Afloat Part 14

Elmer now took a hand in the discussion.

"Here, let's make less noise, fellows," he remarked. "In the excitement we've already broken our rule, and if there was anyone near by they must have known all about us. And we're going ash.o.r.e just beyond there."

"So soon in the afternoon, Elmer; what's up?" demanded Chatz, who, having rested since last using the pole, did not understand why they should call it a day's work at not much after three o'clock.

"If you look at Landy, you'll understand why," continued the patrol leader.

"Why, he is shivering, sure enough!" exclaimed Chatz; "what ails you, suh? Are you feeling cold on such a warm day as this?"

"What, me cold!" stuttered Landy, trying to put on a brave face, though his lips were turning blue and quivering; "of course I ain't. It must be the excitement of the little scare has gripped me, that's all."

But wise Elmer knew very well he was a.s.suming a degree of comfort which he did not feel, and he could not stand for it.

"You've got to do one of two things, Landy,", he said, with authority, "either take the push-pole again, and warm your blood up, or else go ash.o.r.e to dry your clothes. Otherwise, we'll have you getting a chill, and then the fat will be in the fire as far as our hunt goes. Which shall it be?"

"If it's all the same to you, Elmer, and you mean the whole kit to stop off too, I say let's go ash.o.r.e," hastily replied Landy.

"Head for that little cove, Lil Artha, and you too, Toby," said Elmer.

"I'd like to lend him something I've got in my pack," remarked Lil Artha, apparently taking pity on the shivering one; "only you c'n see with one eye it wouldn't come within a mile of meeting around his waist."

"I've got a sweater he could put on while his clothes are drying,"

volunteered Toby Jones; "of course, it isn't his size by a jugfull, but then you know sweaters stretch. Like as not it'll go around me twice though, after Landy's worn the same. But he's our chum, and scouts should always be ready to make sacrifices for each other."

"That's real good of you, Toby," mumbled Landy, strangely enough unable to meet the honest gaze of the generous donor.

The landing was soon made, and when the dripping Landy got ash.o.r.e the first thing Elmer made him do was to jump around, and thresh his arms back and forth. This, of course, was to induce a circulation of blood, so as to resist the chill following his late immersion.

"Lil Artha, I leave it to you to make the fire," said the patrol leader. "Use dry wood so there'll be little or no smoke; and build it in that low spot over to the right. If we choose to keep it going to-night, there's only a small chance that anyone will discover the light in that dip."

Nothing pleased Lil Artha better than to make a camp fire. Besides the genial glow, which he so dearly loved, being a fire worshipper by nature, it doubtless meant that before a great while they would be cooking supper; and as we happen to be aware such a task was never onerous to the lanky scout, whose appet.i.te seldom failed him.

There were others to help pick up the right kind of wood, for every scout has to learn such things early in his career in woodcraft. Soon a crackling little blaze sprang up, which, being carefully fed, presently amounted to a considerable fire.

"Here you are, Landy," said Elmer, when he could feel the genial heat at a distance of five feet away; "strip off, and hang your duds on these sticks we've planted around the fire. They'll soon begin to steam, and then dry out."

Elmer even took a hand himself, wringing each article cast off by the bulky Landy before he hung it judiciously before the fire.

Fortunately, the fat scout had made out to carry an extra pair of socks and a suit of clean underwear in his pack, and having donned these, with the help of Toby's expansive sweater, he had to make out. There was considerable fun poked at him as he squatted there by the fire attending to his clothes, so as to make sure they did not get scorched by the heat.

"There's one thing bad about this drying-out process, though," Lil Artha was heard saying to Ted, who chanced to be near by; "and that's the way clothes shrink after they've been wet."

"Which reminds me," Toby called out, "of that story about the fat bachelor who had washed a suit of his new underwear himself, and hung it on the clothes-line to dry; but the maid came along afterwards and finding them ready to take in hung up a suit belonging to the kid, about four years of age. When the stout bach stepped out to get his suit and saw that baby outfit hanging in its place, he rubbed his eyes and was heard to say to himself: 'Great Scott! and the clerk swore they wouldn't shrink a bit!'"

"But I hope _my_ clothes won't shrivel up so I can't get in the same,"

Landy observed, anxiously. "A nice figure I'd cut going around day and night like this. And let me tell you the skeeters would fairly eat me alive. As it is, I'm cracking at them all the time right now."

Frequent examinations, however rea.s.sured him. His clothes were drying nicely, and did not seem to be losing any of their former generous proportions. So in time Landy might hope to be garbed in his proper attire as became a scout, and not an Arab or a "side show freak," such as Toby persisted in dubbing him.

Supper was later on taken in hand. There was no lack of recruits when it came to doing the cooking; in fact, Elmer found that he had six enthusiastic would-be _chefs_ to choose from, even Landy expressing a willingness to serve, as he had to hover near the blaze more or less anyway, and might as well be busy.

Afterwards the fire was allowed to go down, though Elmer did not feel that it was positively necessary for them to let it die out entirely.

If it was bound to betray them doubtless the mischief had already been done; and having to shoulder the blame, they might as well have the game.

It was a great delight to them all to squat there around the fire and talk in low tones. There were no boisterous language or actions tolerated. Elmer gave them to understand that they were now out on serious business, and all such conduct must be left to another time.

Still, they found plenty to talk about, most of it connected with the strange happening at Hickory Ridge, in which their unfortunate comrade, Hen Condit, bore such a prominent part.

"I wonder now," Toby was saying at one time, "whether the Chief of Police got a clue like we did that'd fetch him up in this region of the country with a posse, meaning to try to round up this escaped rascal?"

There was a variety of opinions concerning this point, some believing one way and the rest having contrary views.

"It would be too bad, now," said Ted, "if they managed to haul both of them up before we could get Hen in hand, and hear hith thory of what happened."

"That's a fact," added Lil Artha. "We know the Chief, and that he'd take Hen back to town just like he was a real criminal. No matter what excuse the boy'd try to give, the Chief wouldn't listen, leaving all that for the Justice of the Peace before whom he'd take his prisoners.

Boys, we've just got to find Hen first; that's all there is to it."

That seemed to be the consensus of opinion among them. By degrees they had come to believe that Hen Condit must be under a spell, to have acted as he did. Nothing else would explain the mystery, for Hen had always been reckoned a mild, inoffensive sort of fellow, one of the last boys in Hickory Ridge to do anything so terrible as commit a robbery.

"That's just what it is!" declared Toby, as they again talked it all over in hopes of getting a better conception of the truth, "the man who's got Hen must be one of those terrible hypnotists you read about.

I saw one down in the city last summer at a show, and he made fellows do the most ridiculous things anybody ever heard tell of."

"Such as what?" asked Lil Artha, looking as though he might be skeptical.

"Why, one boy thought he was a goat, and ran all around on his hands and feet, hunting for tin cans and old shoes to eat. Another believed he was a dog baying at the full moon, and I nearly took a fit listening to him whoop. Then there was a third fellow who believed he was made of iron, so he stretched himself from one chair to another, and three men stood right in his middle; and he didn't break, either. Say, it was the greatest sight you ever saw."

"Fakes, all rank fakes!" snorted Lil Artha; "every one of those boys was a confederate of the impostor. You notice they never come to small places where everybody knows everybody else, but show in cities, where a new audience comes each night. I'd like to see a circus like that, just to laugh; but you couldn't get me to believe in hypnotism worth a cent."

"Well, then," demanded Toby, "what do you think this man's got on Hen that he's made him do whatever he wanted, tell us that, if you can?"

"I don't know," replied Lil Artha, promptly.

"See?" cried Toby, exultantly, "he backs down right away."

"There are a lot of things I don't know," added the tall scout; "but it's my opinion that Hen's being held to that man through some kind of fear. P'raps he's been made to believe he did something _terrible_, and his only hope is to skip out before the police get him. But let's wait till we find him, and then we'll know it all."

"A sensible conclusion," remarked Elmer, who had listened to all the talk with considerable interest; "and as the hour is getting late suppose we begin to settle how we're going to sleep through our first night in Sa.s.safras Swamp."

CHAPTER XI

A NIGHT ALARM

Up to then none of them had apparently bothered about figuring how they would make themselves comfortable, so that Elmer's suggestion was like a bomb thrown into the camp.

"I should think we had better get busy if we want to have a place to sleep on," Landy exclaimed, for the hard ground did not appeal very much to the fat scout, accustomed as he was to a feather bed at home.