Then the man dropped
out. Dick was outwardly calm, though his chums shivered, for
they knew that their combined capital did not reach the amount
now being offered.
"I'm afraid that canoe is going to Dick's head," whispered Harry
Hazelton anxiously to Tom Reade.
"Let him alone," retorted Tom in a low voice. "It's one of Dick
Prescott's good points that he generally knows what he's doing."
"But we have only-----"
"Never mind if we're worth a million, or only a single dollar,"
interrupted Reade impatiently. "Watch the battle between our
leader and Rip, the Mean!"
Now the bidding became slower, fifty cents at a time being offered,
bids coming only when the auctioneer threatened to "knock down."
"I don't want to get this confounded canoe fastened onto me,"
grumbled Fred Ripley to himself. "I want to stick Prescott and
his crowd for all I can, but I must look out that I don't get
stung. I know better than to want that canoe, no matter how good
it _looks_!"
"Sixteen," said Dick at last, feeling more desperate inwardly
than his face showed.
"Sixteen-fifty," from Ripley.
"Seventeen," offered Dick, after a pause.
"Seventeen-fifty," announced Fred, after another long bait.
"Eighteen!" followed up young Prescott. He was in a cold perspiration
now, lest the fight be forced too far.
To his astonishment, Fred Ripley, an ugly sneer on his face, turned
his back on the bidding.
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