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Page 47
FOOLING THE ENEMY
Our hero's impulse was to at once spring into the wagon and see if the
trunk was still intact.
A natural cautiousness checked him, however, and he was glad of it a
minute later as he detected a rustling in the thick undergrowth back of
the tree.
A human figure seemed suddenly to drop to the ground, and a little
distance to the left of it Bart was sure he saw two sharp human eyes
fixed upon him.
He never let on that he suspected for a moment that he was not entirely
alone, but, walking over to a tree stump, where, spread out on a
newspaper, was the remains of a lunch, he acted delighted at the
discovery, picked up a hunk of bread in one hand, a piece of cheese in
the other, and, throwing himself on the green sward at full length,
proceeded to munch the eatables, with every semblance of satisfaction.
Bart's mind worked quickly. He felt that it was up to him to play a
part, and he prepared to do so.
He was morally certain that two persons in fancied hiding were watching
his every movement, and they must be Buck and Hank Tolliver.
Bart hoped they had never seen him before; he felt pretty certain that
they did not know him at all.
Bart sprang to his feet. He had thrown his cap back on his head in a
"sporty," off-handish way, and he tried hard to impersonate a reckless
young adventurer taking things as they came, and audacious enough to
pick up a handy meal anyhow or anywhere. He paid not the least apparent
attention to the wagon or the trunk, although he cast more than one
sidelong glance in that direction.
He walked up to the horse, stroked its nose, and said boisterously:
"Wish I had this layout--wouldn't I reach California like a nabob,
though!"
Then Bart went back to the stump. He purposely faced the patch of brush
where he knew his watchers were lurking.
Ransacking his pockets, with a comical, quizzical grin on his face, he
produced a solitary nickel, placed it ostentatiously on the tree stump
and remarked:
"Honesty is the best policy--there you are, landlord! and much obliged
for the handout."
Then, striking a jaunty dancing step, he started to cross the clearing,
whistling a jolly tune.
"Hey!"
Bart half expected the summons. He halted in professed wonderment,
looked up, to the right, to the left, in every direction except that
from which he was well aware the hail had come.
"Look here, you!"
Bart now turned in the right direction. A man of about thirty had
revealed himself from the brush.
He had small, bright eyes, a shrewd, narrow face, and Bart knew from
discription who he was--Buck Tolliver.
"Why, hello! somebody here?" exclaimed Bart, feigning surprise and then
fright, and he made a movement as if to run for it.
"Don't you bolt," ordered Buck Tolliver, advancing--"come back here,
kid."
Bart slowly retraced his steps. Then he manifested new alarm as a second
figure stepped out from the brush.
Recalling what the Millville postmaster had told him, the young express
agent was quickly aware that this second individual was Buck's brother,
Hank.
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