CHAPTER VIII
THE ROVER BOYS IN NEW YORK
The more the Rover boys talked about the treasure hunt the more enthusiastic they became, until, as Tom expressed it, they were “simply boiling over with enthusiasm.”
“It will be a grand thing for the Stanhopes and the Lanings if we do locate that treasure,” said Sam. “Mr. Laning has some money, but I know he’d like more, so he wouldn’t have to farm quite so hard.”
“And Dick wants to get all he can for Dora, I’m certain of that,” said Tom, with a merry glance at his elder brother.
“How about you getting the Laning share for Nellie’s benefit?” retorted Dick, his face growing red. “I reckon the boot is as long as the shoe.”
As the Rovers had plenty of money it was an easy matter to arrange for the expenses of the trip. Mrs. Stanhope wanted to pay a share, but Anderson Rover said she had better wait until the treasure was found.
Inside of three, days word was received from all those who had been asked to participate in the search. Mr. Laning said that he could not leave his farm very well, but that his wife and two daughters would go. Mrs. Stanhope and Dora said they would pack immediately. Fred Garrison was visiting Hans Mueller and the two sent a telegram as follows:
“You couldn’t hold us back if you tried. Where shall we meet you?”
“That’s like Fred,” said Dick. “I am awfully glad he is to be with us —and glad Hans will come, too.”
The last telegram to come in was from Songbird Powell. The reply of the would-be poet of Putnam Hall was characteristic:
“Tell me where,
And I’ll be there,
On the run
For lots of fun.”
“If that isn’t Songbird!” exclaimed Sam, laughing, as he read the telegram. “Had to talk in rhyme even over the telegraph wire!”
It was finally decided that the whole party should meet in Philadelphia about the Fourth of July, which was now less than a week off. They should go directly to the steam yacht, and the voyage was to begin as soon as all arrangements were completed.
“I wish to stop off at New York for a day,” said Anderson Rover. “If you boys want to go with me you may do so.”
“That will suit me,” answered Dick, and his brothers said the same.
It had been agreed that no outsiders should be told of the treasure hunt, so nothing was mentioned but a summer trip on a steam yacht. The day the Rovers and Aleck Pop left the farm was a clear one, and all were in the best of spirits. The colored man drove to the depot with Jack Ness and the trunks and dress suit cases, and all of the others went in the carryall, Randolph Rover driving and Mrs. Rover giving the boys final instructions about taking care of themselves.
“I shall miss you very much,” she said, with tears in her eyes. Her lively nephews were as dear to her as if they were her own sons.
“You’d better go along, Aunt Martha,” said Dick.
“We’d like it first rate,” added Sam.
“It might help us to keep out of mischief,” came from Tom, with a bright smile.
“No, I’ll stay at home with your uncle, boys. But do take care of yourselves, and come home safe.”
“Oh, there will be no danger in this trip,” said Dick, but he was mistaken—there was to be great peril and of an unusual kind. If the treasure hunters could have seen what was before them they would not have started off in such a confident frame of mind.
The train was a little late, but presently it rolled into the station and the trunks and other baggage were hoisted aboard. Then came the final embraces and the boys climbed up the steps, followed by their father and Aleck.
“Hurrah, we are off at last!” cried Tom, and waved his cap enthusiastically. The others did the same, and then the train started and Oak Run quickly faded from sight. As the boys settled down in their seats a lad came from another car and moved swiftly toward them.
“Songbird, by all that’s lucky!” cried Dick, and caught the other by the hand.
“I thought you’d be on this train,” answered Songbird Powell. “I got your wire last night that you would stop off at New York. I am going to stop, too—to see an uncle of mine on a little business.”
“Then you’ll travel with us to Philadelphia?” queried Sam.
“Sure.”
“Good! Tom was just saying he’d like some of the others along.”
“When I got your invitation I danced a jig of delight,” went on Songbird. “I just couldn’t help it. Then I sat down and wrote—”
“A piece of poetry about it thirty five stanzas long,” finished Tom.
“No, Tom, there are only six verses. You see I couldn’t help it—I was so chuck full of enthusiasm. The poem begins like this:
“’Twas a peaceful, summer night,
When all the stars were shining bright,
There came a rap on our house door
Which made me leap from bed to floor.
To me had come a telegram
From my old chums, Dick, Tom and Sam
Asking if I had a notion
To sail with them upon the ocean.
To skim along on waters blue—”
“And then and there get seasick, too,”
finished Tom. “Don’t forget to put in about the seasickness, Songbird—it always goes with a voyage, you know.”
“Seasick!” snorted the would-be poet. “Who ever heard of seasickness in a poem? The next line is this:
“And see so many sights quite new,
To rest in quiet day by day
And watch the fishes at their play.”
“That’s the first verse. The second begins—”
“Save it, Songbird, until we’re on the yacht,” interrupted Sam. “We’ll have more time to listen then.”
“All right,” answered the would-be poet cheerfully. “I want to fix up some of the lines anyhow. I’ve got ‘harm’ to rhyme with ‘storm’ and it doesn’t quite suit me.”
“Never mind—a storm often does great harm,” said Dick. “You can easily fix it up by throwing out both words, you know.”
After that the talk drifted around to the matter of the treasure hunt and Songbird was given some of the details, in which he became much interested. He declared that he thought the trip on the steam yacht would be even more interesting than the one on the houseboat had been.
“We’re after something definite this trip,” he said. “We’ve got something to look forward to specially if that Sid Merrick starts a rival hunt.”
“We want to get ahead of Merrick,” answered Dick. “We want to locate Treasure Isle and get the gold and jewels before he knows what we are up to.”
“What’s the name of the steam yacht.”
“The Rainbow.”
“That’s a good name, for a rainbow is a sign of good promise,” was Songbird’s comment.
The party had to make one change of cars and had their dinner on the train. They arrived at the Grand Central Depot at half past two o’clock and the Rovers went to a nearby hotel, taking Aleck with them, while Songbird hurried off to transact his business with his uncle.
Mr. Rover had to meet some men who were interested in his mining ventures in the far west, and so, after accommodations had been obtained, he hurried off, leaving the boys to their own devices.
“Let us take a stroll down Broadway,” suggested Sam, to whom the sights of this busy thoroughfare were always interesting.
The others were willing, and they passed through Forty second street to Broadway and then turned southward. The street was filled with wagons, trucks and trolley cars, and the sidewalk appeared to “overflow with folks,” as Sam said. At one point a man was giving some sort of an exhibition in a store window and here the crowd was so great they had to walk out into the gutter to get past.
“I can tell you one thing,” remarked Dick. “There is after all but one New York and no other city is like it.”
The boys walked slowly as far as Union Square and then sat down on one of the park benches to rest. Nearly all the benches were filled with people and in idle curiosity Dick began to scan the various types of men present, from bright, brisk clerks to fat and unshaved bummers, too lazy to work.
“Hullo!”
Dick uttered the exclamation so abruptly that Sam and Tom were startled.
“What do you see?” queried both.
“Look there!”
They gazed in the direction Dick pointed out and on a distant bench saw a youth of about Tom’s age, but heavier set, talking to a man who wore a rusty suit of brown and a peculiarly shaped slouch hat.
“Why, that’s Tad Sobber!” cried Tom.
“So it is,” added Sam. “Who is that fellow with him?”
“I don’t know, although his figure looks somewhat familiar to me,” answered Dick.
“What can Tad be doing in New York?” questioned Tom. “Do you suppose he is down here with Sid Merrick?”
“Perhaps.”
“Let’s go over and see what he has to say for himself,” suggested Sam. “Maybe he’ll run away when he sees us.”
All of the boys were curious to know what the former bully of Putnam Hall might have to say for himself and they strode over to the bench upon which Sobber and the man in brown were sitting. They came up behind the pair.
“I can’t give you any money, Cuffer,” they heard Tad Sobber say. “You’ll have to wait till my Uncle Sid gets here.”
“When will he get to New York?”
“To morrow.”
“That fellow is Cuffer, the man who ran away from us at the old mill!” cried Dick.
“Let us catch him and hand him over to the police,” returned Tom.
In his excitement he talked rather loudly and this attracted the attention of Cuffer and Tad Sobber.
“The Rovers!” cried Sobber, leaping to his feet in consternation. “How did they get down to New York?”
“Who did you say?” questioned Cuffer, and then looking at the three youths his face blanched. “We must get away from here, and be quick about it!”
He started to run and Dick and Sam went after him. The chase led to the lower end of the little park, and then Cuffer crossed Fourteenth street, and amid the crowd bound homeward for the day, pushed his way in the direction of the Third Avenue elevated railroad station.
In the meantime Tad Sobber started to run in another direction. But before he had taken a dozen steps Tom was on him and had him by the arm.
“Stop, Sobber,” he said shortly.
“I won’t! You let me go, Tom Rover.”
“I’ll not let you go,” answered Tom, firmly. “And if you don’t stand still I’ll call a policeman and have you arrested.”
CHAPTER IX
A CHASE ON THE BOWERY
Tom’s threat to have Tad Sobber arrested caused the former bully of the school to pause and turn pale.
“You—er—you don’t mean that,” he faltered. “You can’t have me arrested.”
“We’ll see about that, Sobber.”
“I haven’t done anything wrong.”
“Then why did you run away from Putnam Hall?”
“I had a right to leave. Captain Putnam wasn’t treating me fairly.”
“You ran away on account of that snake affair—you can’t deny it.”
“Humph!”
“That snake nearly killed Nick Pell. He isn’t over it yet, altogether.”
“Bah! It wasn’t the snake made Nick sick. He wasn’t feeling well some days before the snake bit him.”
“It was the snake and nothing else put him in bed,” answered Tom warmly. “And that is not all. You are in league with your uncle, who robbed my uncle of those traction company bonds.”
“I—er—I don’t know anything about that matter,” answered Sobber, hastily.
“Well, I know all about it. You were with your uncle when he got away from us, and when he dropped the pocketbook containing the bonds.”
“Did you get the bonds back?” asked Sobber, with sudden interest. It may be added here that Sid Merrick had gone back long after the chase to look for the pocketbook, but, of course, had been unable to get any trace of it.
“We did.”
“My uncle didn’t steal them. Your uncle put them in his hands to sell,” went on Tad Sobber, with sudden boldness. “It is all a cooked up story about his running away with them. And it’s a cooked up story about his having anything to do with those freight thieves. My uncle is an honest man.”
“I know all about the freight affair, for I overheard him talking to some of the other thieves,” answered Tom. “Where is your uncle now?”
“Do you think I’d be fool enough to tell you?”
“Perhaps you might—if I had you locked up.”
“My uncle is a good long way from New York.”
“I heard you tell that man your uncle would be in the city tomorrow.”
“I didn’t say any such thing!” burst out Sobber, but his manner showed that he was very much disturbed.
“You did say it. Where are you stopping?”
“Nowhere—I only got in a few hours ago.”
“Did you come here to meet Cuffer?”
“What do you know about Cuffer?”
“I know your uncle hired him and a man named Shelley to visit our farm and get some things belonging to my father.”
“Why, you’re crazy! My uncle hardly knows Cuffer—and I never heard of a man named Shelley.”
“I am not crazy, and you know I am speaking the truth,” answered Tom, calmly. “Now you tell me where your uncle is or I’ll have you arrested.”
“You’ll not arrest me!” exclaimed Tad Sobber, and with a sudden movement he twisted himself free from Tom’s grasp. “You follow me and you’ll get the worst of it!” he added, and darted across the park at top speed.
Tom made after the bully, but as luck would have it a nurse girl with a baby carriage got between them and before Tom could clear himself of the carriage Sobber was a good distance away. He turned to the eastward, down a side street where a large building was in the course of erection. He looked back and then skipped into the unfinished building.
“He shan’t catch me,” he muttered to himself, and ran to the rear of the building, amid piles of bricks and concrete blocks. A number of workmen were present, but nobody noticed him.
Reaching the building Tom peered inside, but saw nothing of the bully. He was about to go in when a warning cry reached him from overhead.
“Get back there, unless you want to be hurt!”
Tom looked up and saw a workman in the act of throwing down a mass of rubbish, broken bricks, sticks and old mortar. He leaped back and the stuff descended in front of him and raised a cloud of dust.
“What do you want here, young man?” demanded the superintendent of the building as he came forward.
“I am after a boy who just ran in here.”
“Nobody here that I saw.”
“He just came in.”
“We don’t allow skylarking around here. You make yourself scarce,” and the superintendent waved Tom away.
“I want to have that fellow arrested—that is why he ran away from me.”
“Oh, that’s a different thing. Go find him, if you can.”
The superintendent stepped aside and Tom entered the building. But the delay had cost him dear, for in the meanwhile Tad Sobber had made good his escape by running back to the next street. Tom looked around for over quarter of an hour and then gave up the chase.
“It’s too bad, but it can’t be helped,” he mused. “I may as well go back to the
park and wait for Dick and Sam. I hope they caught that Cuffer.”
While Tom was talking to Sobber the other Rover boys had followed Cuffer to the elevated railroad station. A train was just coming in and Cuffer bounded up the steps two at a time, with the boys not far behind.
“Stop that man!” cried Dick, to the crowd coming from the train. But before anybody would or could act, Cuffer had slipped past the man at the ticket box and was trying to board one of the cars. Dick essayed to follow, but the ticket box guard stopped him.
“Not to fast, young fellow. Where’s your ticket?”
“I must catch that man—he is wanted by the police,” answered Dick.
“That’s an old dodge, but it don’t work with me, see? You go back and get a ticket,” said the gateman, firmly.
“But he’ll get away from me,” pleaded the eldest Rover.
“If he does, it’s not my fault. You can’t pass here without a ticket.”
By this time the train was almost ready to start. But Sam had procured tickets and he rushed up.
“There are two tickets!” he cried. “Come on, Dick!” and he sprinted for the train.
The guard was closing the platform gate, but they managed to squeeze through. The train was crowded with people going home from their day’s work and in the jam they could see nothing of Cuffer.
“But he is on board,” said Dick.
“I know it,” returned his brother, “and we must find him. Quick, you go to the front and I’ll go to the rear. If you locate him, tell the trainman you want him arrested at the next station.”
Without another word the brothers separated and each tried to work his way to an end of the train, which was composed of five cars. This was by no means easy, for the crowd was in no humor to be jostled or have its toes stepped upon.
“Look where you are going!” cried one stout man to Sam. “Stop pushing me!” And then as the youngest Rover dodged out of his way he ran his ear into the big feather on a young lady clerk’s immense hat. The girl glared at him and murmured something under her breath, which was far from complimentary. By the time he had reached the front end of the car half a dozen passengers were his enemies.
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