tipped it over.

I told Scoop then about my scare.

“There was some one in the haymow,” I declared.

The leader grabbed the lantern.

“Come on,” he gritted, starting for the ladder.

I don’t mind telling you that I had a wabble in my legs as I followed the leader up the ladder into the haymow. I had the feeling that we were doing something risky. For if there was a man up there of an evil turn of mind he would have us at a disadvantage. And certainly he must be of an evil turn of mind, I concluded, to set fire to the barn.

But the haymow was empty.

“It must have been some tramp,” Scoop concluded. “While we were out fighting the Strickers he beat it.”

“But why did he tip the incubator over?” I puzzled.

“Search me,” shrugged the leader.

I had the lantern now. And suddenly I made a discovery.

“Lookit!” I cried, pointing to the haymow floor.

What I had discovered was a pool of blood on the hay-covered floor. It wasn’t dry blood—when I touched it I got red finger tips.

We had proof now that some one had been in the haymow—some one who was injured and bleeding. It could have been a tramp, as Scoop had said, for tramps had been known to sleep in the Cap’n’s barn. But why, we asked ourselves, puzzled, had the injured tramp tried to burn the barn down?

It was a mystery, sort of.