Part 3 (1/2)
”No old-fas.h.i.+oned knocker here,” observed d.i.c.k as he gave the b.u.t.ton a push.
”Well, we are not wanting electric push b.u.t.tons,” said Tom. ”An electric runabout or a good two-seat carriage will fill our bill.”
The boys waited for fully a minute and then, as n.o.body came to answer their summons, d.i.c.k pushed the b.u.t.ton again.
”I don't hear it,” said Sam. ”Perhaps it doesn't ring.”
”Probably it rings in the back of the house,” answered his big brother.
Again the boys waited, and while they did so all heard talking at a distance.
”Somebody in the kitchen, I guess,” said Tom. ”Maybe we had better go around there. Some country folks don't use their front doors excepting for funerals and when the minister comes.”
Leaving their dress-suit cases on the piazza, the Rover boys walked around the side of the farmhouse in the direction of the kitchen.
The building was a low and rambling one and they had to pa.s.s a sitting-room. Here they found a window wide open to let in the fresh air and suns.h.i.+ne.
”Now, you must go, really you must!” they heard in a girl's voice. ”I haven't done a thing this afternoon, and what will papa say when he gets back?”
”Oh, that's all right, Minnie,” was the answer in masculine tones.
”You like us to be here, you know you do. And, remember, we haven't seen you in a long time.”
”Yes, I know, Mr. Flockley, but--”
”Oh, don't call me Mr. Flockley. Call me Dudd.”
”Yes, and please don't call me Mr. Koswell,” broke in another masculine voice. ”Jerry is good enough for me every time.”
”But you must go now, you really must!” said the girl.
”We'll go if you'll say good-by in the right kind of a way, eh, Dudd?”
said the person called Jerry Koswell.
”Yes, Minnie, but we won't go until you do that,” answered the young man named Dudd Flockley.
”Wha--what do you mean?” faltered the girl. And now, looking through the sitting-room window and through a doorway leading to the kitchen, the Rover boys saw a pretty damsel of sixteen standing by a pantry door, facing two dudish young men of eighteen or twenty. The young men wore checkered suits and sported heavy watch fobs and diamond rings and scarf-pins.
”Why, you'll give us each a nice kiss, won't you?” said Dudd Flockley with a smile that was meant to be alluring.
”Of course Minnie will give us a kiss,” said Jerry Koswell. ”Next Sat.u.r.day I'm coming over to give you a carriage ride.”
”I don't wish any carriage ride,” answered the girl coldly. Her face had gone white at the mention of kisses.
”Well, let's have the kisses anyway!” cried Dudd Flockley, and stepping forward, he caught the girl by one hand, while Jerry Koswell grasped her by the other.
”Oh, please let me go!” cried the girl. ”Please do! Oh, Mr. Flockley!
Mr. Koswell, don't--don't--please!”