During the next few days we were pretty busy getting ready for the next issue of the Trumpet, so we didn’t get to see Rock, and Mark didn’t have a minute to study out that puzzle about the cat and what color is a brick and all that. Things didn’t go along as smooth this time as they did before. Mark said it was because the novelty had worn off. We got some advertising, but there weren’t any full pages, and we didn’t get in half a dozen subscriptions, so that when the paper was printed we were just about out of money again.

Our paper, printed with patent insides, as they call them, had to be paid for at the express office before we could get it, and Tecumseh Androcles Spat had had to buy a new pair of pants on account of some trouble with a dog while he was out walking one evening, and ink cost money. You haven’t any idea what a lot it takes to print a paper.

Well, we got it out all right, and then started to sell it. But this time Spragg was right on hand with his Eagle Center Clarion, and had kids selling it just like we sold the Trumpet, only he sold his paper for three cents, while we had to get five or bust.

And this time he had more Wicksville news, though we still beat him there. But folks will buy cheap even if what they’re getting isn’t so good as what costs a little more. The result of the whole thing was that we got left with a hundred papers on our hands, and that was pretty bad. It was Spragg that did it.

When we knew just how we’d come out we had a meeting in the office to see what to do about it.

“If we could only git rid of Spragg,” says Tallow.

“Yes,” says I, “he’s messin’ up the whole show.”

“S-sounds easy,” says Mark. “How’d you goat it?”

We looked at one another but nobody had any ideas.

“Might sick a dog on him,” says I.

“We might get out an Eagle Center edition of the Trumpet,” says Plunk.

Well, there was an idea and we talked it over, but it wasn’t long before we saw that wouldn’t do. We had our hands full now without monkeying with Eagle Center.

“If,” says I, “we could only fix it so’s folks here didn’t want anything to do with Eagle Center—”

“Binney,” says Mark, “there is an idee. Start a t-town row. Get folks here to hatin’ Eagle Center. Make a sort of war, eh? Fine. Now,” says he with a grin, “all we got to do is f-figger out how to do it.”

“If that Eagle Center paper would only talk mean about Wicksville,” says I.

“It won’t,” says Mark; “they’re after Wicksville b-business.”

He sat back and pulled at his ear like he does when he’s thinking hard, and whistled a little, and reached for his jack-knife and whittled some.

Pretty soon he whacked his leg and says he’s got it.

“Well?” says I.

“We’ll go to Eagle Center,” says he, “and interview a b-b-bunch of folks, and sort of get ’em to talk about Wicksville. Bet we can f-fix it so’s they make fun of this town. Then,” says he, “there’s that old b-business of the trolley line from the city, which might go through here and m-might go through Eagle Center. What made me think of that was that a s-surveyor got off’n the train to-day, and I asked him what he was up to, and he says he was goin’ over the right of way that was laid out a couple of years ago.”

“Um!” says I. “Sounds promisin’.”

“We’ll t-try it,” says Mark. “Binney, you and I will go over in the m-mornin’.”

So next morning over we went.

I never saw anything so easy. Mark says that folks would rather make fun of somebody or something, whether they’ve got any reason for doing it or not, than to work and make money, and I guess he’s right.

As soon as we began talking about Wicksville they up and sailed into it like they had been waiting for the chance for years. Of course we helped things along by bragging a little and by making a few comparisons that didn’t favor Eagle Center any. But it didn’t take much urging. Why, we could have got enough interviews to fill the paper twice, and any one of them, when they stood out in print, was enough to make the whole population of Wicksville take off its coats and roll up its shirt-sleeves and start right over to give Eagle Center a walloping.

When we had all we wanted we started back for home, and planned out how we’d use it, and the way we planned was the one that would do the most good, you bet.

“Now,” says Mark, “if we just had some sure news about that t-trolley line.”

“We hain’t,” says I.

“No,” says he, “but if Plunk and Tallow’ll git out and tag around after that s-surveyor we’ll git some. Just hang around him and ask questions, but don’t l-let on you’re newspaper men. Just be kids.”

So off they went.

They found out that surveyors were going over both routes—the one through Wicksville and the one through Eagle Center. It seems like the company was keeping pretty quiet about the whole thing, but from what Plunk and Tallow could gather, it was pretty sure the trolley line was going through some place.

Well, there was big news, and if Spragg didn’t get hold of it it would be bigger than ever.

We set right to work getting things in shape for the next paper, and called in Tecumseh Androcles Spat to tell him all about it and get him to fix up the paper so it would look exciting. He got the idea right away.

“Will Tecumseh A. Spat dress up this paper? You may take it, young gentlemen, from an authority, that he will. It is an opportunity. This town shall see what a paper with a real story in it should look like. We will hammer them in the eyes with type. We will make our pages leap out to meet them. Ah, this is an occasion such as delights the heart of a compositor and make-up man. I revel in it. Trust me, gentlemen, and you shall not be disappointed.”

And we weren’t. All we had to do was write the stuff and give it to Tecumseh. Why, he hardly took time to eat or sleep! He was that tickled with himself he almost busted out of his clothes, and we had to keep going hard or he’d have run right away from us.

It was two days before we got the stories all written—the trolley line and what Eagle Center thought of Wicksville. Then we did a little advertising of our own. Mark wrote the signs.

The first one, printed in big type and tacked up in front of our office, went like this:

Then we printed about twenty little signs that said:

That night we put these all up, and the next morning the town was talking. I’ll bet twenty folks stopped in the office to ask what it was about, but mum was the word with us. We wouldn’t peep.

“It’s so,” says Mark Tidd. “Every w-w-word of it. This town’s been insulted like no town was ever insulted before. It’s a shame and somethin’ ought to be done about it. The Board of Trade ought to do somethin’.”

“But who insulted us?”

“The whole thing’s in the n-n-next p-paper,” says Mark, getting sort of excited and stuttering like everything. “Wait till the paper comes out.”

“We want to know now,” says the man.

“Well,” says Mark, “I’m sorry, but it hain’t possible to accommodate you. This is a newspaper. It’s p-printed to give news. That’s what we have to sell, and we can’t give it away any more than the grocer would give you a p-p-pound of cheese.”

“I’ll pay you for it,” says the man. “Your paper costs a nickel. Well, there’s your nickel. Now give me the news.”

“No,” says Mark, “that wouldn’t be f-f-fair. Other folks have to wait till their paper comes, and so will you.” And that was the end of it, though the man kept on asking, and so did other folks.

By the time Thursday got around the town was pretty much worked up. You haven’t any idea how much folks think of their town till something happens, and then up in the air they go. Well, Wicksville was up in the air, you can bet, and it looked like it was up there to stay. Some folks was for having a public meeting about it, but others pointed out it was foolish to have a public meeting till you knew what you were going to have it about.

Other folks said, though, that as long as you knew your town had been insulted, what was the difference how it was insulted or who did it? Something ought to be done. Of course we didn’t do a thing to stop people from feeling that way, either.

At last the Trumpet went to press, and she was a dandy. Across the front page was a big head-line:

Then, side by side, we printed interviews, heading each one appropriately. Mr. Wiggamore, the justice of the peace at Eagle Center, said every time a loafer came into his court the first question he asked him was, did he come from Wicksville. That was pretty good for a send-off, letting on that Wicksville folks were loafers, but he went farther than that. He said when he had to drive through the country he would go out of his way five miles before he would drive through our town, because our streets were so rotten they weren’t fit to drive cattle over, let alone a horse and buggy. We knew that would rile the folks, because we do take pride in our streets.

Next came Mr. Smart, the grocer. He said he wouldn’t do business in Wicksville except on a cash basis. That he’d never seen a man from Wicksville he’d trust with a red-hot stove. And he said the town looked like somebody passing in the night had dropped it by accident and forgotten it. Also he said that the man that dropped it was probably mighty glad of it.

Then came Mr. Pilkins, town clerk, and he gave his opinion that Wicksville was the worst-looking, most run-down, dilapidated, out-at-heel village in Michigan. He said it was a shame; that the rest of the towns in the country ought to take up a collection to help Wicksville folks paint their houses. He said it was his experience that Wicksville folks were ashamed of where they lived, and didn’t let on unless they were cornered, and he said that when they thought they’d be believed they always let on they came from Eagle Center.

Mr. Stoddy said that Wicksville didn’t have enterprise enough to keep the hogs out of Main Street. Now that was a lie if there ever was one, and it made me kind of mad myself. He said the best men in our town were the women, and that so fax’s he could see there wasn’t any reason for keeping up such a town at all unless it was that no other town wanted such a lot of folks to live in it.

Well, those are just samples. The men that said them were more than nine-tenths joking, all right, but when you saw what they said right in cold type it looked pretty bad. Whee! but it looked bad.

Then, right on top of those insults, and a lot more, we printed another big head-line:

Then we printed the story about the trolley line, and what was going on. And we more than hinted that if Eagle Center got a chance it would do something underhanded to influence the line to go that way. And we pointed out the benefits of the line to Wicksville, and what money it would bring to town, and all that. My! it was a screamer.

Then, inside, we printed an editorial by Mark Tidd, which asked our folks if they wanted anything to do with a town that thought about us the way Eagle Center did. He asked if we wanted to trade with them, or visit with them. He wanted to know why the Board of Trade didn’t meet and fix up to boycott Eagle Center, and he ended up by demanding why something wasn’t done at once to see to it Wicksville got that trolley line for itself.

You wouldn’t believe it, but we ran out of papers before they’d had time to dry, and had to turn to and print some more. Yes, sir, we printed a whole hundred extra, and sold every one of them. Wherever you looked was a man reading the paper, maybe out loud to a crowd. It was funny. Men stood shaking their fists and scowling and making speeches and tearing around like they was crazy. There was some talk of organizing a party to go over to Eagle Center to dare them to fight, but this was overruled.

Anyhow, everybody was mad, and when Spragg, of the Eagle Center Clarion, came out of the hotel and sent his boys to sell papers, the crowd took after him and chased him up to his room, and he didn’t dare come down until the town marshal went home and put on his star and then escorted him to the train. Spragg never waited to see what became of his papers, but just went away from there as fast as he could.

I don’t believe he was exactly clear why the folks was so turned against him, but he soon found out, all right.

Well, there was a mass meeting, and our folks adopted resolutions paying their respects to Eagle Center and to everybody that lived in it, and they vowed they wouldn’t have any dealings with the town or anybody in it. They appointed committees and everything.

Mark and the rest of us were at the meeting, and we got busy getting subscriptions. Civic pride was the tune we played.

“Here,” says Mark, “is a paper all our own. It’s a b-b-better paper than Eagle Center’s. Yet you f-folks let an Eagle Center man come in here and sell that paper of his, and you r-refuse to buy ours. Now’s the time to show them. If you mean what you say, why, cut out that Eagle Center paper and dig down for a dollar ’n’ a quarter to subscribe for your own.”

That was the way he talked, and the rest of us took a leaf out of his book. And it got results, too. That night we took more than fifty subscriptions. Which was pretty good. We thought it had disposed forever of the Eagle Center Clarion, but it hadn’t. Anyhow, it hadn’t disposed of Mr. Spragg, who seemed to have got a grudge against us. He wasn’t much of a newspaper man, but as an enemy he did pretty well, so we found out before we were through with him.