LITMIR.BIZ

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wanted food again so soon. During the afternoon they ate the rest of the lunch and some apples to stave off actual hunger!

      "I bet you get sunburned again," said Bobby.

      "No, I won't. I'm in the shade all the time."

      "The wind will burn as well as the sun."

      "But I'm not in and out of the water all the time, like I was that day at Sanders' Pond. Just the same," added Fred, "I'm going into the creek now. There's a dandy place for fish just across there."

      "There's some stepping stones below. I'll go over with you," declared Bobby, winding up his line.

      Fred was not afraid of splashing himself. He ran across the stones laid in the bed of the creek. Bobby came more cautiously, but he did not see the wide grin on Fred's face as he stood on the far side and watched his chum.

      Bobby stepped on the rock in the middle of the stream. Just as it bore his full weight, and he had his right foot in the air, stepping to the next dry-topped rock, the one under him rolled!

      The red-haired boy had felt that stone "joggle" when he came across but he had leaped lightly from it. Bobby was caught unaware.

      He yelled, and tried to jump, but the stepping stone, under which the action of the water had excavated the sand, turned clear over. "Splash!" went Bobby into the water.

      He stood upright, but he was in a pool over his knees, and the agitated water splashed higher. His knickerbockers were as wet as Fred's clothes had been when he waded out.

      "Oh, oh, oh!" shouted Fred, writhing on the grass. "Aren't you clumsy? Now you'll have to take off your clothes to dry, Bobby."

      "You might have told a fellow that rock was loose," grumbled Bobby.

      "And you might have told me that I was stepping off into the old creek when I was jerking at my line," retorted Fred. "I got it worse than you did."

      Bobby removed his trousers and wrung them out. Then he put them on again. "They'll dry as good on me, as off," he said. "Now, come on. Let's go up along and see if we can't get some more fish."

      They whipped the creek for half a mile up stream, and were successful beyond their hopes. Both boys had a nice string of pan-fish when they came to the deep swimming hole, which was only a few yards below the corner of Plunkit's farm Sphere the apple tree stood.

      The sun was then sliding down toward the western horizon. Bobby's trousers were pretty well dried. He put on his bathing trunks, and followed Fred into the pool.

      Both boys were good swimmers. There was a fine rock to dive from and a soft, sandy bottom. No danger here, and for an hour the chums had a most delightful time.

      Then Bobby brought his own clothes across to the side of the creek where they had begun to fish. Fred brought the fishing-tackle and the two strings of fish. Then he trotted down the bank to get his own clothes and their shoes and stockings.

      Bobby was half dressed when he heard his chum shouting. "Bobby! Bobby!" shrieked the red-haired boy.

      Fearing that his chum was in trouble, Bobby started for the sound of Fred's voice, on a hard run.

      "I'm coming, Fred! Hold on!" he shouted, as loudly as he could.

      In a few moments he came out into the open place where Fred had carefully arranged his clothing on the low bushes. There wasn't a garment there, and Fred came out of the brush, his face very red and angry.

      "What's the matter?" asked Bobby.

      "Matter enough!" returned his chum. "Don't you see?"

      "Not – not your clothes gone?" gasped Bobby.

      "Yes they are. Every stitch. And your shoes, too. What do you think of that?"

      "Why – why – Somebody's taken them?"

      "Of course somebody has. And it's your fault," said Fred, very much provoked. "If you had helped me pitch in and lick that Ap Plunkit, he wouldn't have dared do this."

      "Maybe – maybe he'd have licked us," stammered Bobby.

      "He'll – he'll just have to lick me when I meet up with him next time, or else he'll take the biggest licking he ever took," threatened the wrathful Master Martin, wiping a couple of angry tears out of his eyes with a scratched knuckle.

      CHAPTER V

      THE TALE OF A SCARECROW

      "My goodness! you can't go home that way," said Bobby Blake, faintly.

      He did not laugh at all. The situation had suddenly become tragic instead of comic. Fred could not walk back to Clinton in his bathing-trunks – that is, not until after dark.

      "I wish I had hold of that Ap Plunkit," repeated Fred Martin. "He did it," he added.

      "Oh, we don't know – "

      "Of course we do. He sneaked along there after us and found my clothes, and ran away with them – every one. And your shoes and stockings, too!"

      "No he didn't, either!" cried Bobby, suddenly, staring up into the tall tree over their heads.

      "Eh?"

      "There are the shoes and stockings – shoes, anyway," declared Bobby, pointing.

      It was a chestnut tree above their heads. It promised a full crop of nuts in the fall, for the green burrs starred thickly the leafy branches.

      Whoever had disturbed the chums' possessions had climbed to the very tip-top of the chestnut and hung the two pair of shoes far out on a small branch.

      "That's Ap Plunkit's work – I know," declared Fred, with conviction. "He climbs trees like a monkey. You see how long his arms are. I've seen him go up a taller tree than this."

      "Maybe he's taken your clothes up there, too," said Bobby, going to the trunk of the tree.

      "The mean scamp!" exclaimed Fred. "How'll we get them, Bob? I – I can't climb that tree this way."

      "Neither can I," admitted his friend. "But wait till I run and get my clothes on – "

      "And you'd better run, too!" exclaimed Fred, suddenly, "or you won't find the rest of yourclothes."

      Thus advised, Bobby Blake set out at once for the spot where he had been dressing. There was no sign of Applethwaite Plunkit about – or of any other marauder. Just the same, when Bobby was dressed and went down the creek side again to Fred, he carried all their possessions with him.

      That chestnut was a hard tree for Bobby to climb – especially barefooted. There were so many prickly burrs that had dropped into the crotches of the limbs, and, drying, had become quite stiff and sharp. He had to stop several times as he mounted upward to pick the thorns from his feet.

      But he got the shoes and stockings, and, hanging them around his neck, came down as swiftly as he could. Both boys at once sat down and put on this part of their apparel. Fred was almost tempted to cry; but then, he was too angry to "boo-hoo" much.

      "I'll catch that Ap Plunkit, and I'll do something to him yet," he declared. "I'll have him arrested for stealing my clothes, anyway."

      "How can we prove he took them? We didn't see him," said Bobby, thoughtfully.

      "Well!"

      "I tell you what," Bobby said. "Let's go up to his house and tell his mother. We know he did this, even if we didn't see him. Of course, we got him mad first – "

      "We didn't have to get him mad," declared Fred. "He's mad all the time."

      "Well, we plagued him. He just was getting square."

      "But such a mean trick to steal a fellow's clothes!"

      "Maybe his folks will see it that way and make Applethwaite give them back."

      "But I can't go up there to the house with only these old tights on!" said Fred.

      "No," and Bobby couldn't help grinning a little. "You wear my jacket."

      "And if I have lost my clothes," wailed Fred, "and have to go home this way, my father

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