PROFESSOR GROUCH PAYS THE PENALTY

Harold and Vincent were awakened early the next morning by merry shouts and the ring of axes on heavy timbers. Harold was the first out of bed.

"Gee, they are working already," he cried to Vincent. "Come on. We're late."

"Working on what?" asked Vincent, drowsily.

"On the big stunt fire where they're going to burn 'Grouch.' Come on, hurry!" He slipped into his trousers, pulled on a gym jersey, stuck his head into a pan of cold water at the pump, and was off.

The camp had been astir for an hour. The fellows were busy rolling the heavy logs to the water's edge and piling them on end about a stout hickory they had planted in the ground as a center pole.

"One, two, three-up she goes. Steady now. Here, Durbin, back this end in. Let her down-easy now. That's the ticket." So one by one the timbers were stood on end about the hickory. All the small sticks and brush that could be found were being hauled in by the smaller fellows and filled in about the base.

By breakfast the job was well along. By swimming time it was all up, well wired, oiled, and ready for the big event.

Mr. Blaine was busy most of the morning building the dummy, and by noon a real "Grouch" had been constructed. Certain portions of the gentleman's anatomy were made in secret, and there was no little speculation as to just what would happen "When the old boy got well afire."

I saw them putting in a lot of sticks of dynamite," confided "Love" to Dale and Longley.

"Those were roman candles," laughed Longley.

"How do you know?" questioned "Love."

"'Cause I saw the big box of fireworks come yesterday, and I saw the 'chief' open it this morning," replied Longley.

Well, I saw Mr. Blaine put a long of cannon crackers in 'Grouch's' shoes, anyway," said Vincent.

"O, those weren't cannon crackers at all," affirmed Leonard. "They were just red sox. The cook gave them to Mr. Blaine especially for the occasion."

"Well, anyway, there are a lot of big sky rockets sticking out of his coat collar, I'll bet on that," assured Vincent.

"His head's full of green light, too," said "Love," "'cause I found a bag down by the fire that said 'Green Light,' and I know they made his head of a big tin-can.

In the afternoon the pyramids were practiced for the last time, while in the woods adjoining the camp minstrels held a final rehearsal. Every fellow was busy.

Quite a number of visitors arrived on the evening train to stay until after July Fourth, and among them was Mr. Eldred, who was to make the patriotic address on the morrow.

The invitation had been extended to all the neighbors, young folks, both boys and girls, to come to the big fire. After supper these began to arrive, coming in ones, twos, and threes, by boat, buggy, or afoot.

A makeshift court room had been arranged, with seats for the judge and the jurors. Professor Grouch was calmly seated on a chair, fastened to the hickory pole, high above the fire, and seemed to care very little about what was going on below him, for he looked straight ahead. His hat was cocked on one side of his head, and in his teeth he grimly held a corn-cob pipe, from the bowl of which protruded a mysterious fuse.

The guests assembled; the jurors took their seats; the judge called the court to order, and the trial began.

The council for the defense made a vary lame plea, stating that poor Grouch had always been a grouch; a sour, crabbed man, who had never tasted real happiness in his life nor felt good-will toward any one. He had never been known to smile or laugh. Taking it all in all, Grouch himself confessed that he had just about come to the conclusion that he really had no right to live, at least among such a crowd of live and happy boys.

The court finally charged Grouch with disturbing the peace of the camp and with the murdering of "Good Will." To these charges Grouch, through his attorney, pleaded guilty. Witnesses were then sworn in, and these to a man testified that Grouch was an unkind, unfair man, selfish in the extreme, and that his heart was anything but good. The testimony further showed that he had time after time gotten well-meaning fellows into trouble, and that he had a type of indigestion that was contagious. He was merely a public nuisance.

After all the witnesses had been on the stand, the prosecuting attorney made an eloquent speech in which he pleaded for the death of the rascal prisoner and a severe sentence for every one of his followers and accomplices, closing his appeal to the jurors by declaring that the very future success of dear old Eberhart itself depended on the complete overthrow of this unprincipled scoundrel.

The jury were out just thirty seconds, when they returned a verdict of guilty. "Guilty in the murder of 'Good Will' in the first degree, Your Honor, and we recommend to the court that Grouch be burned at the stake this night, until he is entirely consumed, and that his spirit be sent to dwell in the swamp with that of old Thomson." The judge with marked ceremony so ordered. In a second the torches were applied to the oiled fagots, and the flames swept upward, enveloping the victim.

A long, oiled rope had been attached to the Professor and dropped into the fire. The flames quickly ran up this fuse, and in an instant Mr. Grouch was paying his last respects to his accusers. He held a red light in his right hand, his left was placed over his heart. His pipe had been filled with green light, and this he smoked vigorously. A half-dozen roman candles, concealed in his breast pocket, poured forth a shower of colored balls. Just as a great bomb exploded in his trousers' pocket, a series of sky-rockets slid out of his coat collar into the sky, to typify the releasing of his spirit. His head tipped forward, and his arms dropped listlessly at his sides just as the flames from the great pile of logs reached him. In another second he was lost from view in the clouds of smoke and flame.

There were several rousing cheers, a hearty song or two, and then the stunts began. The fire and the speeches had impressed every boy, and it was not until huge slices of water-melon made their appearance that the spirit of the trial disappeared.

Final announcements for the morrow were made, and then the crowd made for their tents amid a shower of water-melon rinds.

"Say that was great, wasn't it?" Dale said to Cooper, as they walked along the path to the tents. "I wouldn't have missed it for a farm. No more grouching for mine."

"So old Grouch is gone for good," remarked "Shrimp" Warren as he slipped out of his clothes preparatory to his evening dip. "It's a good thing, too, for he was a scalawag right, wasn't he?"

"The tyrant rules no more," cried Durbin, tragically. "No more he'll haunt our pleasant canvas homes to peeve and urge the imps of Satan on. And if he dares return, we'll shout: 'Avaunt ye, idle, lounging villain. Why loiter ye here? For this is a happy kingdom.'"

"Where'd you get it, Durbin?" asked Vincent, good-naturedly. "Say, by the way, Durbin, what's the weather signs for the Fourth?"

Durbin knelt and felt of the grass at his feet.

The fellows shouted their approval of the prophecy, and in less than a jiffy were in the water for their evening dip.