The High School Boys Canoe Club | Page 7

saw the six
youngsters climbing up to look at their purchase. A broad, malicious
grin appeared on Ripley's face.
"Sold! sold!" gasped Dave Darrin. Then his face flushed with anger.
For the canoe, which looked well enough on exhibition, proved to have
three bad holes in her hull, which had been carefully concealed by the
manner in which the craft had been propped up on the truck.
The great war canoe looked worthless---certain to sink in less than sixty
seconds if launched!
CHAPTER II
"RIP" TRIES OUT HIS BARGAIN
Had a meaner trick ever been played on boys with whom it was so hard
to raise money?
"Ha, ha, ha!" chuckled Fred Ripley, so loudly that the dismayed, angry
boys could not fail to hear him.
"You sneak! You knew it all the time!" flared Dave Darrin, gazing
down in disgust at the lawyer's son.
"Maybe I did know," Fred admitted, yet speaking to Mr. Dodge. "You
see, one of my father's clerks served the papers which attached the
show."
There was no help for Dick & Co. They had parted with their money
and their "property" had been turned over to them.

It is an ancient principle of law that the buyer must beware. The
auctioneer had been most careful not to represent the canoe as being fit
for service. He had offered it as an historical curiosity!
Dick & Co. looked at the canoe anxiously.
"What shall we do with it?" asked Dave Darrin moodily.
"Make a bonfire of it?" asked Danny Grin.
"Might as well," Greg nodded.
"No, sir!" Dick interrupted. "Tom, what do you say? You're one of the
really handy boys. Can't this canoe be patched up, mended and put in
commission?"
"It might be done," Tom answered slowly.
The other five stood regarding him with eager interest.
"But we'd have to get an Indian here to show us how to do it."
"Where are the Indians that were here with the show?" asked Harry
Hazelton.
"They went away as soon as the show was attached," Dick answered.
"Probably they're hundreds of miles from here now. They were only
hired out to the show by their white manager, and they've gone to
another job. Besides, they were only show Indians, and probably
they've forgotten all they ever knew about canoe-building---if they ever
did know anything."
"Then I don't see but that we're just as badly off as ever," sighed Greg.
"We're out eighteen dollars and the fine canoe that we expected would
provide us with so much fun."
"The paddles look all right, anyway," spoke up Harry Hazelton, lifting
one out of the canoe and looking it over critically.

"Oh, yes, the paddles are all right, and the river is close at hand," spoke
Dave Darrin vengefully. "All we need is a canoe that will float."
"If it were a cedar canoe we might patch it easily enough," Prescott
declared. "But I've heard that there is so much 'science' to making or
mending a birch bark canoe that an amateur always makes the job
worse."
"Haw, haw, haw!" came boisterously from Fred Ripley. He and Mr.
Dodge were now standing before the table of the auctioneer's clerk.
Fred was paying down the remaining twenty-six dollars on the price he
had bid for the handsome chestnut pony.
"Yes, you're laughing at us, you contemptible Rip!" scowled Dave,
though he spoke under his breath. "You can afford to lose money, for
you always know where to get more. You knew this canoe was
worthless, and you deliberately bid it up on us---you scoundrel!"
"Shall we make Colonel Grundy a present of this canoe?" suggested
Danny Grin dolefully.
"The poor old man hasn't money enough to get the canoe away from
here, even if he wanted to," replied Dick, in a voice of sympathy.
"But how did the show folks manage to use this canoe?" asked Tom
Reade.
"They didn't, except on a truck in a street parade, I imagine," Dick
replied. "And that must be how the holes came to be in the bottom. The
sun got in its work on the bark and oil, and blistered the body of the
canoe so that it broke or wore away in spots. Oh, dear!"
The sale was over, but a few odds and ends remained. Fred Ripley,
having now paid the whole of his forty-one dollars through Mr. Dodge,
ordered his handsome new purchase led out.
A man came out, holding the pony's halter. He walked slowly, the pony
moving contentedly after him.

"A fine little animal!" glowed Fred, stroking the glossy coat.
"He---er---looks rather old, doesn't he?" ventured Mr. Dodge.
"Not so very old," Fred answered airily. "There is a lot of life and vim
left in this little fellow. And he can show speed, too, or I'm all wrong."