Dick Merriwell's Trap: or, The Chap Who Bungled

Brad believed that he understood Dick better than any other fellow in the school did, and there was good reason why he should, being his roommate and seeing so much of him. He knew Dick had not gained the mastery over his quick temper and unreasoning disposition without a struggle, and he admired him for it.

The agitation over Arlington’s fight to get on to the athletic committee and his sudden and amazing resignation from it had died out. No one save a certain few understood why Chester had resigned almost immediately after being elected. Sometimes the boys talked it over a little and wondered at it.

But things were moving at Fardale. Football-game followed football-game. The hockey-team had been organized and was making ready for an active season. The basketball-team had been in practise some time. There was talk of an indoor baseball-team.

Of course, athletics and sports were not the only things to take up the time at the school. The boys had their studies and drills. The members of the football-team had been excused from drilling during the season, but the others were put through their paces regularly. Of these drills, and inspections, and parades little need be said here, for those characters in whom we are most interested had made up the football-team and took no part in the exercises.

But there were studies and lectures they could not miss. Professor Gunn might be easy with them; not so Professor Gooch. He demanded their attendance and attention in the class-room. He was opposed to athletics of all sorts, and he took delight in detaining members of the football-team to listen to some dry-as-dust talk of his when they felt that they should be out on the field getting in some practise.

As Professor Gooch, his spectacles on his nose, droned away one day about the Punic Wars, and Hannibal, and Rome, and the destruction of Carthage, Ted Smart noticed that Billy Bradley, who sat next to him, was napping. Ted thrust his elbow into Bradley’s ribs.

“Ouch!” grunted Billy, with a start and a snort.

Professor Gooch looked at him severely and continued in his droning voice:

“Of the general character and history of the Carthaginians, from the founding of the city down to the wars with Rome, less is known than of any other great nation of antiquity.”

“I’m glad to see you are so interested, Sir William,” whispered Ted, as Billy was dozing off again.

“Eh?” grunted Bradley, with another start.

“Er – er – hum!” snorted the professor, glaring at Billy over his spectacles, while Ted sat up very straight and looked supremely innocent and interested.

Billy was flustered and confused. He fancied the professor had asked him a question, and he retorted:

“Ya-as, ya-as, Hi quite hagree with you, sir.”

Whereupon there was a suppressed titter, and the professor, thinking Billy was trying to be “smart” and make sport, said:

“This, is a matter of history, young man, and it makes little difference whether you agree or not.”

“Hexcuse me!” gasped Billy, almost, collapsing.

The professor continued:

“With the exception of a few inscriptions on medals and coins, a score of verses in one of the comedies of Plautus, and the periplus of Hanno, not a solitary relic of Carthage has been preserved.”

“How sad!” whispered Smart. Then he snuggled over closer to Bradley.

“Say,” he whispered, “what’s the longest word in the English language?”

“Hi dunno,” confessed Billy. “But Hi’ll bet hanything Professor Gooch uses hit hevery day.”

“Not so bad for you!” admitted Ted, for, as a rule, Billy was extremely dense and slow to see the point of a joke. “But you’ll be surprised when I tell you. The longest word, in the English language is smiles.”

Billy showed interest at first, then looked doubtful, mildly surprised, absolutely astonished, and finally positively rebellious.

“Go hon!” he hissed back at Ted. “Hi know better! Hare you taking me for a fool?”

“Oh, dear, no!” said Ted. “I wouldn’t think of such a thing!”

“Hi know a ’undred hother words that hare longer,” whispered Bradley.

“I’ll bet you a treat you can’t name one word longer than smiles,” returned Smart, with great earnestness.

“Hi’ll ’ave to go you. Hit’s dead heasy. Hi’ll give you the first word Hi think of. Hit’s transubstantiation. ’Ow is that?”

“It isn’t a patch,” asserted Smart. “Look at the short distance between the first and last letters in that word.”

“Hey? Well, look at the shorter distance between the first hand last letters hin your word. Hi ’ave got you!”

“Not on your tintype! There is a mile between the first and last letters in smiles.”

Billy gasped for breath and grew so excited that there was danger of his again attracting the attention of the droning professor.

“A mile?” he gasped. “You hare a blooming hidiot! ’Ow do you make that hout?”

“It’s easy,” assured Smart. “If you don’t believe it, just knock off the first and last letters of smiles and spell what is left. I’m sure you will find it a mile.”

Billy frowned, glared, wrote “smiles” on the margin of a leaf in the book he carried, drew a line after the first “s” and before the last “s,” and found that there really and truly was a “mile” between those two letters, whereupon he had convulsions and Professor Gooch paused and stared at him in wondering amazement.

“Woo! woo! woof!” came in a series of explosive grunts from Bradley, who was doing his best to “hold in.”

“Really, sir,” said the professor severely, “if you feel as bad as that you may leave the room at once.”

“Woo! woo! Thank you, sir!” said Billy, and he hustled out to have further convulsions in the anteroom.

Billy was waiting for the others when they filed out of the class-room. He took great delight in repeating any story that he heard. On this occasion he seized on Chip Jolliby as a fit subject to try the story on first.

“Hi say, hold fellow,” he said, locking arms with the lank chap. “What is the longest word hin the Henglish language?”

“Ru-ru-ru-rubber,” said Chip promptly.

“Hi ham hin hearnest,” declared Bradley. “What his the longest word?”

“Ru-ru-ru-rubber,” stuttered Chip, once more. “That’s the longest word.”

“’Ow do you make that hout?”

“Why, if it ain’t lul-lul-long enough you can sus-sus-stretch it,” said Jolliby, with a grin, but this did not satisfy Bradley.

“You can’t stretch hit long henough,” he said. “Hi know a word with a mile between the first hand last letters.”

“Now you sus-sus-stop,” chattered Chip.

“Hi can prove hit,” insisted Billy.

“What’s the word?” demanded Jolliby.

“It’s laughs,” declared Bradley triumphantly, giving the lank lad a poke in the ribs. “’Ow is that for ’igh? Hisn’t that pretty good, eh?”

To his surprise, Chip looked blank and puzzled.

“Well, hif you ain’t a chump!” exploded Bradley, in disgust. “Just spell between the first and last letters hand see hif hit hisn’t a mile!”

With which he released Jolliby and turned away, completely dismayed over his ill success.

Smart, who had kept near enough to hear all this, was forced to press his hand over his mouth to prevent a shout of laughter.

“Hi wonder what the matter was,” thought Bradley. “’E didn’t seem to see the point. Hi’ll try hanother fellow.”

He sidled up to Brad Buckhart.

“Hi say, Buck’art,” he said, “what is the longest word hin the Henglish language. Give hit up?”

“I reckon I’ll have to, William,” said the Texan. “What is the longest word?”

He looked at Billy in such a way that the Cockney youth was confused and stammered:

“Hit – hit’s giggles. Hif you don’t believe hit, just spell between the first hand last letters hand you’ll find a mile. ’Ow his that?”

The Texan looked Billy over.

“Whatever kind of loco-weed have you been eating?” he exclaimed. “You’re plumb loony for sure.”

Then he strode away, leaving Billy scratching his head and looking extremely puzzled and bewildered.

Ted Smart was enjoying this hugely. He approached Billy and spoke to him. Bradley glared at Ted.

“What is the matter with your blawsted blooming old joke?” he ripped out hotly.

“Eh?” said Ted, in apparent surprise. “What’s the matter? Why?”

“Hi ’ave tried hit hon two fellows, hand hit didn’t go hat hall.”

“What fellows?”

“Jolliby and Buckhart.”

“No wonder it didn’t go!” said Ted. “Those chaps are too dense to see the point. Come on with me up to Merriwell’s room. Some of the fellows are going up there. Just you spring it there and see if you don’t make a big hit with it.”

So Bradley was led away to Dick’s room, where some of the boys had gathered, it being a general gathering-place for the football-team. Singleton was there, lounging comfortably on a Morris chair. Merriwell was talking to Dare and Douglass. Buckhart and Jolliby had dropped in.

“Give it to them right off the reel,” urged Ted, in a whisper to Billy.

“Hi say, fellows,” said Bradley, “what his the longest word hin the Henglish language?”

Jolliby and Buckhart looked at each other in disgust.

“What it is, William?” grunted Singleton.

“Give it up?” asked Bradley.

“Sure thing. What’s the word?”

“Hit – hit’s grins,” fluttered Bradley. “Hif you doubt hit, you’ll find there is a mile between the first and last letters. Hi can thrash hanybody who doesn’t see the point!”

Then, as nobody laughed, he began to tear off his coat, truly fighting mad.

“You hare a lot hof blawsted thick-’eaded Yankees!” he raged. “Hover hin hold Hengland – ”

“Dear! dear!” said Smart. “Don’t disgrace yourself, Sir William, by thrashing such dummies. It really takes the English to see the point of a joke. Now, when I get a good thing I always take it to you, for I know you will be so quick to catch on!”

This appeased Bradley somewhat, but he returned:

“Hi don’t believe they want to see hit! They never want to see hanything when Hi tell hit.”

“It’s very shameful,” said Ted, winking at the others behind Billy’s back. “Any one should be able to see in a minute that there is a mile between the first and last letters of smiles.”

Then, for the first time, the boys on which Billy had tried to spring the joke saw the point in it. Immediately they began to laugh, which disgusted the Cockney lad more than ever.

“Look hat that!” he cried. “When Hi say hit nobody laughs; when you say hit they hall catch hon him a minute. Hit’s a put hup job!”

“It may look that way, Billy,” said Dick; “but I assure you that we have just seen the point of the joke. We humbly beg your pardon. But I assure you that smiles, with its mile between the first and last letters, is not the longest word. I know one that is longer.”

“Hi doubt hit,” retorted Bradley. “What is hit?”

“It is longer,” explained Dick.

“Hi know you said so, but what is the word?”

“It is longer,” repeated Dick.

“That’s all right. Hit may be, but what is hit?”

“I will spell it for you,” smiled Dick. “L-o-n-g-e-r. Can’t you see that proves my claim. It is longer.”

Bradley paused with his mouth open. Slowly the point dawned on him. He slapped his thigh and uttered an exclamation.

“By Jawve! that’s a good one! Hit’s better than the hother one! But Hi’ll wager hanything lots hof fellows will not see the point when Hi spring hit hon them. Don’t you know, Merriwell, Hi believe some people inherit their blawsted stupidity.”

“My dear Bradley!” exclaimed Dick, as if shocked. “It’s not proper to speak that way of your parents!”

At this the others shouted with laughter, while Bradley was utterly at a loss to comprehend the cause of their merriment.

“You’re a ’ole lot of hiddiots!” he cried, his disgust breaking all bounds. “You heven laugh at a fool!”

“Don’t – don’t cast reflections on yourself!” said Smart.

Billy reached for him, but Ted knew better than to fall into those muscular hands, and he dodged away.

“Hi’ll ’ave nothing more to do with you!” declared the Cockney lad, as he turned and stalked out of the room, and the laughter behind him added to his disgust as he closed the door.

CHAPTER XXV – THE SPOOK APPEARS

Ted Smart saw it first, but no one believed him when he told about it. Ted declared that he turned over in bed and beheld a white, ghostly form floating slowly and silently across the room about two feet from the floor. He also declared that he could see through the white form and discern solid objects on the farther side. But every one knew Smart was given to exaggeration, and so they laughed.

“Did you really see anything at all?” asked one.

“Oh, no!” exclaimed Ted derisively; “I didn’t see a thing. I am stone blind, and I can’t see anything.”

“But it was dark.”

“Oh, the moon didn’t shine in at the window at all!” retorted the little fellow. “It was dark as pitch! I can see better in the dark than I can in the daylight!”

All of which meant exactly the opposite.

“Well, what was the spook doing in your room, Smart?”

“Ask me! Just floating round, I fancy. But when the old thing floated my way I just sat up and said, ‘Shoo!’ like that. The thing stopped and stretched out a hand toward me. I said, ‘Oh, Lord!’ and went right down under the bedclothes. I don’t know how long I stayed there, but when I rubbered out the spook was gone.”

“A pretty bad case of nightmare,” was the verdict, but Ted did not accept it. He insisted that something had been in his room. True, his door was locked when he got up and looked around, and the “something” was gone.

Ted was the last fellow at Fardale to be able to impress any one with such a story. They guyed him at every opportunity about it. One after another the boys came to him and asked him to tell them about the “spook.” They kept him repeating the story over and over until he became tired of it. Then when he became disgusted and refused to talk about it any more they laughed and kept up the sport by gathering around him and repeating what he had said.

Later in the day, Smart said:

“I wonder if spooks have to comb their hair. My pet comb and silver-backed hair-brush are gone. Don’t know where they could have gone to unless my spook took them.”

Of course he was advised to look around thoroughly in his room for the missing articles. He did so, but the comb and brush he could not find. Ted could not understand why any one should wish to steal the comb and brush.

The very next night Joe Savage saw the “spook.”

Savage and Gorman roomed together, although they were not the best of friends, having come to a misunderstanding over Dick Merriwell and football matters.

Joe knew not just what awakened him. It seemed like a long, low sigh. However, when he opened his eyes, he dimly saw a white form standing at the foot of his bed. His first thought was that Gorman had arisen for something, but a moment later he discovered that Gorman was peacefully sleeping beside him, breathing regularly and somewhat loudly.

Savage was a fellow of considerable nerve, but now he was startled in spite of himself. His room was not on the right side for the moonlight to shine in at his window, but still there was light enough for him to make out the white figure, which had the general semblance of a human being.

Joe thought of Smart’s spook-story.

“Rot!” he told himself. “That’s what’s the matter. I must be dreaming.”

He deliberately pinched himself, discovering that he was very wide-awake.

The thing seemed to be looking straight at him, and a feeling of unspeakable queerness froze him stiff in bed. He tried to convince himself that it was a case of imagination, but the longer he looked the plainer he could see the ghostly figure. After a while he became convinced that there really was something white there at the foot of the bed.

Then through the room again sounded that long, low, tremulous sigh. It was expressive of unspeakable sadness, and about it there was something inhuman and spiritlike.

Savage felt himself getting cold as ice. He began to shiver so that the bed shook. In that moment he was ashamed of himself, for he was not a fellow who believed in such nonsense as ghosts. Summoning all his will-power, he sat up in bed, expecting the thing would vanish, in which case he would be satisfied it was an hallucination of some sort. Instead of vanishing, the ghost stretched out a hand toward Joe as if to grasp him.

Immediately Savage lay down again. The thing slowly moved away, disappearing from view.

Joe lay there, hearing Gorman still breathing regularly and stentoriously, but straining his ears for some other sound.

The door leading from his room to the corridor was not in view.

Joe had remained silent thus a full minute or more. At last he forced himself to get out of bed and step out of the alcove into the room. He was still shaking, but he looked about in vain for the spook. The thing, had vanished from the room.

He crossed the floor quickly and tried the door. It was locked.

“Well,” said Savage to himself, “I wonder if I really did see anything! I’m almost ready to swear I did, and yet – ”

He lighted a match and looked around as well as he could. Lights were not permitted in the rooms at that hour, but he did not believe any one would observe the light from a burning match.

The striking of the match broke Gorman’s slumber. He choked, started, and sat up. He saw Savage in the middle of the room, holding the lighted match above his head.

“What’s up?” grunted Abe, rubbing his eyes.

“I am,” answered Joe.

“What are you looking for?”

“The spook.”

“Hey?”

“I saw it,” said Savage.

“What’s the matter with you?” growled Gorman, in deep disgust. “Come back to bed.”

The match burned Joe’s fingers and he dropped it.

“I saw something,” he declared.

“Been dreaming,” mumbled Gorman, lying down.

But the darkness seemed to convince Joe that he had really and truly seen something.

“No,” he declared grimly, “I know I saw something at the foot of the bed.”

“Pooh!” ejaculated Abe, and he got into a comfortable position and prepared to sleep again.

After returning to bed Joe lay a long time thinking the matter over.

“I’m not a fool,” he thought, “and I am ready to bet my life that there was some kind of a thing in this room.”

The impression settled on him so that he found it almost impossible to get to sleep. As he lay thus a sudden wild yell echoed through the corridors, followed by a commotion.

Joe had left the bed at a single bound as the yell rang out. Another bound seemed to take him to the door of his room. He found some difficulty in unlocking the door, as the key was not in the lock, and he was compelled to take it from the hook where it hung and use it to unlock the door.

By the time he got outside, with Gorman at his heels, the corridor was swarming with excited cadets in their night garments.

“What’s the racket?” asked Savage, of the nearest fellow.

“Jim Wilson saw a ghost,” was the laughing answer. “Wouldn’t that jar you!”

But immediately Savage was eager to question Wilson. This was prevented, however, at this time, as the boys were hustled into their rooms.

“What do you think of that?” asked Joe, when he and Gorman were back in their room.

“Jim Wilson’s a scare-baby,” returned Gorman. “If any other fellow had yelled like that I’d thought it a joke to get up a sensation. Wilson would never think of such a thing.”

“But I saw something here in this very room a while ago.”

“Don’t tell anybody that,” sneered Abe, as he again prepared to sleep. “They’ll take you for a big chump.”

Gorman was a fellow who liked to sleep, and he declined to make any further talk.

During the remainder of the night all was quiet about the academy.

CHAPTER XXVI – THINGS ARE MISSING

“Hey, Savage!” said Gorman, as they were rushing through dressing in order to be present at roll-call; “where’s my watch?”

“How do I know?” returned Joe, as he buttoned his shirt. “Where you put it, I suppose.”

“No it isn’t. It’s gone.”

“Well, I think you’ll find it if you look for it.”

“But I can’t find it!” snapped Gorman. “I left it right here on the table last night, where I leave it every night. It’s gone now.”

“Well, you needn’t look to me for it!” flung back Savage, whose temper had been ruffled by the tone assumed by his roommate. “I hope you don’t think I took your old watch? I have one of my own, and – Hey! where’s my knife?”

Savage was very neat and trim in his habits, and he always cleaned his finger-nails mornings when he reached a certain point in his dressing. It was shortly after washing his face and hands, as that was the best time to do so. Just now he had thrust his hand into his pocket for his knife, only to discover that it was gone.

Gorman paid no attention to Joe, but continued to look around for his watch, a scowl on his face.

Savage felt hastily through his pockets, then began to look around himself.

“Seen my knife?” he demanded.

“No!” snapped Abe; “but I’d like to see my watch. It’s mighty strange where that watch has disappeared to.”

Joe stood still, his hands in his pockets, thinking.

“I had that knife last night,” he muttered. “I sharpened a pencil with it. I was sitting right there by the table. I put it back into my pocket. Funny where it’s gone.”

Then the two boys found themselves staring suspiciously at each other.

“My watch is valuable,” said Gorman.

“My knife was a present from my mother,” said Savage. “I thought everything of it.”

“My watch was a present from my father. It was worth a neat little bit.”

“I can’t help that. I know it is a good watch. You’ll find it – ”

“I don’t know about finding it. I had it last evening. I wound it up just the same as usual before going to bed. I remember very distinctly winding it.”

“Well, your watch didn’t walk out of this room, did it?”

“How about your knife?”

There was little satisfaction in these questions, and they suddenly realized that they would have to hustle if they were to be on hand at roll-call, whereupon they hastily completed preparations and scudded out of the room, both in a very bad temper.

After roll-call and morning service there were a few moments before breakfast. Savage came upon a group gathered about Gorman, who was telling of the mysterious disappearance of his watch. Just as he came up, Jim Wilson joined the group.

“Lost your watch right out of your room?” he said. “Well, I lost mine last night, so I’m in the same scrape.”

“Perhaps your ghost took it, Jim,” laughed one of the group of lads.

“Ghost?” exclaimed Gorman. “Why, confound it! Savage said something about a ghost. I woke up in the night and found him standing in the middle of the floor, holding a lighted match over his head. He was white as a sheet.”

“How about that, Savage?” demanded several of the boys, who had noted the approach of Joe.

Savage shrugged his shoulders.

“I wasn’t going to say anything about it,” he declared; “but I did see something in our room last night.”

Jim Wilson grew excited.

“What was it like?” he asked wildly, much to the amusement of some of the boys. “Was it tall and white, with long arms, and did it just seem to float along without making a sound?”

“I couldn’t see it very plainly. It stood at the foot of the bed. But it was white.”

“Did it groan just awful?”

“No; but it uttered a doleful sigh.”

“My ghost groaned. Gosh! It made my hair stand right up. Then when the thing lifted its arm I just gave a yell. It vanished quick enough. I got out of the room. Don’t know how I got out there. Don’t know how I opened the door. Perhaps it was open. I can’t say. Laugh, you fellows! I don’t care! I tell you there was something in my room!”

“I suppose you fellows know,” said a tall, solemn lad, “that a chap committed suicide here at the academy once?”

“No?” cried several.

“Sure thing,” nodded the tall fellow. “Cut his throat. He was daffy.”

“Dear me!” murmured Ted Smart, who had just strolled along in company with Dick Merriwell. “What a delightful way to kick the bucket! I admire his taste!”

“But was there a fellow who really committed suicide here?”

“Yes,” nodded Dick Merriwell. “My brother told me about it. His name was Bolt. The room he killed himself in was closed for a long time. Some of the fellows used to sneak into it nights when they wanted a little racket. There was a story about the room being haunted; but, of course, that was bosh.”