Guns and Snowshoes | Page 7

bill and also something more--at least fifteen or
twenty dollars." Mr. Dudder sighed at the thought of parting with so
much cash. "I shall take the amount out of your spending money, and
out of the money I was going to give you for Christmas"
"Can't I have the five dollars you promised me for Christmas?" gasped
Carl.
"Not a cent of it."
"Oh, you're a mean thing!" burst out Carl, and ran from the room before
his father could stop him.
CHAPTER IV
THE EXPLOSION
On the following afternoon Snap was walking down to the river front,
on an errand for his father, when he caught sight of Ham Spink and
Carl Dudder, under a lumber shed. The pair were conversing in an
earnest fashion, but ceased their conversation as Snap came closer.
Snap knew that Ham and Carl were in far from a friendly humor.
Through one boy he had learned how Carl had been treated by his
father, and through another how Andrew Felps had discovered that
Ham had been his aggressor. There had been a lively interview when
Mr. Felps and Mr. Spink had met, and in the end the latter had said he
would stand for all damage done. Then he had gone home and laid
down the law good and hard to Ham.
"To punish you I will cut off your spending money," said Mr. Spink,
and thus Ham and Carl found themselves in the same trouble so far as
cash was concerned. It galled them exceedingly, and, as was their habit,
they laid the blame entirely on others.
As Snap passed the shed both Ham and Carl scowled at him. Then,
after he had gone a dozen steps, Ham called out:

"Come back here. I want to talk to you."
"Did you address me?" demanded Snap, wheeling around.
"I did. Come here, I want to talk to you."
Snap did not budge.
"If you want to talk to me you can come where I am," he said.
"Oh, you needn't get so mighty high and loftly!" sneered Ham Spink.
"I am not your servant."
"Nice stories you and your crowd have been telling about me and Carl,"
went on Ham, coming closer.
"Trying to get us into trouble," put in Carl. "It's a jolly shame and you
ought to be thrashed for it."
"See here, Dudder, and you too, Spink," answered Charley firmly, "I
want no quarrel with you. Ever since our outing last summer you have
been like bears with sore heads. If your camping out was a failure it
wasn't our fault. When you hadn't any game we let you have some of
ours, and we did a great deal more for you than you deserved. Now--"
"Oh, don't preach!" cried Ham.
"What do you want of me?"
"I want to give you fair warning that neither I nor Carl will stand for
the way you are acting. Either you keep your distance, or it will be the
worse for you."
"I am not afraid of you."
"Well, you had better be."
"What do you mean by that?" demanded Snap. He fancied there might

be some hidden meaning to Ham Spink's words.
"Oh, you'll find out one of these days," came from Carl, significantly.
"If you try any of your underhanded tricks you'll get the worst of
it--just as you did up to the camp," answered Snap, and went on his
way.
"Oh, I wish I could mash him!" muttered Ham Spink, between his set
teeth.
"Yes, and mash the whole crowd of 'em," added Dodder. "I hate the
very sight of 'em!"
"Do you know that they are talking about camping out again?"
"What, this winter?"
"Yes."
"Where?"
"That I don't know."
"I'd like to spoil the trip for them."
"So would I. Maybe we can do it too, if we watch our chances."
The two talked the matter over for some time and when they separated
it was with the fixed determination to play some underhanded trick and
do "the Dodge crowd," as they called our friends much harm.
All of the boys who attended the local school had been waiting
impatiently to learn when the present session would come to an end.
Now it was announced that school would close the following Friday
afternoon and remain shut up for three weeks and a half.
"Hurrah! that will give us just time enough for a dandy outing!" cried
Whopper.

"You'll have to kill a bear a day to make up the number you said you'd
bring down," answered, Giant.
"Pooh! I never kill bears singly," sniffed Whopper. "I always kill them
in pairs or by the half dozen."
"We've got to make sure that we can go first," said Shep. "Remember
the school averages."
They did remember, and all were very anxious