The High School Boys Fishing Trip

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The High School Boys' Fishing
Trip

The Project Gutenberg eBook, The High School Boys' Fishing Trip, by
H. Irving Hancock
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Title: The High School Boys' Fishing Trip
Author: H. Irving Hancock
Release Date: June 25, 2004 [eBook #12730]
Language: English
Character set encoding: US-ASCII
***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE HIGH
SCHOOL BOYS' FISHING TRIP***
E-text prepared by Jim Ludwig

The High School Boys Fishing Trip or Dick & Co. in the Wilderness
By H. Irving Hancock

CONTENTS
CHAPTERS
I. Tom Reade has a "Brand-New One" II. Dodge and Bayless Hear
Something III. Dick & Co. Driven Up a Tree IV. Stalling the Red
Smattach V. Bert Dodge Hears the Battle Cry VI. Paid in Full---To
Date VII. The Box That Set Them Guessing VIII. The Man With the
Haunting Face IX. The Start of a Bad Night X. Powder Mills, or Just
What! XI. In a Fever "To Find Out" XII. Dick Makes a Find XIII.
Perhaps Ten Thousand Years Old XIV. More Mystery in the Air XV.
The Scream That Started a Race XVI. The Camp Invaded and Captured
XVII. Dick Makes Fish Talk XVIII. A Kettle of Hot Water for
Someone XIX. Bert Dodge Hears Frightful News XX. A Frenzied Ride
to Safety XXI. Real News and "Punk Heroes" XXII. Tom Tells the Big
Secret XXIII. "Four of Us are Pin-Heads!" XXIV. Conclusion
CHAPTER I
TOM READE HAS A "BRAND-NEW ONE"
"Hello, Timmy!"
"'Lo, Reade."
"Warm night," observed Tom Reade, as he paused not far from the
street corner to wipe his perspiring face and neck with his
handkerchief.
"Middling warm," admitted Timmy Finbrink.
Yet the heat couldn't have made him extremely uncomfortable, for Tom
Reade, amiable and budding senior in the Gridley High School, smiled

good naturedly as he stood surveying as much as he could make out of
the face of Timmy Finbrink in that dark stretch of the street.
Timmy was merely a prospective freshman, having been graduated a
few days before from the North Grammar School in Gridley.
Tom, himself, had been graduated, three years before, from the fine old
Central Grammar, whence, in his estimation, all the "regular" boys
came. As a North Grammar boy, Timmy was to be regarded only with
easygoing indifference. Yet a tale of woe quickly made Tom Reade his
young fellow citizen's instant ally.
"Aren't you out pretty late, Timmy, for a boy who isn't even a regular
high school freshman as yet?" inquired Reade, with another smile. "It's
almost nine-thirty, you know."
"Don't I know?" wailed Timmy Finbrink, with something of a shiver.
"It's getting later every minute, too, and I'm due for a trouncing when I
do go in, so what's the odds?"
"Who's going to give you that trouncing?" Tom demanded.
"My father," replied Timmy Finbrink.
"What have you been doing?"
"Pop told me to be upstairs and in bed by nine o'clock, without fail,"
Timmy explained. "I came along just five minutes ago, and found that
pop has the house planted for me. I can't slip in without his knowing
it."
"Oho! So your father has the other members of the family stationed
where they can see you, whichever way you go into the house?" asked
Reade, with genuine interest in the unfortunate Timmy.
"Nope," explained Timmy, with another shiver. "Mother and sister are
away visiting, and pop is all alone in the house."
"But he can't watch both the front and back doors at the same time,"

Reade suggested hopefully.
"Can't he do just that, though?" sputtered Timmy. "I've been scouting
on tip-toe around the house to get the lay of the land. Pop is smoking
his pipe, and has placed his chair so that he can see both the back and
the front doors, for he has the room doors open right through. There
isn't a ghost of a show to get in without being seen---and pop has the
strap on a chair beside him!" finished Timmy, with an anticipatory
shiver.
"Timmy, you're a fearfully slow boy," Tom drawled.
"What do you mean?"
"I can fix it so you can get into the house while your father is doing
something else," Tom declared.
"Can you? How? Ring the front door bell, while I slip in at the back
door?"
"Nothing as stale as that," scoffed Tom Reade. "That wouldn't call for
any brains, you see. Come along and we'll look over the lay of the land.
Cheer up, Timmy! You'll have plenty of