"Barney Mulloy dead?" exclaimed Inza, coming up at that moment and
hearing the news.
"What?" cried Elsie.
"Report in the _Herald_," Frank answered. "Killed yesterday by hoboes,
somewhere below Sandy Hook."
Bad news spreads as if by magic. In a little while the other members of
the party, having read the story for themselves or heard of it from
others, gathered round Merriwell.
"Well, he was an honest boy," said Hodge, a noticeable tremor in his
voice.
"A better-hearted lad never lived!" Merriwell asserted.
Frank's mind went back to Fardale, and, grieved as he was, he could
again hear the yells of Barney Mulloy and Hans Dunnerwust, when they
crawled into bed with the lobsters, which they thought were centipedes.
It had been one of the funniest incidents of the Fardale days, for both
thought they were poisoned by the bites of the creatures, and that they
would surely die. The whole thing had been a practical joke, in which
Frank had played a prominent part. And now Barney, the mischievous, the
loyal, the reckless, was dead!
"I can hardly believe it!" Merry declared. "It doesn't seem possible.
But there is one thing! I shall spend some money in having those hoboes
hunted down and punished for their crime."
"I wish I could have happened along there about the time they jumped on
him!" growled Hodge, and the light in his dark face showed that he would
have done his best to make it hot for the hoboes if he could have put
his hands on them.
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