Burt Standish - Dick Merriwell's Pranks - or, Lively Times in the Orient

A strong odor filled the air, reaching the nostrils of both Dick and Brad, who were laughing heartily.

“Great horn spoon!” gurgled the Texan. “For a duel this sure beats! Look at ’em, pard! The professor got it in the neck that time! There – he hit the major! They’ll be sights in a minute!”

Dick was laughing in his old, rollicking way.

“Oh, ha, ha, ha! Go it, professor! Soak him! That’s the way! Ha, ha, ha!”

Never had that grim and gloomy cemetery resounded with such shouts of merriment.

“Oh, I’ll fix him!” cried Zenas. “I’ll teach him a lesson! I’ll teach him to challenge me! I’ll – Murder! I’m blinded!”

In truth he had been struck fairly between the eyes, and the mass that spattered over his face completely blinded him.

“Teach me, will yo’, suh?” triumphantly shouted the major. “Oh, I don’t know!”

Dick was gasping for breath.

“Brad, it’s t-too much!” he laughed, holding onto his sides. “Ha, ha, ha! It’s too much!”

Professor Gunn wiped his sleeve across his eyes. Then he tried the other sleeve and succeeded in clearing them.

“Have yo’ got enough, suh?” demanded the major. “Cry quits, suh, if yo’ have.”

“Never – never while I live!” grated Zenas.

“Then I’ll have to finish yo’, suh. I offered yo’ – ”

He said no more, for at that instant an egg thrown with all the force Zenas Gunn could command struck him full and fair in the mouth.

The little man went down as if shot.

“Whee!” shrilled the professor. “Got him then!”

Fitts kicked and floundered and then rolled over on his stomach, lifting himself to his hands and knees. The sounds he emitted were trying on those who heard him.

At this juncture two ladies suddenly appeared on the scene, having approached during the excitement without being observed. They were Sarah Ann Ketchum and an Englishwoman whom she had found in the hotel and induced to accompany her to the scene of the duel.

Major Fitts had written her a passionate note of farewell, telling her about the duel, where it was to be fought and when. This he had intrusted to a servant to be delivered that morning. The servant had not waited for Miss Ketchum to rise, but had rapped at her door until she got up and received the message. When she comprehended its contents she lost not a moment in dressing and getting the other woman to accompany her to the scene of the “deadly” meeting.

When she saw Major Fitts on his hands and knees, giving utterance to those distressing and terrible sounds, she shrieked and ran forward.

“Oh, heavens!” she cried. “He is slain! He is wounded unto death! He is dying! Hear him gurgle, and groan, and gasp for breath! It is a horrible tragedy!”

“Great horn spoon!” exclaimed Buckhart. “Sarah Ann is on deck, pard.”

“She has arrived too late to prevent the fearful deed,” said Dick.

The lady from Boston saw Professor Gunn. She shook her clenched hands at him and screamed:

“You murderer! You have killed the poor major! You have slain the idol of my heart!”

“Great Cæsar!” gasped Zenas. “So she acknowledged that human wart as the idol of her heart! Well, she may take her idol, eggs and all!”

Sarah Ann fell on her knees beside the major, clasping him in her arms.

“Poor, poor hero!” she sobbed. “Tell me where you are wounded.”

“Fo’ the love of goodness, go ’way!” gurgled Fitts thickly.

“What is this horrid odor?” she exclaimed chokingly. “It is frightful!”

“Turkish cemeteries always smell that way, madam,” huskily declared the major. “Please go ’way! Please let me die in peace!”

“Never! I will remain by you until the last! I will – But I can’t endure this terrible odor! I’m growing faint! And what is this sticky substance all over your clothes?”

“That’s blood – pure blood.”

She held up her hands. The light was now sufficient for her to see.

“But it’s not red – it’s yellow!”

“That’s the color of my blood, madam. I’ve had yellow fever. Do go ’way!”

“But it smells – it smells – Why, it’s everywhere! It’s on the ground!”

“I’ve shed gallons of it already. I beg yo’ to leave me!”

“And those brutes are permitting you to bleed to death! What monsters!”

She began to grow hysterical. The language she applied to the professor made him wince. It also aroused his resentment. When she repeatedly called him a murderer he finally decided that the limit had been reached. Prancing over to her, he shrilly cried:

“Madam, you are needlessly wasting your sympathy on that little runt. He’s not seriously harmed, I assure you. We did fight a duel, and I am the victor; but we did not engage with deadly weapons, and Major Fitts is not dying.”

“Not dying? Did not use deadly weapons? Why – why, what did you use?”

“Eggs, madam – rotten eggs; and I am proud to say that I pasted him with them in a most scientific manner.”

“Eggs?” screamed Miss Ketchum, springing up and looking at her besmeared hands. “Rotten eggs? Then this is not his blood!”

“Hardly,” assured Zenas.

“Oh, horrible! Disgusting! It is perfectly shameful and outrageous! Look at my hands! Look at my waist! And the smell! I’m going to faint! Catch me!”

“Not on your life!” exclaimed Gunn, backing off. “I’ve learned my little book.”

She did not faint. Instead, she stiffened up like a ramrod and denounced both the duelists in scathing and scornful terms. Once more she declared that both were fools, and finally she fled, accompanied by the Englishwoman.

“Well, boys,” said Professor Gunn, some days later, as the trio were lounging in their rooms after the midday meal, “what do you think of Constantinople? Have you seen about enough of it?”

“Well, we have seen a great deal,” confessed Dick. “It is a fascinating and bewildering place, with its narrow, dirty streets, its swarms of people of many races, its veiled women, its dogs, its palaces and watch towers – in short, its thousands of strange sights.”

“It is a whole lot queer,” nodded Buckhart. “It gives me a right odd feeling to stand beside a mosque and see a muezzin come out on the balcony of a minaret and utter the call to prayer. The way he chants it kind of stirs something inside of me: ‘God is great; there is but one God; Mohammed is the prophet of God; prayer is better than sleep; come to prayer!’ Oh, I’ve got her all down fine, and I’ll never forget the words nor how they sound.”

“I suppose there are lots of places we have not seen, together with plenty of interesting things,” said Dick. “The thing that I’ll remember longest is the dance of the howling dervishes.”

“You bet that was a corker!” exclaimed the Texan, sitting up. “I opine I’ve got good nerves, but it certain came near driving me crazy to see them, a full dozen, just whirling and whirling like tops.”

“Then when they began to chant and howl!” said Dick. “The way they wailed, and groaned, and cried, ‘Allah, hough! Allah, hough!’ was enough to disturb nerves of steel.”

“But the finish was the worst, when all the whirlers had their eyes set and their lips covered with foam. No more howling-dervish shows for me!”

“Nor me, pard!”

“Well, when you youngsters get tired of Constantinople we’ll move on,” said Zenas.

“I sure would like to know whatever became of Major Fitts and Miss Ketchum,” said Brad.

“Never mind them!” exclaimed the professor hastily. “It was a great relief when they both took themselves out of this hotel after that – after that encounter in the cemetery.”