



Produced by David Edwards, Barry Abrahamsen and the Online
Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This
file was produced from images generously made available
by The Internet Archive)









     [Illustration: “For once that day, Guy was supremely happy.”]




------------------------------------------------------------------------




                              GUY HARRIS,

                              THE RUNAWAY.


                          BY HARRY CASTLEMON,


                              _Author of_


 “Julian Mortimer,” “The Boy Trapper,” “Sportsman’s Club Series,” “The
                      Gunboat Series,” etc., etc.


                              ILLUSTRATED.

                    [Illustration: Publisher’s Logo]

                               NEW YORK:
                         A. L. BURT, PUBLISHER.




------------------------------------------------------------------------




                         ---------------------

                    COPYRIGHTED 1887, BY A. L. BURT.

                         ---------------------




------------------------------------------------------------------------




                              GUY HARRIS,

                              THE RUNAWAY.

                             --------------




                               CHAPTER I.

                      THE AFFAIR OF THE MATCH-BOX.


“WELL, Guy Harris, I have only one word to say to you. If you think you
can play off on me in this way, you are very much mistaken. I will post
you among the fellows as a boy who is too mean to pay his honest debts.”

“I don’t care if you do, George Wolcom. I’ll tell the fellows in return
that I have no debts hanging over me, and that you are a boy who doesn’t
do as he agrees. I wanted a cross-gun; I tried to make one and failed.
You said you knew how to handle carpenters’ tools and would make me one.
I described to you just what I wanted, and you told me that you could
fill the bill, and that the gun, when completed, would be worth half a
dollar. What sort of a thing have you given me? Look at this,” continued
the speaker, holding out at arm’s length a piece of wood which might
have been taken for a cross-gun, although it looked about as much like a
ball-club; “I can make a better one myself.”

“Then you don’t intend to pay me?”

“Of course I do, when you bring me such a gun as I told you I wanted.”

“But you won’t pay me for the one I have already made for you?”

“No, sir, I won’t.”

“Very well; but bear in mind that I am a boy who never let’s one do him
a mean trick without paying him back in his own coin. I’ll be even with
you for swindling me.”

“Oh, Guy! I say. Guy Harris, hold on a minute.”

The two boys, between whom the conversation above recorded took place,
stopped when they heard these words, and looking across the street saw
Tom Proctor running toward them. One arm was buried to the elbow in his
pocket, and under the other he carried a beautiful snow-white dove,
which was fluttering its wings and trying to escape from his grasp.

“See here, Guy!” exclaimed Tom as he came up, “I have just been over to
your house, where I found my pigeon, which I lost about a week ago. Your
mother said it came to your barn, and that you shut it up to keep it for
me. Now that was a neighborly act, and I want to repay it. Here’s that
box you have so often tried to buy from me.”

As Tom said this he pulled his hand out of his pocket and gave Guy the
article in question, which proved to be a brass match-box. It was not a
very valuable thing, but it had a revolving top secured by a curiously
contrived spring, was stamped all over with figures of wild ducks, deer
and rabbits, and was altogether different from anything of the kind that
Guy had ever seen before.

For some reason or other he had long shown a desire to obtain possession
of this box, but the owner could not be induced to part with it.

Before he could express his thanks for the gift Tom was half-way across
the street on his way home.

“This is just the thing I wanted,” said Guy joyfully, as he and George
Wolcom resumed their walk. “I shall think of Tom every time I look at
this box when I am out on the prairie.”

“When you are out on the prairie?” echoed George. “What do you mean by
that?”

“Oh, it is my secret. You may know it some day, but not now. What do you
suppose is the reason why I want a cross-gun?”

“Why, to kill birds with.”

“No, sir; I want to practice shooting at a mark. I shall have use for a
rifle every hour in the day before I am