The Boy Scouts of Bob's Hill Part 8

Skinny answered, while I ran into the house to tell the folks that it was all right. Then we went out in front and waited.

The first we saw of them was when Bill Wilson turned into Park Street in a cloud of dust and came tearing up the middle of the road on a jump.

The other boys were close behind, running to beat the band, and every mother's son of them was carrying a big club.

They didn't even yell when they saw us, they were so nearly winded, but Bill, being corporal, ran up to Skinny, gave the Scout salute, and then whirled his club around his head three times.

It was great to see them come up that way, every Scout whirling his club and all out of breath. Skinny's eyes shone like stars, he was so proud, and I saw Ma looking out of a window, surprised some, I guess.

"Show 'em to us!" yelled Bill, as soon as he could speak. "We'll eat 'em up."

"You'll get all the eating you want in about five minutes," Skinny told him.

"Where are they?" yelled Bill again, while the other boys marched up and stood in a row, each with his club in the air.

"You are crazy," said Skinny. "Where's who?"

"The Gingham Ground Gang. Didn't you tell us the Gang was after you and for us to come quick?"

"Not much. I said supper was ready and that if you didn't get a move on yourselves you would lose out."

"Ain't there going to be a fight?"

Just then Ma came out and it was a good thing she did, because there might have been a fight, after all.

"Boys," said she, smiling at us, "you are all invited to stay to supper, and you will just about have time to wash up and cool off a little. We are having supper early to-night. I was so disappointed when I found out that you had gone that your patrol leader, Captain Miller, told me that he would signal to you and that Corporal Wilson would get you here on time if he had to run his legs off. I don't exactly see how he did it but you are here, that is certain. I've let your folks know, so you can stay just as well as not, unless you don't like my cooking."

When she said that the boys set up a shout, for they knew all about Ma's cooking.

"I wish you would tell me how you do it," she added, turning back as she was going into the house. "If your secretary would come like that when I call him, I should be the proudest woman in the village."

CHAPTER V

A CAMPFIRE ON BOB'S HILL

"JEE-RUSALEM, fellers," said Skinny a few days later, "we're going to have a campfire to-night on Bob's Hill. Mr. Norton, the Scoutmaster, is going to be there, and he says for us not to eat too much supper because there will be something doing along about eight o'clock. It will beat the Fourth of July."

We hardly could wait for evening to come. The folks thought that I must be sick because I didn't want much supper, until I told them about the campfire.

"You'd better eat a bowl of bread and milk, anyhow," said Ma. "If I know anything about boys, and I have seen a few in my day, you will be ready for another meal by eight o'clock."

I don't know how it is, but things always seem to happen just as Ma says they will. Long before eight o'clock came we were waiting for Mr.

Norton at our house, as hungry as bears.

After a while he came along, lugging a big basket and wearing a smile that would have made us warm to him if we never had before.

"Captain," said he to Skinny, "if you will detail two of your men to bring some water, we'll get started. Of course, if we were going to make a regular camp we should see that there was water near. We'll have to carry it this time, but it isn't far to the top of the hill. One of you might help me with this basket; there seems to be something in it."

Fifteen minutes later we were all at the top of the hill and had brought some sticks from Plunkett's woods for a fire and a curl of birch bark to kindle it with.

"I understand that you boys came near burning up the woods and village once with a fire up here," said Mr. Norton. "We must be careful about that. Fire is a good servant but a very hard master. We do not need a big blaze for a campfire, so hot that we cannot sit around it. All we need is just enough to look cheerful, to heat our coffee, and furnish enough hot coals for cooking this beefsteak."

He was unpacking the basket while he talked, and Skinny was lighting the fire.

"I don't know that I can tell you anything about making fires and cooking. You boys just about live out of doors in summer, so far as I have observed. You are in great luck to have your homes in a small village. If you should play some of your pranks in a city, I am afraid that you might become unpopular and the police might get after you. Boys in great cities, like Chicago or New York, know little of the freedom and sweetness of country life."

He went over to a little clump of trees and came back with a small branch, from which he stripped the leaves and twigs. When he had finished he had what he called a "pot hanger" of green wood, about four feet long and with a kind of crotch at the smaller end. He put the big end under a stone, the right distance from the fire, and drove a short, crotched stick into the ground to hold the pot hanger over the blaze at the right angle. When that was done all we had to do was to hang a pail of water on the end of the pot hanger and wait for the water to boil.

"I thought that we wouldn't bother with potatoes this time," said he, "although they make good eating when baked in hot ashes, as you boys probably know. Mrs. Norton put in a whole stack of bread and b.u.t.ter sandwiches and some other things, which we must get rid of somehow, and Mrs. Smith gave me this bag as we were leaving the house. I don't know what is in it, and she told me not to open it until the feast was ready."

We all kept our eyes on the bag and wondered what was in it. I thought that I could make a good guess, being better acquainted with Ma than the other boys were, but I couldn't be sure.

By the time the water was boiling the fire had burned down to red-hot coals. Mr. Norton poured the water over the coffee and set the pot in a hot place. Then he began to get busy with the meat, using a broiler which he had brought in the basket. The delicious smell of the beefsteak and the coffee almost drove us crazy, and we began to be afraid that it would bring the whole village up the hill to us.

It seems as if every meal that we eat out of doors that way is better than any which we ever have had before. It grew dark before we had finished Ma's doughnuts, which we found on opening the bag. As we sat there we could see lights begin to glow all up and down the valley and back of us from an occasional farmhouse, up toward Greylock. Stars came out overhead, and after a little we saw a light in the sky above the East mountain and knew that in a few minutes the moon would come up.

After we had eaten all that we wanted, we threw some wood on the coals to make a little blaze, and then lay around and talked.

Finally Benny said, "I wish you would tell us a story, Mr. Norton, like Mr. Baxter did out in Illinois last summer."

"I am going to tell you a whole lot of stories before we get through with our meetings," he replied, "but let us discuss this Scout business a little more first. When you took the Scout's oath and were enrolled in the Tenderfoot cla.s.s, you pledged your word of honor that you would do your duty to G.o.d and your country, that you would help other people at all times, and that you would obey the Scout law. That Scout law is important. Suppose we talk it over. Gabriel, you are leader, can you tell us what the first law is?"

Skinny stood up and folded his arms.

"A Scout is trustworthy," said he.

"It is a great thing to be trustworthy; to be dependable," said Mr.

Norton. "In a few years, you boys and others like you will be running this country and the other countries which make up what we call the civilized world. To you doubtless that time seems far off. Let me tell you that it will be here almost before you know it. It seems only yesterday when I myself was a youngster like you."

"I'm going on twelve," Benny told him, "and I have begun to grow again."

"The Band is dependable all right," said Skinny, stabbing around in the air with his fork. "I mean the patrol is. Bet your life, when they monkey with the Band they run up against a buzz saw."

Bill didn't say a word, but he cawed three times; then flapped his arms and crowed, and ended by standing on his hands and kicking his feet in the air. Bill didn't have to talk. He could do things that made us know what he meant, without saying a word.

"To be dependable," went on Mr. Norton, "means more than to fight for your rights, or for your country's rights. It means that in all walks of life you must be ready to 'deliver the goods.' When a Scout gives his word of honor that settles it. That which he says is true, is true; you can depend upon it, and he will do exactly what he says he will do. That is a quality which we greatly need in men as well as in boys, who soon will be men."

"Corporal, what is the second law?"

Bill thought a minute and then said:

"A Scout is loyal."

"Right you are. You must be loyal to your country, to your parents, to your officers, to your employers, when you get to work. Loyalty is a great thing. It means to stick together. One boy, or one man, alone, cannot accomplish much. Several working loyally together for a single object, are a power. You and the Gingham Ground Gang used to have considerable trouble, didn't you?"

"We do now," we told him, "except with Jim Donavan. Jim is square and we'd like to have him join us, but he won't leave the Gang; says it wouldn't be right."