The Banner Boy Scouts on a Tour Part 27

"That's right," replied Paul, seriously; "but don't forget that it's his secret, and as true scouts we've no business to go prying into his affairs unless he asks our help. Forget it all for a while, and let's talk about what we have laid out for to-morrow. I do hope Mr. Gordon shows up. I wonder if he can read the Indian talk I left in each place we stopped."

They were soon deep in the various interesting features of the programme as mapped out for the next day. Having now settled into what they expected would be the permanent camp of the tour, the boys were wild to get down to business, and show their efficiency in the various lines which they favored.

"Listen to 'em gabble like a pack of old women," laughed Jack, as the friendly argument about the crackling fire grew more heated.

"Bob Tice is demanding why they didn't think to bring a portable dark room along, so he could develop his films in the daytime," said Paul, after listening a minute; "and Jud is explaining to the novice that with his new film tank there's no need of any such thing, for he can do all that work right in the tent at noon."

Many other subjects were discussed about that blazing fire, and much information pa.s.sed around.

Strict discipline was maintained in camp, just as though the scoutmaster himself were present to enforce it.

At the hour appointed, Bobolink tooted his bugle, and immediate preparations for retiring commenced. Twenty minutes later taps sounded, and every light had to go out save the one fire that occupied the centre of the camp.

Three sentries paced to and fro, and they had been given to understand that any failure to keep constant watch would meet with prompt punishment. They knew that Paul meant to enforce his orders; and suspecting that he might creep out under the rear of his tent to make a secret rounds, they were one and all determined that nothing should cause them to fail in their duties.

Paul was asleep in his tent with two of his mates, when something suddenly awoke him. He sat up to listen, and again heard the sound. It was a dull thud, as of a hard object falling to the ground. Then came a distinct splash in the nearby lake.

"What in goodness can it be?" he thought, as he listened for a repet.i.tion of the strange sounds. "h.e.l.lo! what's going on, Paul?" Jack asked at that moment, raising his head as if he too had been awakened by the several thumps, and wondered what his chum was doing sitting up.

"That's what I'm trying to guess," replied Paul, quietly.

"Sounds as if it was hailing to beat the band!" exclaimed Jack, as a series of continuous thumps came.

Just then some one burst in at the open flap of the tent. It proved to be Bluff Shipley, who had been appointed sentry from the Red Fox Patrol.

"Paul, c-c-come out here, q-q-quick!" he cried, in considerable excitement; and as this condition was always bad for the poor fellow's twisted tongue, he began to "fall all over himself," as Jack expressed it, when he attempted to go on and explain what had happened.

In the jumble, however, Paul caught something that gave him the clue he wanted--"Ted Slavin" and "rocks!"

He quickly got inside some clothes, not even waiting in his hurry to remove his pajamas. When he crawled out of the tent he found a number of the scouts had been aroused. Their angry shouts were heard on every hand; for a shower of stones was descending upon the camp from some point further up the abrupt side of the mountain.

"It's that Slavin crowd, as usual!" cried Jud, furiously, rubbing his arm where he had been struck.

"We've just _got_ to get after them with a hot stick!" exclaimed Wallace, who was usually the warmest advocate of peace in the troop; but this constant and vicious annoyance on the part of their rivals was proving too much for even his temper.

"Come on, fellows; us to the attack!" called Bobolink, with his accustomed vim; "this is the limit, and we've just got to flag 'em!"

All discipline was forgotten in the excitement of the moment. Nor did Paul try to show his authority. He was very nearly as indignant as any of them; and had they been able to locate the enemy, possibly there might have ensued a scramble that would hardly have been to the credit of the well known peaceful principles of the scouts.

But the stone throwing seemed to cease about the time the scouts began to climb the side of the rocky elevation. Doubtless Ted and his allies knew that it would be dangerous for them to remain longer; and having stirred up a hornets' nest below, they probably crept away over a path they had mapped out, which would lead to their cave camp.

The boys came back in bunches of twos and threes presently, heated with their useless search, and breathing out all sorts of threats against the disturbers of their peace. On the next night Paul meant to have a vidette posted on the mountain side, whose one particular duty would be to look out for prowlers.

There was no further alarm that night. Possibly Ted and his crowd believed that it would not be wise to go in too strongly for these things. And so another day dawned, that was fated to be full of strenuous doings between sunrise and sunset.

CHAPTER XXIII

WHAT THE EYES OF A SCOUT MAY SEE

"What damage was done last night?" asked Jack, as he and Paul walked around the camp, while the cooks of the several patrols were engaged in getting breakfast over fires built after that clever fashion, partly in holes in the ground.

"Well," replied his chum, "outside of Jud's bruised arm that will handicap him a bit in his work; and one hole through the fly that serves as our mess tent; I haven't been able to find anything. But I picked up several stones that must have come down, and they were big enough to hurt if they had hit any of us."

"What ought we to do?" asked Jack.

"For one I think we've just got to change our way of handling those fellows. The more we try to argue, and hold out the olive branch, the worse they get. I hate to tell the boys we've reached the end of the rope; but what else is left?" and Paul, as he spoke, shook his head, and drew a long breath.

"Oh! nothing but give t.i.t for tat," returned Jack, without a pause, as if his mind had long been made up. "Why, even a Quaker will fight if forced to defend his honor; or some bully attacks his family. They say a worm will turn; which you mustn't take to mean that we are grubs."

"Well," declared Paul, "to-night we'll have a watch set, and if they try that sort of thing again, perhaps they'll find two can play at a bombardment."

The welcome call to breakfast broke in on their dialogue; and being possessed of the ordinary boy's appet.i.te, both Paul and his chum were not at all backward about dropping into their places around the rude table.

Of course pretty much all the talk during the meal was about the unprovoked and cowardly attack of the preceding night. Every time a boy cast his eyes upward, and saw the sky through the ragged hole in the canvas cover, he was noticed to grit his teeth, and look angry.

But Paul a.s.sured them that he had a plan ready whereby they could put a stop to this rough treatment. Knowing him as they did, the scouts felt sure he had been driven to the limit of his forbearance. Having gone as far as their code called for in the effort to keep the peace, they would certainly be justified in taking the law into their own hands from this time forth.

"Forget it all until night comes, fellows," said Paul, finally, when they had talked the subject threadbare. "Meanwhile don't think you're going to get any sort of a nap to-day. There will be something doing every minute of the time from now up to supper call. And to begin with, let the dishwashers get busy right away, so as to clear the decks for action."

As every one had satisfied his appet.i.te, and just then cared little whether there was ever such a thing as eating again, they were not sorry to leave the mess tent.

The camp was quickly a scene of animation. Some fellows were busy with cameras, seeking enticing subjects for views that would do them credit when the results of the great hike were examined by a committee later on. Others set about making preparations for the various duties to which they had been a.s.signed. Paul kept his finger on the pulse of everything that took place.

He sent one squad along the sh.o.r.e of the lake to try the fishing.

Another was engaged in forming a rude raft so that they could have something on which to paddle around from time to time. Still another group followed Paul and Wallace to hunt for signs of the racc.o.o.ns they had heard during the preceding night.

Each boy of the bunch was expected to jot down in his note-book the various interesting things they came across as they tramped. Paul gave a few hints; but he wanted them to think it out for themselves.

The most observing would make mention of dozens of things that might never attract the eye of the novice in woodcraft. He would state the species of trees he noticed on either hand; the formation of the rocks, the result perhaps of a former hurricane that leveled many old trees, and the direction which it must have pa.s.sed along over this country; he would find a mult.i.tude of things to mention in the sap-sucker that tapped the dead limb of a tree; the wise crow that cawed at them from a distance; the flashing bluejay that kept just ahead of them; the red squirrel and the little chipmunks that scurried over the ground, to watch with bright eyes from the shelter of some tree, or hummock of up-tilted stones.

There was absolutely no limit to the list of interesting subjects that an observing lad could find to fill pages upon pages in his memorandum book. After he had returned home again how pleasant it would be to read anew these notes, and realize that he could not be termed blind when he pa.s.sed along the trail.

And then the tracks of the little woods animals, how interesting it was to hunt for them close to the border of the water, where they could be plainly seen in the soft mud.

At first one seemed pretty much like another to the greenhorns; but either Paul or Wallace, who had studied these things before, pointed out the difference; and after that lesson the other fellows could easily tell the tracks of a racc.o.o.n from those of a mink or a 'possum, for they found them all.

After that Paul took pains to explain just how differently the imprint of a dog's or a cat's foot looked when compared with those of the wild woods folks. These two were so much alike that Bobolink remarked upon the fact.

"How can you tell them apart, Paul?" he asked, looking at the prints made by the scout leader in the mud.

"That's easy," replied Paul, "if you notice that the dog leaves the track of his nails every time; while puss, well, she sheathes her claws while she walks, keeping them sharp for business when she sights a sparrow or a young rabbit."

"But look here, what's this funny track here? Some baby must have put its hand down in the mud; but that's silly, of course. Whatever made these, Paul?" asked Philip Towne, pointing ahead to a spot they had as yet not visited.

Paul took one look, and smiled. He turned to Wallace, who nodded instantly.