Fortunately for Dick and his chums the steak order was delayed
in the serving. Thus Dodge and Bayliss finished their ice cream
and left the place without discovering the presence of their intended
victims.

"Say, aren't that pair just going to enjoy themselves at our expense?"
chuckled Hazelton, after the plotters had left.

"Unless I miss my guess, they're going to dance to our music to-night,"
laughed Dick gleefully.

Their meal was served soon after, and eaten with relish. As soon
as it had been finished Dick asked the waiter for a sheet of paper
and envelope.

"Don't worry about any weird doings you may hear of from our camp,"
Prescott wrote his mother. "We've just learned of a big scare
Dodge and Bayliss are planning to spring on us up at our camp.
We're going to turn the tables on them---that's all. But I write
this for fear you may hear some awful tales when that pair reach
Gridley."

As they left the restaurant, Dick returned to the post-office,
mailing this second letter to his mother.

"Now, we must buy a few things here," Dick explained to his friends.
"Then we must get out of this village by a back road, and we
must make sure that we don't run into that pair of ex-soreheads."

The "sorehead" reference, as readers of our "_High School Boys