It was not, however, till she had been home for the week-end that she brought them a really sensational exhibit.
“I don’t know whether it’s any use to you,” she said casually, “but an uncle of mine had it and he didn’t want it, so I brought it along.”
They stared incredulous, amazed, paralysed with delight, at a German bomb stick.
“Gosh!” gasped William. “Is it really for us?”
“’Course it is,” said Katie, “if you want it, that is. I don’t think worm Hubert’s got one.”
“Worm Hubert”, as Katie called him, certainly hadn’t got one. And “worm Hubert’s” face, when he saw it, was a ludicrous mask of dismay.
“W-w-what’s that?” he asked, peering over his garden hedge into the road, where the Outlaws passed in triumph, bearing aloft their trophy.
“Oh, it’s jus’ an’ ordinary German bomb stick,” said William carelessly.
“W-w-where d’you get it?” said Hubert.
“Katie gave it us.”
“Has she got any more?”
“Oh no,” said William. “They’re very rare, but you can have a look at it.”
Hubert had a look at it, examined it closely, jealously.
“Bet I soon get one,” he said. “Bet I get one by to-morrow.”
But he didn’t get one, despite the efforts of the entire Lane household. Mr. Lane asked all his business friends for one, Mrs. Lane wrote frantically to everyone she knew, offering large sums of money in exchange for one . . . but no German bomb stick arrived. The Hubert Lane collection, magnificent in every other way, rich in nose-caps and time-fuses and casings and copper driving-bands, remained without a German bomb stick. And the Outlaws made full use of their advantage.
“Got three more copper driving-bands,” Hubert would shout triumphantly, and the Outlaws would retort:
“You’ve not got a German bomb stick.”
“Got another nose-cap.”
“You’ve not got a German bomb stick.”
They took it about with them on their rambles through the woods and fields and on their trespassing expeditions. It was on one of these last that the tragedy happened. For Farmer Jenks met them coming out of the woods, knocked their heads together and—confiscated their bomb stick. He walked off with it, chuckling to himself (for he got a certain satisfaction out of his feud with the Outlaws), leaving them rubbing their heads and gazing after him in consternation. Their German bomb stick, the flower of their collection, their one defence against the jeers and taunts of their enemies! And the Hubert Laneites were not slow to realise the situation. They saw the Outlaws set off jauntily for their morning’s activities with their bomb stick, and saw them return crestfallen without it. They even had the good fortune to come upon a small boy who had seen the whole thing and who reported it faithfully.
“Boxed their ears, ’e did, an’ took that there stick thing off ’em.”
The Hubert Laneites lost no time in profiting by this turn of fortune’s wheel.
“Yah! Who’s not got a German bomb stick! Yah! who had their German bomb stick took off ’em!”
They now enumerated their own collection with restored and unbearable triumph. “We’ve got over three hundred pieces of shrapnel an’ seven nose-caps, lots more parachute cord an’ eight driving-bands, and what’ve you got? Yah!”
Katie was as much distressed as the Outlaws by the tragedy.
“I’ll have a good look for it,” she said. “It ought to be somewhere about. If it is I’ll get it back for you.”
An exhaustive search of the farm buildings, however, revealed no German bomb stick.
“I’ll have a look in the house if I get a chance,” said Katie.
She got a chance and looked all over the house, still without results. She even, greatly daring, when Mrs. Jenks was shopping in Hadley and Farmer Jenks was safely in Six Acre Meadow, ran upstairs to search in the big front bedroom, with its mahogany furniture, enlarged photographs, crochet mats and the group of moth-eaten stuffed birds under a glass case, but without result.
“It just doesn’t seem to be anywhere,” she reported despairingly to the Outlaws.
And that wasn’t the end. The second tragedy happened the next day. Exhilarated by the downfall of their foes, the Hubert Laneites grew still more daring. They approached Katie as she was digging in the potato held, and, smiling smugly, told her that Farmer Jenks wanted her in the big barn. Katie fell into the trap. She thrust her fork into the ground and went off to the big barn. Farmer Jenks was not there and Katie returned to find both the Hubert Laneites and her fork gone.
“The old horror’s not found out about it yet,” she told the Outlaws mournfully. “He checks up the tools on Saturday. He’ll be livid when he does. He’ll stop it out of my wages—and I shan’t be able to go home for the weekend. It’s sickening, because I’d made a very special date.”
“Don’t you worry,” said William grimly. “We’ll get it back for you. We won’t do anythin’ else till we’ve got it back for you. An’ we’ll get it back by Sat’day.”
The Outlaws assembled in the old barn and took a solemn oath to that effect. “We won’t do anythin’ else till we’ve got ’em both back an’ we’ll get ’em back by Sat’day,” asseverated William, and the other three agreed.
The double task was, however, easier to undertake than to carry out. Daring raids upon the farm and its outbuildings merely confirmed what Katie had already told them. The bomb stick had apparently vanished into air.
“I bet he’s buried it somewhere,” said William. “I bet he has.”
“No, he wouldn’t,” said Ginger. “He wouldn’t do that. He’s planted every inch of ground with onions an’ things same as the gov’nment told him to.”
“I bet he’s sold it.”
“I bet he’s not. He doesn’t know the sort of people what want things like that. He only knows the sort of people what want pigs an’ corn an’ stuff.”
“l bet he’s taken it to someone else’s house to hide.”
“No, he hasn’t. People would’ve seen him takin’ it. We’d’ve known.”
"Well, then, it must be here somewhere,” said Ginger. “It jus’ must.”
"An’ that ole scarecrow seems to be laughin’ at us all the time,” grumbled William, looking at the scarecrow. lt had stood in the middle of the field next to the barn for as long as the Outlaws could remember. It wore a battered old slouch hat and a cape-like ulster that had, many years ago, adorned Farmer Jenks’ person. Certainly it seemed to flap its arms derisively in the breeze as it watched the Outlaws’ futile attempts to find their missing treasure.
The hunt for the fork was no more satisfactory. Raids into the Lanes’ greenhouse, toolshed and conservatory met with no other results than a painful encounter with the Lanes’ gardener (a misanthropic, embittered man, who looked on all boys as so many Huberts and hated them accordingly), and a narrow shave when Mr. Lane appeared suddenly at the gate by which they were making their escape and only missed them because he tried to catch them all at once.
The search, however, had convinced them that the missing fork was nowhere in the Lanes’ outbuildings. The Outlaws would have abandoned the search as hopeless if it had not been for William. William was definitely of the bulldog type. Having once taken hold, he didn’t let go.
“No,” he said firmly,“we’re goin’ to do it. We said we’d do it an’ we’re goin’ to do it. An’ we’re goin’ to do it by Sat’day.”
“Well, we’ve tried,” protested Ginger. “We’ve looked everywhere an’ they aren’t anywhere.”
“Well, then, we’ll start all over again,” said William.
“How? We’ll jus’ look again an’ they still won’t be there.”
“We’ve gotter start a diff’rent way.”
“What diff’rent way?”
“Well—we won’t try ’em both at once. We’ll fix which we’ll find first an’ we’ll—we’ll jus’ find it.”
“
Well, then, which?”
“Well—the fork. I bet we oughter start findin’ Katie’s fork before we start findin’ our own bomb stick.”
“Don’t see how we’re goin’ to find either of ’em,” said Ginger morosely. “We’ve tried hard enough.”
“I tell you we’ve gotter start lookin’ a diff’rent way," said William impatiently.
“What way?”
“Oh, be quiet for a bit,” said William. “I’m tryin’ to think."
“We’ve looked everywhere an’ it’s not there. It’s no use startin’ lookin’ everywhere again. It still won’t be there.”
“No,” said William slowly, ”we’ve gotter make Hubert give it back.”
“But he won’t,” objected Douglas. “We’ve asked him an’ he jus’ pretends he doesn’t know what we’re talkin’ about. No one saw ’em take it, you know. An’ its no good tryin’ to make him give it us back. If we touch him he gets his father to write to our fathers, an’ we get into a row.”
“No,” said William, “we won’t do it that way. We’ll make it so’s Hubert wants to give it us back.”
“Dunno how you’ll do that,” grumbled Henry.
“Nor do I jus’ now,” admitted William, “but I bet I’ll think of a way.”
As he passed the cornfields next to Farmer Jenks’ farm on his way home, the scarecrow again seemed to flap his arms at him in mockery.
“Oh, shut up,” muttered William impatiently, for he hadn’t yet thought of a way and was beginning to feel somewhat less optimistic about his ability to do so. “Shut up flappin’ about an’ makin’ fun of people! Well, I bet you couldn’t think of a way. I jolly well bet you couldn’t.”
The scarecrow seemed to wave its arms still more derisively. The exasperated William took up a stone from the road and hurled it at the mocking figure. He missed it by several feet and walked on in disgust.
“Can’t even hit an ole scarecrow!” he muttered in angry self-abasement. “Can’t even do that."
But it was the scarecrow that gave him his first idea. It didn’t come to him at once. It didn’t come to him in fact, till he was going to bed… He happened to glance at the calendar on his mother’s writing table after supper and noticed without much interest the words “Longest Day" against next Saturday.
“Longest Day?” he said.
“Yes, dear,” said Mrs. Brown. “They call it Midsummer Day, and the day before it is called Midsummer Eve. There are all sorts of superstitions connected with it.”
“What sorts?” said William, more from an ineradicable propensity for asking questions than because he really wanted to know.
“I’m a little vague about it, dear, but I think that fairies are supposed to have special powers and that sort of thing.”
“Why?” asked William.
“Oh really, William, I don’t know. Do stop asking questions. I’m busy.”
William went out into the garden. He was looking very thoughtful. The words “fairies” had struck a chord in his mind.
Fairies . . . Hubert Lane believed in fairies. More than once in the past William had played on that particular weakness. Could he play on it again?
He was so quiet that evening that his mother looked at him anxiously.
“Are you feeling ill, dear?” she asked.
William abandoned his expression of deep thoughtfulness, which, to do Mrs. Brown justice, always suggested acute nausea.
“Ill? Me?” he asked. “Gosh! I don’t get enough to eat to feel ill on these days.”
Perhaps it was a guilty conscience, thought Mrs. Brown.
“William, have you been at the store cupboard again?”
Injured innocence radiated from William’s freckled countenance.
“Me?” he said. “Been at the store cupboard? Gosh!” bitterly. “You don’t give me a chance these days. It’s always locked.”
“What are you thinking of, then?” said Mrs. Brown.
William assumed an expression of imbecile sweetness.
“Fairies,” he said.
“Don’t be silly, dear,” said Mrs. Brown.
But William was thinking about fairies, and he continued to think about them all that evening. By the time he went to sleep his plans were fully laid.
* * *
He happened to run into Hubert Lane as Hubert was coming out of the sweet shop in the village early on Friday. Hubert visited the sweet shop every morning in order to buy what small allowance of sweets the shopkeeper had at his disposal. Mrs. Lane provided her son with large sums of money for the purpose and told the shopman to keep any sweets he got for Hubert because he was used to eating as many as he wanted and it would be a shock to his system if he had to stop. The shopkeeper said nothing, but it was noticed that often, when he had told Hubert there were no sweets available, he would produce them for the Outlaws.
On seeing William, Hubert hastily slipped a bag of humbugs into his pocket and transferred a large bulge from one side of his mouth to the middle. Even in the days of peace and plenty Hubert had never been known to “hand round” his sweets.
“Hello, Hubert,” said William in a voice that was obviously friendly—even conciliatory.
The look of apprehension left Hubert’s face, and he abandoned his half-formed project of dodging back into the shop for safety. The Outlaws evidently knew when they were beaten, he thought with an inward chuckle. Or else they had forgotten the whole affair. The short memory of the Outlaws for insults and injuries was always surprising Hubert. He himself never forgot one till he had avenged it to his satisfaction.
“Hello,” he muttered guardedly.
“You goin’ home?” said William. “I’m goin’ along your way.”
The two boys set off down the road.
“You’re not worryin’ any more about that ole fork?” Hubert couldn’t help saying through his humbug.
“What fork?” said William blankly. Then, as if with difficulty remembering something in the remote past, “Oh that . . . Gosh no! S’no good worry in’ over that.”
“Well, it hadn’t anythin’ to do with us,” said Hubert. “She jus’ lost it, I s’pose.”
He accompanied the words with a malicious little grin, but William did not seem to notice it.
“’Course,” he agreed. Then, conversationally: “Midsummer Eve’s to-day, isn’t it?”
“I know,” agreed Hubert, lulled into a sense of false security and sucking his humbug openly. There was a triumphant swagger in his walk. He had, he considered, scored off the Outlaws at last. The fork was safely hidden in the box-room at home behind a pile of trunks, and the Outlaws had in any case no proof that it was he who had taken it. And Farmer Jenks wasn’t likely to give them the German bomb stick back. Better rub it in a bit more . . .
“Pity havin’ that bomb stick of yours took off you,” he said.
“Yes, wasn’t it?” agreed William.
“Don’t suppose you’ll ever see it again.”
“’Fraid not,” said William.
“Doesn’t leave you much of a collection, does it?”
“No,” said William.
“I got another nose-cap this mornin’. I’ve got ten now. You’ve only got one, haven’t you, and that’s all bashed up?”
“Yes,” agreed William.
A discerning boy would have been put on his guard by the unusual humility of William’s manner, but Hubert was not a discerning boy. He continued to gloat and throw his weight about for about five more minutes, uttering insults, and taunts that normally William would not have endured. But William endured them, though once or twice it might have been noticed that he clenched his teeth and fists. When Hubert paused for breath, he introduced the subject of Midsummer Eve again.
“All sorts of funny tales about it,” he said. “Animals talkin’ an’ people gettin’ their wishes an’ such like.”
“I know,” said Hubert earnestly. “They’re true, too, but they don’t happen till midnight an’ we’re in bed by then, so we
can’t see it.”
“That one about scarecrows is s’posed to happen earlier, you know,” said William.
“Scarecrows?” said Hubert with interest. “I never heard one about scarecrows.”
“Oh, there’s nothin’ in those ole tales,” said William contemptuously. “I don’t believe any of ’em.”
“No, but what’s the one about scarecrows?” demanded Hubert, taking another humbug out of his pocket and slipping it into his mouth. “I never heard one about scarecrows.”
“Well, you bet there’s nothin’ in it.”
“No, but what is it?” demanded Hubert, his curiosity whetted beyond endurance. “What is it?”
“Dunno if I remember it right,” said William, “but they’re s’posed to come alive jus’ after dark an’ come to anyone what’s stole anythin’ out of their fields durin’ the year an’ get it back off them.”
Hubert paled.
“G-g-get it back off them?” he stammered.
“Yes,” said William carelessly. “They leave the person what stole it in a jolly nasty mess, too. They’ve got the strength of ten men when they come alive, scarecrows have. Well, I know I wouldn’t like to be knocked about by a scarecrow come alive with the strength of ten men.”
“The s-s-s-s-strength of ten men?”
“Yes, or it might’ve been twenty.”
“I don’t believe it,” said Hubert, but looking like a boy in the grip of a nightmare.
“I don’t either,” agreed William. “I don’t believe a word of any of those soppy ole fairy tales. It wouldn’t come to me, anyway, ’cause I’ve not stolen anything off a field. An’ you haven’t either, have you?”
“N-n-no,” said Hubert hastily. “No, ’course I’ve not. ’Course I’ve not.”
“I think those ole tales are all silly,” said William scornfully. “People must’ve been bats to believe in ’em. We’ve got a bit more sense now. ’Bout half-past ten the scarecrows are s’posed to come alive. Never heard anything so cracked, did you? Well, here’s your house, Hubert . . . Nearly tea-time, isn’t it? I’ll be gettin’ on home.”
William Carries On Page 5