The Rover Boys on the River | Page 4

have
been so anxious had they dreamed of the many adventures and perils in
store for them.

CHAPTER II
ON THE WAY TO PUTNAM HALL
"Boys, we start the march back to Putnam Hall in fifteen minutes!"
Such was the news which flew around the camp not long after the
dinner hour had passed. Already the tents had been taken down, the
baggage strapped, and six big wagons fairly groaned with the loads of
goods to be taken back to the military institution.
The cadets had marched to the camp by one route and were to return to
the academy by another. All was bustle and excitement, for in spite of
the general order a few things had gone astray.
"Weally, this is most--ah--remarkable, don't you know," came from that
aristocratic cadet named William Philander Tubbs.
"What's remarkable, Tublets?" asked Tom, who was near by, putting
away a pair of blankets.
"Lieutenant Rover, how many times must I--ah--tell you not to address
me as Tublets?" sighed the fashionable young cadet.
"Oh, all right, Tubhouse, it shan't occur again, upon my honor."
"Tubhouse! Oh, Rover, please let up!"
"What's wrong, Billy?"
"That is better, but it is bad enough," sighed William Philander.
"I've--ah--lost one of my walking shoes."
"Perhaps, being a walking shoe, it walked off."
"Maybe it got in that beefsteak we had this morning," put in Sam, with
a wink. "I thought that steak was rather tough."

"Shoo yourself with such a joke, Sam," came from Fred Garrison.
"Have you really lost your shoe, Tubby, dear?" sang out Songbird
Powell, the so-styled "poet" of the academy. And then he started to
sing:
"Rub a dub dub! One shoe on the Tubb! Where can the other one be?
Look in your bunk And look in your trunk, And look in the bumble-bee
tree!"
"Whoop! hurrah! Songbird has composed another ode in Washtub's
honor," sang out Fred Garrison. "Washtub, you ought to give Songbird
a dollar for that."
"Thanks, but I make not my odes for filthy lucre," same from Powell,
tragically, and then he continued:
"One penny reward, And a big tin sword, To whoever finds the shoe.
Come one at a time, And form in line, And raise a hullabaloo!"
And then a shout went up that could be heard all over the encampment.
"I'll lend you a slipper, Tubbs," said little Harry Moss, whose shoes
were several sizes smaller than those of the aristocratic cadet.
"Somebody get me a shingle and I'll cut Tubstand a sandal with my
jackknife," came from Tom.
"I'll shingle you!" roared William Philander Tubbs, and rushed away to
escape his tormentors. In the end he found another shoe, but it was not
the one he wanted, for that had been rolled up in the blankets by Tom
and was not returned until Putnam Hall was reached.
Drums and fifes enlivened the way as the cadets started for the military
academy. The march was to take the balance of that afternoon and all
of the next day. During the night they were to camp out like regular
soldiers on the march, in a big field Captain Putnam had hired for that
purpose.

The march did not take the cadets through Oakville, so the Rover boys
did not see the friends they had made in that vicinity. They headed
directly for the village of Bramley, and then for another small
settlement named White Corners,--why, nobody could tell, since there
was not so much as a white post anywhere to be seen in that vicinity.
"It's queer how a name sticks," declared Tom, after speaking of this to
his brother Dick. "They might rather call this Brown Corners, since
most of the houses are brown."
At the Corners they obtained supper, which was supplied to the cadets
by the hotel keeper, who had been notified in advance of their coming.
While they were eating a boy who worked around the stables of the
hotel watched them curiously. Afterwards this boy came up to Sam and
Tom.
"We had a cadet here yesterday who was awfully mad," said the boy.
"Had hydrophobia, eh?" returned Tom. "Too bad!"
"No, I don't mean that; I mean he was very angry."
"What was the trouble?"
"I don't know exactly, but I think he had been sent away from the
school for something or other."
"What was his name?"
"Lew Flapp."
"Why, I thought he had gone home!" cried Sam.
"So did I," answered his brother. He turned to the hotel youth. "What
was this Flapp doing here?"
"Nothing much. He asked the boss when you were expected here."

"Is he here now?"
"No, he left last night."
"Where did he go to?"
"I don't know, but I thought I would tell you about the fellow. I think he
is going to try to do