Don Strong, Patrol Leader Part 20

Barbara went out to the kitchen for a piece of cake. He sighed, and relaxed in his chair, and waited. It seemed that she was gone a long time. Suddenly he gave a start, and jerked open his eyes, and looked up to find her shaking his shoulder.

"Better eat your cake tomorrow, Don. You're falling asleep."

He stumbled upstairs and went to bed. As he lay there, on the borderland of sleep, his thoughts drifted back to Tim walking with the others with his hands in his pockets--the way no scout who was alert and alive should walk.

"Wonder what Tim was thinking about," he muttered sleepily.

Tim had been thinking about a boy who could have made it hot for him--and who hadn't. He had expected Don to tell. He had hurried forward ready to argue heatedly in his own defense. And instead, Don had plainly tried to shield him.

He slouched his shoulders with an air of hard toughness, but deep inside he felt small and cheap. He was used to wrangling and boisterous striving for what he wanted. Yet, for all of his roughness, a finer streak of his nature could, on occasion, respond to fair dealing. Squareness--being white--was something he could understand. Don had been white.

He found himself wishing, as he walked along, that he had never started the hike. He had seen Mr. Wall's eyes travel in his direction as though picking him out as the ringleader in whatever mischief had been afoot. He wondered what the Scoutmaster thought of him.

"Aw!" he told himself uncomfortably, "I'm a mutt."

For the time being, at least, his hot blood was chastened. He had gone off that afternoon and had left several ch.o.r.es undone. When he reached home his mother scolded and his father threatened. It was no new experience. Nevertheless, he finished the neglected work in silence, and in silence he ate his supper.

It had begun to dawn on him that he was spoiling things for himself. He wasn't getting any fun out of scouting. He had been banished from baseball. If Ted Carter stayed behind the bat, and if he didn't get another chance to play--

"It's coming to me," he said, and his eyes blinked.

The time he had ruined Andy's fire Mr. Wall had said, "What do you think a scout should do--the square thing?" He was confronted with the same question now. What should he do--the square thing?

All of Sunday he wrestled with the problem. Monday afternoon he went to the field early. He was the first boy there. He sat under the tree; and when he saw Ted coming, he stood up slowly and went forward to meet the captain.

"Say, Ted, any chance for me to get back?"

Ted glanced at him sharply. "Get back for what?"

"To play ball."

The captain tossed him the mitt. "Sure. Here comes Don. Catch him. No curves--he worked nine innings Sat.u.r.day. Just a little warm-up."

It was an awkward moment for Tim. He was not used to knuckling under. He swallowed a lump in his throat; but Don acted as though there had never been a change in the team. Slowly his restraint wore away. The other players took him back without question; n.o.body mentioned Sat.u.r.day's disastrous game.

Tim went home from the practice whistling shrilly. There was a patrol meeting at Don's house that night. He arrived on time. The others talked eagerly of the first aid contest that was scheduled for Friday night. For once he listened without trying to break into the conversation and monopolize it, and gradually a little frown of worry wrinkled his forehead.

The dining-room table was pushed up against the wall.

"No fooling tonight, fellows," said Don. "Let's see how much work we can do."

Tim worked as faithfully as any of the others. In a corner Don and Ritter practiced with splints, and over by the bay window Wally and Alex did their bandaging. He and Andy and Bobbie had the center of the floor for artificial respiration, stretcher work, and fireman's lift.

He worked feverishly. Something whispered to him, "Why didn't you work hard before? You're too late now." Presently it was nine o'clock and the work was over.

"How does it look?" Don asked eagerly.

"All right here," said Wally.

Tim and Andy were silent. Don's eyes clouded.

The meeting broke up. The boys pa.s.sed out through the hall calling back good night. Andy stayed behind.

"Tim's going to fall down," he said bluntly, "and fall down hard."

Don slowly returned the bandages to the first aid kit. "He was trying tonight."

"Sure he was--tonight. Why didn't he try at the other meetings and cut out his fooling?"

Don closed the kit and pushed it aside. "If he practiced a couple of times this week--"

"How are you going to get him to practice?" Andy demanded.

"Ask him."

"Mackerel! Ask _him_ to do extra work? Can't you imagine what he'll tell you?"

Don could imagine it without much trouble. But he remembered how his last appeal, when everything seemed lost, had stopped the Danger Mountain hike. It cost nothing to try. He had no love for the job of intimating to Tim that his work was not satisfactory. And yet was it fair for him to keep silent? Was it fair to those scouts who had labored with a will?

He went out to the porch and lifted his voice. "Tim! O Tim!"

An answering cry came faintly.

"Now for the fireworks," said Andy.

Tim came through the gate and advanced as far as the porch steps.

"How about you and Andy and Bobbie practicing a couple of times before Friday?" Don asked.

There was a long interval of silence.

"All right," said Tim at last. He swung around and walked out the gate.

"Mackerel!" said Andy. "I thought he'd go up in the air."

Wednesday morning Tim practiced at troop headquarters. Thursday afternoon, as soon as the baseball drill was over, he practiced again.

Friday morning he was even ready for more; but that morning Bobbie had to weed the vegetable garden in back of his house and could not come around.

Tim went home vaguely disappointed.

That afternoon, at the baseball field, he played a b.u.t.ter-fingered game.

He could not hold the ball, and his throws to bases were atrocious.

"Hi, there!" called Ted. "Go take a walk around the block."

Tim was frightened. "Don't you want me to play tomorrow?"

"Sure I do. Tomorrow you'll be all right. This is your bad day. Go off by yourself and get the air."

Tim went off to the maple tree and sat down. And by and by he found himself wondering, not what kind of baseball he would play on the morrow, but whether he would be good or bad in first aid that night.