tug now got quickly to his feet, and he and history shook hands with their left hands very majestically. then they faced about and stood back to back, asking the crows why they had lost interest so suddenly, and cordially inviting them to return and finish the game. they stood thus, monarchs of all they surveyed, for a few moments. but dismay replaced their joy as they heard the words of the first crow: they cant get back to their rooms before their pokers grow cold, and it is only a matter of a few minutes until they chill, anyway, so all that we have to do is to wait here a little while, and then go back and finish up our workand perhaps add a little extra on account of this last piece of rambunctiousness. tug saw that they were prisoners indeed, but intended to hold the fort until the last possible moment. he told history to put his poker back in the fire and to heat it up again, while he stood guard with his own. to this stratagem the first crow responded with another,he trumped tugs ace, as it were,for though he saw that the fire was going out and would not heat the pokers much longer, he decided not to wait for this, but set his men to gathering stones and sticks to pelt the two luckless lakerimmers with. and now tug saw that the chances of escape were indeed small. he felt that he could make a dash for liberty and outrun any one in the crowd, or outfight any one who might overtake him; but he would sooner have died than leave history, who could neither run well nor fight well, to the mercies of the merciless gang that surrounded them. lets give the lakerim yell together, history, he said; perhaps the fellows have missed us and are out looking for us, and will come to our rescue. so he and history filled their lungs and hurled forth into the air the old lakerim yell, or as much of it as two could manage: {ray! {ri! {ro! l`¨¡y-krim! l`¨¡y-krim! l`¨¡y-krim! hoo-{row! {roo! {rah! the crows listened in amazement to the war-whoop of the two lakerimmers. then the first crow, who had irish blood in his veins, smiled and said: oho! i see what they are up to; theyre calling for help. well, now, well just drown out their yell with a little noise of our own. and so, when tug and history had regained breath enough to begin their club cry again, the whole two dozen of the crows broke forth into a horrible hullabaloo of shrieks and howls that drowned out tugs and historys voices completely, but raised far more noise than they could ever have hoped to make. after a few moments of thus caterwauling night hideous, like a pack of coyotes, the crows began to close in on the lakerim stronghold, and stones and sticks flew around the two in a shower that kept them busy dodging. weve got to make a break for it, histry, said tug, under his breath. now, you hang on to me and ill hang on to you, and dont mind how your lungs ache or whether you have any breath or not, but just leg it for home. he had locked his arm through historys, and made a leap toward the circle of crows just as a heavy stone lighted on the spot where they had made their stand so long. before the crows knew what was up, tug and history were upon them and had cut a path through the ring by merely brandishing their incandescent pokers, and had disappeared into the dark of the woods. there was dire confusion among the crows, and some of them ran every which way and lost the crowd entirely as history and tug vanished into the thick night. the glowing pokers, however, that were their only weapons of defense, were also their chiefest danger, and a pack of about a dozen crows soon discovered that they could follow the runaways by the gleam of the rods. tug realized this, too, very shortly, and he and history threw the pokers away. tug and history, however, had come pretty well to the edge of the wood, and were just rushing down a little glade that would lead them into the open, when the first crow yelled for some of his men to take a short cut and head them off. the lakerimmers, then, their breath all spent and their hearts burning with the flight, which tug would not let history give up, saw themselves headed off and escape no longer possible. tug knew that history would be useless in a scrimmage, so, in a low tone, he bade him drop under a deep bush they were just passing. history was too exhausted to object even to being left alone, and managed to sink into the friendly cover of the bush without being observed. and tug went right into a mob of them, crying with a fine defiance the old yell of the athletic club: l`¨¡y-krim! l`¨¡y-krim! l`¨¡y-krim! hoo-ray! vii the nine lakerimmers who had set forth to the rescue of tug and history had no more clue as to the whereabouts of the kidnapped twain than some broken furniture and an open door; and even one who was so well versed in detective stories as b.j., had to admit that this was very little for what he called a slouch-hound to begin work on. there had been no snow, and the frost had hardened the ground, so that there were no footprints to tell the way the crowd of hazers had gone. as jumbo said: its like looking for a needle in a haystack after dark; and it wouldnt do you any good to sit down in this haystack, either. the only thing to do, then, was to scour the campus in all its nooks and crannies, pausing now and then to look and listen hard for any sign or sound of the captives. but each man heard nothing except the pounding of his own heart and the wheezing of his own lungs. then they must up and away again into the dark. they had scurried hither and yon, and yonder and thither, until they were well-nigh discouraged, when, just as they were crashing through some thick underbrush, b.j. stopped suddenly short. sawed-off bumped into him, and jumbo tripped over sawed-off; but b.j. commanded them to be silent so sharply that they paused where they had fallen and listened violently. then they heard far and faint in the distance to the right of their course a little murmur of voices just barely audible. b.j.s quick ear made out the difference between this far-off hubbub and the other quiet sounds of the night. that dim little noise his breathless fellows could just hear was the wild hullabaloo the foolish crows had set up to drown out the voices of tug and history, as they gave the lakerim yell. b.j.s ear was correct enough not only to understand the noise but to decide the direction it came from, though to the other lakerimmers it came from nowhere in particular and everywhere in general. before they had made up their minds just how puzzled they were, b.j