Dick Merriwell's Pranks: or, Lively Times in the Orient

“That’s whatever,” chuckled Brad. “We must be the peaches of your harem.”

“I’ll do my best. I have a customer waiting. Follow me.”

They passed through winding ways and came finally into a room where a little Frenchman waited, amid a collection of feminine garments.

“Here they are, Louis,” said Coddington. “Make them into handsome girls. Show your skill.”

“Make us handsome, with the exception of our faces,” said Dick “Those must be as hideous as possible.”

“But ze faces will be covaired by ze veils,” protested Louis.

“Not all the time,” smiled Dick. “Some one is going to get a peep beneath my veil.”

“Mine, too,” nodded Brad. “I want a mug on me that would scare a dog into a fit.”

“Vera well; eet s’all be. Get redee.”

“In the meantime, boys,” said Coddington, “I will be on the watch for the guest who is on the outlook for a harem.”

Some time later Colonel Stringer and Professor Gunn rapped at the door of the house.

They were not admitted by Coddington himself, but by a black man in flowing garments, who bowed obsequiously before the colonel and bade them follow him.

They were ushered into a large, luxuriously furnished room, with many divans and Turkish rugs, a fountain playing in the centre of the apartment, and a man in Eastern garments propped up amid some cushions, lazily smoking a hookah.

“My deah Coddington,” said Stringer, hastening toward the smoker and bowing low, “delighted! Permit me to present my friend, Professor Gunn, of America.”

The professor bowed after the fashion of Stringer.

“Deuced glad to know you, don’t you know,” drawled Coddington. “Is this the gentleman, colonel, who is looking for a harem?”

“The same, suh,” nodded Stringer.

“Well, by Jove! I believe I’ve got the very thing he wants. I have the finest harem in the East, you know. Fourteen wives, in all, and every one a pearl. Ya-as.”

“But why do you wish to sell out, sir?” questioned Gunn.

“It’s become a deuced bore, don’t you understand. Besides that, I must return to England soon, and I can’t take my beauties with me. It would be quite scandalous there. I’d find myself arrested, don’t you know. So I have to dispose of my dear little doves. It breaks my heart, but I can’t do anything different. If you want a harem, professor, that outrivals anything in the East, you’ll get it right here, and get it for a song, too.”

Now, it is best to confess the actual truth right here. Professor Gunn had no intention of buying a harem. What the old boy wanted was to get inside a harem – to see it and get a peep at the “Eastern houris,” as he had heard them called. And he took this method of getting in.

The professor was congratulating himself on his cleverness.

“Eh, eh, ahem!” coughed the old pedagogue. “I’ve always been somewhat shy of bargains that can be obtained for a mere song. I always favor inspecting whatever I purchase.”

“Then be seated,” invited Coddington, motioning toward the heaped-up cushions at his side. “Sit here, professor, and you shall see some of the sights of the harem.”

The professor hastened to deposit himself amid the cushions, chuckling inwardly over his success.

Colonel Stringer accepted a seat on the opposite side of the professed owner of the harem.

Coddington clapped his hands.

Immediately a huge black man, dressed in gaudy, barbaric clothes, his head turbaned, his feet bare, appeared from somewhere and bowed low before the Englishman.

“Bring hookahs for my visitors,” said Coddington, “and bid my dancing girls appear and dance for me.”

The black man bowed sweepingly again, and hastily disappeared.

Almost immediately two boys, clothed in purple, entered, bearing hookahs, which they placed before the professor and the colonel. When the visitors were ready to smoke, the boys lighted the hookahs.

“He! he!” laughed Zenas, as he puffed away. “Makes one feel decidedly kinky and chipper. I’m not much of a smoker, but I – ough! ugah! ugah! agoo-ugah! – hah! Whew!”

He had taken some of the smoke into his lungs, and it nearly strangled him. He continued to cough for some time, but suddenly stopped and rubbed the water from his eyes.

Out upon the tiled floor before them glided a number of graceful figures, girls in diaphanous draperies, which fluttered in the air, light as azure. These girls were swaying, bending, dancing, their arms waving in the air, their feet moving swiftly to the sound of tiny, tinkling bells and the throb of a strange, unnatural music. The music was produced by a number of musicians who mysteriously appeared, seated on the floor at one side.

The faces of the girls were hidden by veils, which were bound down lightly, to keep them from fluttering aside with their swaying movements and exposing their features.

Zenas gazed and gasped.

“Great Cæsar!” he muttered. “This being the proprietor of a harem is great!”

The girls continued their dance, and to the old pedagogue every movement was full of poetry. They advanced, retreated, pirouetted, their arms waving from side to side above their heads, their heads swaying, their garments fluttering, their veils hiding their features, yet seeming to show glimpses of dark, flashing eyes beyond.

The professor forgot to smoke; he forgot to breathe; he forgot to do anything but stare.

How long the dance continued, he was unable to say, but finally Coddington clapped his hands, and away glided the girls, as graceful as phantoms, and like phantoms they vanished.

The musicians vanished in the same silent manner.

A great sigh of regret came from Gunn.

“Well, professor,” said Coddington, “how did that hit you?”

“Great!” was the enthusiastic answer. “How often do they perform?”

“Whenever I bid them. I keep them to amuse me.”

“Shade of Absalom! If I owned this harem, I’d tire them out dancing. What’s next on the program?”

“I will call in some of my wives.”

“Were there any in that bevy?”

“Oh, no; those are nothing but dancing girls. The ladies of the harem are more select and beautiful.”

“Call them! You can’t hurry them too much to suit me.”

“But there are certain rules to which I must conform, else I forfeit my rights. You know, the ladies of the harem never enter this room when more than one man is present. If I call them, it will be necessary for the colonel and myself to retire.”

“And leave me alone with them?” gasped Zenas.

“Yes. I will send you my two favorites, the greatest beauties of the harem. I have taught them both to speak English, although they do so somewhat imperfectly, and they have picked up several expressions of which I do not approve. No matter what they say, you must understand that they are complimenting you.”

“All right,” said the professor, a bit doubtfully. “But are there only two?”

“Only two? How many do you want? There are plenty of them, but you understand that the two I shall send are the reigning belles of the harem. They are marvelously beautiful.”

“Well, I – I don’t know about being left alone,” muttered the old fellow nervously. “Can’t it be arranged some other way?”

“Why, I thought you might wish to be alone with them. As I have said, the colonel and I must leave the room, as no man save yourself may be present; but I can send in the dancing girls again and let them dance while you are chatting with my favorites.”

“Do so, do so,” urged Zenas, in relief. “That is a good idea.”

“Very well. I hope you may be pleased; and do not forget that I am willing and ready to dispose of my harem at a most reasonable price. By Jove! I’ll almost give the whole outfit away!”

Coddington and Stringer retired, having seen the professor take the seat of honor in the midst of the cushions.

The old man was rather nervous, but he endeavored to remain calm and dignified.

Finally a low burst of musical laughter came to his ears, causing him to brace up. A moment later, hand in hand, two persons entered the room and advanced swiftly, bowing low before the professor, their foreheads touching the tiling.

“Ah, these are the favorites!” murmured Zenas, his eyes shining. “Arise, my dears, and come here. Be seated beside me.”

They needed no second invitation to sit beside the professor, however. Cooing in a coy manner, they plumped themselves down amid the cushions on either hand.

“He nice!” said one.

“Him fine!” murmured the other.

Then both giggled.

“He! he!” laughed the professor nervously, as the one on his right leaned against his shoulder. “What’s your name, my dear?”

“Fraud,” was the answer.

“Fraud? Well, that’s an odd name! How do you happen to have such a name as that?”

“Effendi, him give it. Effendi, him husband. Him call me Little Fraud.”

“Ah, I see; sort of a pet name.” Then he turned to the other one, on his right. “And what is your name, darling?” he asked.

“Fake.”

“Hey? Fake?”

“Sure. Effendi, him call me Big Fake.”

“Well, surely he has peculiar names for his wives. Do you love Effendi?”

“Oh, so, so. Him better no husband. Much tired now. Like change.”

“Well, you’re frank about it, to say the least. How many times have you changed husbands?”

“Sev’teen time.”

“What’s that? Great Scott! Seventeen times?”

“Maybe more.”

“Christopher! You’ve had seventeen different husbands – or more? Goodness, but that’s a record!”

At this juncture, Fake threw her arms round the professor.

“You be next one?” she asked. “Like you much. You be old Lobster.”

“What’s that? Old Lobster?”

“Pretty name,” cooed Fraud, from the other side, cuddling on his shoulder. “We like old Lobster, Fake.”

“You bet your back teeth!” elegantly retorted Fake. “We like him lot. Pull his leg.”

“Well, you’re frank in proclaiming your intentions, at least!” gasped Zenas.

At this moment the strange music began again, and the dancing girls reappeared, posing and pirouetting, the tiny bells on their bare ankles tinkling in a lively manner.

Zenas tried to untangle himself from the twining arms of the two favorites, but they declined to be thrust aside.

“No! no!” they cried. “Keep so. Like it, old Lobster.”

“Old Lobster!” grated Gunn. “Say, my dears, you’ll please me if you call me something else. I don’t like the name you have selected for me.”

“No like it?” questioned Fake, in apparent surprise. “Pretty name.”

“Sweet name,” gurgled Fraud. “We like it.”

“But I object! You’ll have to call me something else. I won’t stand for it.”

“All right,” said Fraud, in apparent disappointment.

Then she tried to get a strangle hold on Zenas, who was beginning to perspire and wish himself a thousand miles away.

“Well, you have a mighty queer notion about pretty names!” snapped the old man. “Don’t choke me! Those dancing girls are laughing – I know they are! I can see them laughing behind their veils!”

But they clung to him more closely than ever, and all his squirming was useless.

“Where’s the boss of this house?” he spluttered. “Be careful, both of you! I’m a respectable married man!”

“Nobody ever think it,” snickered Fraud.

“You be married lots more when you get us,” observed Fake.

“Christopher! I should say so! I’d be too much married.”

“We not all you have,” said Fraud. “You get lots more like us.”

“Only not so nice – not so pretty,” declared Fake.

“Well, I’ll have to think this thing over before I close the bargain. I’m beginning to think that one wife is enough for any man – too much in some cases.”

“How silly!” commented Fake.

“Awful chump,” said Fraud.

“But we love him,” purred Fake. “Him old. Him not last long. Then we have ’nother husband.”

“That fun,” giggled Fraud.

“Say, you’re beginning to make me sick!” snapped the distressed victim. “Call the boss of the house – call him! He can keep his harem!”

“You nervous,” said Fake. “See girls dance. Be still.”

“I see them,” groaned Gunn, “and they see us. They’re making sport of us! I didn’t come here to be laughed at! I won’t stand it.”

“No stand – sit still,” advised Fraud.

He gave over his efforts and fell to watching the dancers. They were very graceful, but he remembered that Coddington had spoken carelessly of them, declaring that the favorites of the harem were far more beautiful. To Zenas it seemed that the so-called favorites were big, husky ladies, while their free-and-easy manners, and their slang, filled him with aversion. He had fancied the beauties of a harem to be something entirely different from the ones who were boldly embracing him. And one of them had confessed that she had changed husbands sixteen times – or more! This in a land where he had supposed a man could have a number of wives, but that no wife ever had more than one husband.

The glamour of the harem was fast wearing off, as far as Zenas Gunn, of Fardale, was concerned. Already he was beginning to think he had seen quite enough of it.

Fake and Fraud were not inclined to keep still long. The former began to dally with the professor’s whiskers, running her fingers through them and pulling them playfully.

“Pretty! pretty!” she cooed.

“Ba-a-a-a!” bleated Fraud, like a goat. “Wind go z-z-z-z-z.”

“Quit your fooling!” half snarled the fretted old fellow, pushing Fake’s hand away.

Her gloved fingers seemed to catch in his whiskers and give them a fearful yank, as he thrust her hand aside.

He howled with pain.

“Nice hair,” commented Fraud, giving a pull at the professor’s wig and jerking it off. “Oh, see! Hair all loose! He look funny now!”

“Gimme that!” panted the professor, snatching at the wig; but Fraud thrust it back of her, laughing mockingly behind her heavy veil.

She was strong, astonishingly strong. He found he could not recover the wig by force, so he gave over the attempt.

“That nice,” said Fake. “Behave, old Lobster. Pretty teeth. Bite Fake’s little finger.”

Before he even suspected her purpose she thrust her finger into his mouth. In some manner she caught hold of his upper set of false teeth and jerked them out.

Then both favorites uttered exclamations of seeming surprise and merriment, while the triumphant Fake held the extracted set of teeth above her head.

“Him fine!” she cried. “Hair come off! Teeth come out! Old Lobster lots funny!”

“We take old Lobster all to pieces,” said Fraud. “Come on, Fake. Take him eyes out next.”

“Hold on, both of you!” frothed Zenas. “Don’t you dare carry thish thing any farsher! Gimme my wig! Gimme me my teesh! Hand ’em over, or shomebody going to get hurt!”

By this time he was greatly enraged, but he found himself almost helpless in the hands of the favorites.

The dancing girls were continuing their gyrations, but he knew they were laughing.

He felt that he had been robbed of his dignity and humiliated, and he was eager to take flight from the harem. Again and again he sought to struggle up, but Fake and Fraud pulled him back and held him.

“Oh, good old Lobster!” they cooed. “We love old Lobster. Him great joke.”

“I demand to be released!” gasped the professor. “If you hang onto me you’ll regret it! I’m a desperate man! I’m dangerous!”

He had managed to recover his teeth and thrust them back into his mouth, and now Fraud sought to mollify him by restoring his wig, which she placed on his head, hind side foremost.

“If this is what the owner of a harem has to endure, I’m thankful I don’t own one,” declared Zenas.

Then they patted his cheeks and sought in various ways to pacify him.

“We like you,” they protested.

“Well, you both have hanged queer ways of showing your affection, that’s all I’ve got to say!” he retorted.

“Maybe old Lobster like to kiss me?” questioned Fraud.

“No; old Lobster like to kiss me,” declared Fake.

“Who told you so much?” sneered Gunn.

“We say so, old Lobster have to kiss us,” asserted Fake.

“Have to?” gasped the perspiring pedagogue. “Why should I?”

“That rule,” explained Fraud. “We want it, no man get away less he do so.”

A groan of genuine distress escaped the lips of Zenas.

“I’m sure you don’t want it,” he hastened to say. “Just call Mr. Coddington. I’m very ill! I must see a physician at once! Please let me off!”

But they were obdurate, both insisting on receiving a kiss from him.

“It’s foolishness,” he declared. “You have veils on.”

“Oh, we move um,” Fake hastened to say.

“We move um,” echoed Fraud.

“And then will you call the boss of the house?”

“We have him called then,” they promised.

“If this ever gets out, my reputation is blasted,” sighed the professor; “but I see no other way to escape from these creatures. I’ll have to submit.”

He signified his willingness, whereupon both favorites again clasped him about the neck with an arm, while they prepared to lift their veils with their free hands.

“Here goes!” he muttered, turning to Fraud.

She lifted her veil.

A squawk of astonishment and horror burst from Professor Gunn, for Fraud was black as midnight, with huge red lips, which were parted in a horrible grin. Brass rings dangled from her ears and her nose.

“Heavens and earth deliver me!” panted the professor.

Then he turned and saw the face of Fake. It was that of an old, haglike creature, wrinkled and hideous, while her mouth was filled with horrible black teeth.

A shriek escaped the old man. Like a maniac he tore himself free from their clutches.

“Help! Murder!” he yelled.

“Come back, old Lobster!” they implored.

But he scrambled to his feet and fled from the room, yelling for assistance at every step, and pursued by a burst of laughter from the dancing girls.

The professor rushed from the room and into the arms of John Coddington and Colonel Stringer. They grasped him and held fast.

“Let go!” he shouted. “Don’t let those creatures catch me! Let go!”

“Well, by Jove!” drawled Coddington. “The man is crazy, don’t you know!”

“What’s the matter with yo’, professah?” asked the colonel, in apparent amazement. “Have yo’ lost your senses, suh?”

“How dare you insult the favorites of the harem by running away from them in such a manner?” sternly demanded the Englishman.

“Insult them!” snarled Zenas, glaring at Coddington as if he longed to throttle the man. “How dare you insult me by putting such hideous hags onto me?”

“Hideous hags? Sir, those are the most beautiful ladies in all Cairo, by Jove!”

“Beautiful! They would frighten a mummy into a fit! They would give a dog hydrophobia.”

“Suh,” said Colonel Stringer, “I am astonished, suh! My friend Coddington is a fine judge of feminine beauty.”

“Bah!” sneered Zenas. “Bah! bah! I’ve seen his beauties, and they are horrible things! Let me get out of this house! I wish never to see the interior of another harem! A man who would have more than one wife is insane. And a man who thinks such creatures as those beautiful ought to be locked fast in a home for incurable imbeciles! You’re an imbecile, Coddington – that’s my opinion of you! Don’t talk back! Don’t open your mouth! Want to sell your harem, do you? I don’t wonder! You ought to pay somebody about ten million dollars to take it – and then he’d get stuck! Good day, sir! I tell you not to attempt to detain me a moment! I am going now!”

And go he did, hurrying forth from the house with trembling steps and almost running until he was far from that vicinity.

Barely had the professor left the front door when the two “favorites” appeared, both convulsed with laughter.

They were Dick Merriwell and Brad Buckhart, the former having posed as Fraud, while the latter had given his name as Fake.

“Oh, great horn spoon!” gasped Buckhart, “I certain won’t get over this in a year!”

“I think the professor has been taught a splendid lesson,” laughed Dick. “The game worked like a charm.”

“I should say it did!” agreed Coddington, who was also laughing. “We watched it all. We were behind some curtains, and we dodged out just in time to get ahead of the professor when he took flight. It was deucedly funny, don’t you know. You boys did your parts very cleverly.”

“Did you see Dick remove the professor’s wig?” laughed the Texan. “I thought I’d blow up then, but it gave me an idea, and I managed to get my digits into his mouth and yank out the upper layer of his store teeth.”

“And then I was on the point of blowing up,” confessed Dick. “But the professor was so excited he didn’t notice it.”

“The climax came when yo’ invited him to kiss yo’,” grinned Colonel Stringer. “He’ll be ready to shoot me now.”

“Don’t you think it,” said Dick. “He’ll be round begging you to keep still about it. He’ll be humble enough.”

“We’re very much obliged to you, Mr. Coddington, for your assistance,” said Dick. “If you’ll give us a bill of expenses, I’ll settle it. If Colonel Stringer hadn’t known you, I fear we could not have carried out the plan after we formed it.”

“Oh, the expense was nothing compared with the sport I’ve had,” asserted the Englishman.

“But you had to engage the dancing girls.”

“They are professionals, and their services cost a mere nothing. It’s not worth mentioning.”

“Oh, yes it is. Then there was the costumer. You had to pay him. I insist on settling the bill.”

Coddington did his best to get out of taking anything, but Dick was obdurate and finally compelled the Englishman to state the full expense of the affair, which he paid.

It was nearly an hour later when the boys reappeared at the Shepherd’s Hotel, having washed off their make-ups and donned their usual attire.

They found the professor, looking pale and wan, pacing the floor of his room, which adjoined theirs. The old man noted their entrance, and paused to peer at them suspiciously.

“Where have you been, boys?” he asked.

“Oh, out for a little airing,” answered Dick, carelessly. “Did you enjoy the afternoon, professor?”

“Well – er – ah – I can’t truthfully say that I did,” confessed the old pedagogue.

“That was too bad. Why didn’t you enjoy it?”

“Ahem! I can’t explain, boys. Don’t ask foolish questions.”

“But didn’t you see that collection of old relics?”

“I did – I saw it!”

“And you were disappointed in it?”

“Very much so.”

“Were not the relics very ancient?”

“Well, two of them were, beyond question.”

“And did the inspection of them add greatly to your fund of knowledge?” persisted Dick.

“Greatly,” declared Zenas. “I know much more than I did when I left this hotel.”

“Then I fail to understand why you seem so terribly disappointed. You said you expected to return here a much wiser man.”

“And if I’m not wiser,” said the professor, “I ought to be shot, that’s all! I have this day learned something I’ll never forget. Don’t ask another question! I decline to discuss the matter further. But I will say that no man is too old to learn, and sometimes a man who thinks himself very wise discovers that he’s a big fool. I’m going to lie down and rest now, for I need it. I am quite exhausted.”

He closed the door between the two rooms.

“I must tell Dunbar and Nadia about it,” chuckled Buckhart. “Come on, Dick; let’s go see them.”

“You go ahead,” nodded Merriwell. “I have a letter to write, and I think I’ll do it now.”

Buckhart was not gone long, and there was something of a worried look on his face when he returned.

“Well, did they appreciate the joke?” questioned Dick, without looking up.

“I didn’ tell them.”

“Didn’t?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“They’re not in.”

“Oh, that’s it! Where have they gone?”

“I don’t know. I inquired and found they left the hotel about two hours ago. They did not take a carriage, or even engage donkeys. They walked out, without stating whither they intended to go.”

“Well, it’s likely they’ll return soon.”

“I hope so.”

Buckhart’s tone caused Dick to look up quickly.

“What’s the matter, Brad?” he asked.

“I’m worried, pard,” confessed the Texan.

“About them? Oh, nonsense; they’re all right.”

“They may be; but you know Budthorne is a mighty poor protector for a girl, and Nadia has been watched by that strange man we observed.”

“That is, she thought that man was watching her; but she was not sure of it.”

“She was pretty sure. He was a Turk, and you know what happened to her in Damascus.”