"What is it?" asked Bart.
"Let's get away from here, to some place where we can talk it over quietly," suggested Fenn. "We don't want them to know we're onto their plans."
The four chums moved off down the street. Frank seemed to have recovered his good spirits, and joined in the talk readily enough. They listened to Ned's suggestion, and the more they talked of it the more enthusiastic they grew over it.
"This'll beat their breaking-up of our dinner all to pieces," said Fenn. "It's all to the merry. They'll wish they'd let us alone."
"There's one point we almost overlooked," said Frank, just as the chums were about to disperse.
"What is it?" asked Fenn.
"To make the plan work right we've got to get on the floor where the dance is going on, and I don't believe we can. Those fellows will have every entrance guarded."
"Leave that to me," spoke Ned. "I know that old dance hall like a book. There's an entrance they'll never guard and we can use that."
For the next few days the four chums were busy at home every spare moment. Their folks wondered what was in the wind, but the boys kept their own counsel.
"Have you got any cheese?" asked Bart of his mother one evening.
"What for? Are you hungry?" asked Alice, looking up from the first-aid-to-the-injured book that she was studying.
"No, but I'm going to feed it to those who are hungry," her brother replied.
"Do you want it for some poor persons?" asked Mrs. Keene. "I think, Bart, I can give them something better than cheese."
"No; cheese is just what's wanted," Bart answered. "You see it's a secret."
"Oh, I guess he's going to have some sort of an initiation in a secret society!" exclaimed Alice. "Tell me about it, Bart, I'll never breathe a word of it, really I won't."
"I'd like to, Sis, but I can't," Bart replied. "It's very secret."
Bart got the cheese and took it to his room. Alice tried to tease him into telling her what he wanted of it, but Bart maintained a provoking silence.
"All right!" declared Alice. "I'll never tie your hand up again, if you hurt it with your shotgun," referring to an incident when Bart had slightly injured several of his fingers by the premature discharge of his gun.
"I don't intend to get shot again," Bart made answer. "Really, Alice, I'd like to tell you about this, but you'll hear about it soon enough."
"When?"
"Saturday night, maybe."
"But I'm going away Saturday night."
"Where?"
"To a dance."
"A dance, eh?" and Bart looked interested. "What dance?"
"Why one the first-year boys are getting up. I've got an invitation."
"You don't mean to say you're going to the racket the Upside Down Club is going to give?"
"Yes; why not?"
"Oh, nothing."
"Yes, there is something. I can tell by the way you act."
"Well, I didn't think a sister of mine would go to an affair given by the enemies of the Darewell baseball team."
"Oh, you're mad just because they played a trick on you about your dinner. That's nothing. I'm going to the dance just the same. So you'd better tell me now what you want the cheese for."
"Oh, if you go to the dance you may hear of it there."
"Now, Bart, I think you're real mean! Please tell me! How can I hear of it at the dance?"
"Run along now, Sis, I'm busy," and Bart, with a provoking smile, shut the door of his room. Alice waited a minute, and then, hearing her brother moving about among his possessions, and realizing that it was useless to tease him further, went downstairs.
"I don't care," she said to herself. "I'll have a good time at the dance, anyhow."
Preparations went on for the little informal affair the boys of the Upside Down Club were to give. They tried to keep it a secret, but it was impossible. However, they took precautions to prevent any unbidden ones gaining access to the hall. The place was kept locked all day, and in the evenings, while the work of decorating it was under way, there were enough of the first-year boys on hand to prevent any untoward acts on the part of their enemies.
The four chums had taken a few of their closest friends of the nine into their confidence, but they kept matters so quiet that none of the Upside Downs suspected that a plot of vengeance was afoot. While the first-year boys did not ask any of the other male pupils of the school to the dance, they were not so strict with the girls, and a number from all the classes of the institution were bidden to the affair.
"The more the merrier," said Ned, when he heard of this. "It will be the talk of the town Monday morning."
"If it works out right," put in Fenn.
"Oh, it will work out right," Ned said confidently.
The night of the dance came at last. Alice put on her prettiest dress, and, as she was leaving she saw her brother, attired in an old suit of clothes, lounging in his room.
"I thought you were going to tell me about that secret to-night," she said.
"The night isn't over yet," Bart replied. "There's time enough."
So Alice went to the dance. She found many other girl acquaintances there, and scores of boy friends among the members of the Upside Down Club.
Bart, who had remained in his room all the evening, was started from a revery about nine o'clock by a whistle out in the street.
"There are the fellows!" he exclaimed, and, catching up his cap, and taking a package, from which sounded a mysterious scurrying and squealing, he went out.
In front of his house he met Ned, Fenn and Frank. Each one had a bundle similar to the one Bart carried.
"Got plenty of 'em?" asked Ned.
"About two dozen," was the answer.
"You had better luck than I. I got fifteen."
"I have twenty and Fenn has ten," put in Frank.
"That's enough to break up a dozen dances," spoke Ned. "Come on now, we've got to do a bit of climbing."
The hall, where the dance was being held, was over the drug store. This was in the center of a business block, the drug structure being higher than any of the buildings amid which it stood. The ballroom was on the top floor.
"Have you arranged about getting in?" asked Fenn.
"We can't get in," Ned replied. "They've got every door doubly guarded, for they suspect we're up to something. In fact we don't want to get in. I have a better way. Come along."
Ned led the way, through back streets until he came to a certain high fence.
"One of us has got to climb over and open the gate," he said. "After that the rest is easy."
Bart, being a good climber, was soon over the obstruction, and admitted his companions to a yard in the rear of a group of buildings.
"Where are we?" asked Fenn.
"We're in back of Williamson's hardware place," replied Ned. "That's right next to the drug store. We're going to the roof of that, and when we get there we can go up a short ladder until we get to the roof of the drug store."
"How did the ladder get there?" asked Frank.
"I bribed a telephone lineman, who was stringing some wires on the buildings yesterday, to leave it there."
"But what are we going to do when we get on the roof of the drug store?" asked Fenn.
"You watch and you'll see," Ned answered.
By means of an outside stairway, and by climbing up on a rear porch, the boys reached the roof of the hardware building. Thence it was an easy task to get on top of the structure in which the dance was being held. They could hear the music below them, and the sound of merry feet tripping to the melody of a two-step.
"There's a scuttle near the center," Ned spoke. "Walk quietly now. It's a tin roof, and they may hear us, in spite of the music. Go easy!"
They found the scuttle, and it was unlocked. Ned had seen to that, by giving a judicious hint to the janitor of the place the day before. The boys cautiously removed the covering to a hole that led into a sort of attic or ventilating space. A few minutes later the four chums were in a dark loft, looking through the grating of a ventilator in the wall right down on the dancing floor.
"My, but they're having a good time!" exclaimed Ned in a whisper. "It seems a pity to spoil it."
"Pity nothing!" exclaimed Bart. "What did they do to us? Besides, there's no harm in this. There'll be a little screaming from the girls, but that's all."
"Have you got 'em in paper bags?" asked Ned, as he began to open the box he carried.
"Sure," replied Bart, and the others answered in the affirmative.
"When I open the grating just toss the bags out, right in the middle of the floor," Ned went on. "Do it quick, as I want to close the ventilator before they see where the things come from."
An instant later Ned had opened the ventilator grating, which he had previously loosened. Then, through the air, went sailing four paper bags. They struck almost in the middle of the ballroom floor and burst.
Then from the bags there scampered over three score mice, rushing, running, leaping and darting amid the dancers, with frightened squeaks and squeals.
For a moment there was silence, broken only by the noise of the rodents. Then every girl in the room, and there were forty of them, uttered a frightened scream and rushed for a place of safety.
"A mouse! A mouse! Oh, save me!" was the universal cry, and the music came to a stop in a crash of discord as the dance was most effectually broken up.
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