The Rover Boys in the Jungle | Page 8

several minutes it was hard to tell whether
he was holding his own or losing.
"Hurrah! we are catching up!" cried Dick, after pulling for five minutes.
"Keep at it, Tom, and we'll have him before he is half over."
"Gosh, but it's hot work!" came with a pant from Tom Rover. "He must
be almost exhausted to row like that."
"He knows what he has at stake. He sees the prison cell staring him in
the face again. You'd do your best, too, if you were in his place."
"I'm doing my best now, Dick. On we go!" and Tom renewed his
exertions. Dick set a faster stroke than ever, having caught his second
wind, and the rowboat flew over the calm surface of the lake like a
thing of life.
"Keep off!" The cry came from Baxter, while he was still a hundred
yards from the eastern shore. "Keep off, or it will be the worse for
you!"
"We are not afraid of you, Baxter, and you ought to know it by this
time," answered Dick. "You may as well give in now as later on."
"Give in! You must be crazy!"
"We are two to one, and you know what we have been able to do in the
past."
"Humph! I don't intend to go to jug again, and that is all there is to it."
"Maybe you can't help yourself."
"We'll see about that. Are you - going to keep off or not?
"Don't ask foolish a question."
"You won't keep off?"

"No."
"If you don't I -- I'll shoot you."
As Dan Baxter spoke he stopped rowing and brought from a hip pocket
a highly polished nickel-plated revolver.
"Do you see this?" he demanded, as he pointed the weapon toward the
Rover boys.
Both Dick and Tom were taken aback at the sight of the weapon. But
they had seen such arms before, and had faced them, consequently they
were not as greatly alarmed as they right otherwise have been. They
knew, too, that Dan Baxter was a notoriously bad shot.
"Put that up, Baxter," said Dick calmly. "It may only get you into
deeper trouble."
"I don't care!" said the bully recklessly. "I'm not going back to jail and
that is all there, is to it!"
"You won't dare to shoot at us, and you know it," put in Tom, as the
two boats drifted closer together.
"I will, and don't you fool yourself on it."
"Drop those oars or I'll fire, as sure as my name is Dan Baxter," and the
revolver, which had been partly lowered, was raised a second time.
It must be confessed that Dick and Tom were much disconcerted. The
two rowboats were now less than fifty feet apart, and any kind of a shot
from the weapon was likely to prove more or less dangerous. Baxter's
eyes gleamed with the hatred of an angry snake ready to strike.
"You think you are smart, you Rover boys," said the bully, after an
awkward pause all around. "You think you did a big thing in rescuing
Dom Stanhope and in putting me and my father and Buddy Girk in
prison. But let me tell you that this game hasn't come to an end yet, and
some day we intend to square accounts."

"There is no use in wasting breath in this fashion, Baxter," returned
Dick, as calmly as he could. "We are two to one, and the best thing to
do is for you to submit. If you fire on us, we may do a little shooting on
our own account."
"Humph! Do you imagine you can scare me in that fashion? You
haven't any pistol, and I know it. If you had you would have drawn the
weapon long ago."
At this Dick bit his lip. "Don't be too sure," he said steadily, as the
boats drifted still closer together. "The minute I heard you had escaped
from jail I went and bought a pistol in Cedarville." This was the strict
truth, but Dick did not add that the weapon lay at that moment safe in
the bottom of his trunk at the Hall.
"Got afraid I'd come around, eh?"
"I knew there was nothing like becoming prepared. Now will you -"
Dick did not have time to finish, for, lowering the front end of the
pistol, Dan Baxter pulled the trigger twice and two reports rang out in
quick succession. One bullet buried itself in the seat beside Tom, while
the second plowed its way through the bottom, near the stern.
"You villain!" cried Dick, and in his excitement hurled his oar at Dan
Baxter, hitting the fellow across the fact with such force that the bully's
nose began to bleed. The shock made Baxter lose his hold on the