He was very angry and now he shook his cowhide whip at them.

At that instant, quite unintentionally, Shep let an apple core drop from his hand.  Pop Lundy was looking up when the core hit him plumb in the left eye.

“Yeou villain!” he cried, dancing around.  “Want fer to put my eye eout, hey?  Oh, wait till I git my hands on ye, I’ll show ye a thing or two!”

“Mr. Lundy, supposing we agree to pay you for the apples?” questioned Snap, after an awkward pause.

“How much?” demanded the farmer, cautiously.  He was a good deal of a miser and money was very dear to him.

“Oh, a fair price.”

“Don’t pay him a cent,” whispered Giant.  “Let us all drop and run for it.”

“If we do that he may report the matter at home and make trouble that way,” went on Snap.  “He can’t charge us only a few cents for what we have taken.”

“Will ye give me a dollar fer the apples?” asked Pop Lundy.

“A dollar!” ejaculated Whopper.  “Humph!  I can get a barrel of these apples for a dollar!”

“No, yeou can’t!  I’m a-goin’ to git six dollars fer ’em—–­they’re the best in these air parts.  Make it a dollar an’ I’ll let ye go.”

“This is a regular hold-up,” muttered Shep.  “Offer him twenty-five cents.”

At that moment came a loud cry from the direction of the farmhouse, which was located at the upper end of the orchard.

“Help! help!  Simon!  Simon!  Help me!” came in the voice of a woman.

CHAPTER IV

THE DISAPPEARANCE OF THE BOAT

“Something is wrong sure!” exclaimed Snap, as the cry from the farmhouse was repeated.

He looked below and saw that Pop Lundy was running away, in the direction of the cry for assistance.

“Now is our chance to get away!” cried Whopper, and dropped to the ground, while the others did the same.

“Wait!” came from Snap.  “That sounds as if somebody was in great trouble.  Hadn’t we better go and see what it means?”

“And get caught by Pop Lundy?” queried Giant.

“I don’t care,” put in Shep.  “If I can help a lady I am going to do it.”

He hurried off in the direction Simon Lundy had taken and one after another his chums followed.  To get to the back door of the farmhouse they had to pass around a chicken house and a pig sty, and as they were doing this they saw a burly negro leap a rail fence not far away.

“What is it, Jane?” they heard the farmer cry, as he dashed into the house.

There was no reply, and coming to the door, the four boys saw that the farmer’s wife lay back in a kitchen chair in a dead faint.

“Sumbuddy hez killed her, I guess!” moaned Simon Lundy.  “Oh, where is the villain?”

“She isn’t dead, only fainted,” answered Shep, who had assisted his father on more than one occasion.  “Got some smelling salts in the house?”