CHAPTER XXIV

SAFE

We went up the hill a little ways into the woods and then down into a hollow. I knew about it because I had been there before. It was lucky I had some matches because those two fellows were soaking.

“What’s the idea?” Will Dawson asked me.

“Any fool would know that,” I told him. “It’s so we can start a fire where they can’t see it from camp. Do you think I want the whole camp coming over here?”

“He’ll be found out anyway,” Dub said to me.

“Sure he will, he’s a fool,” I said. “But you fellows have got to get dry, haven’t you?” Will Dawson he didn’t say a word, he just stood there. “A fine kind of a Star Scout you’ll make,” I said to him. “All but two badges and then you have to go spoil it all! After Westy and Dorry and all of us were counting on being a Star Patrol--_good night_! Warde Hollister, he wouldn’t even take a tenderfoot stalking for fear he’d get a black mark, he was so anxious on account of our record. Now look what _you_ go and do.”

“A lot you care that I didn’t get drowned,” Will said.

“Sure I care,” I told him. “But if you had got drowned it would have been your own fault.”

“Oh, cut it out,” Dub said. “What’s over is over.”

“Sure,” I said, “our being a Star Patrol is over--you said it. He’s as good as Pee-wee for fixing things.”

“How about you?” Will said. “Didn’t you go off on a three day leave with other Scouts? Do you call that being a patrol leader?”

Gee, but I was good and mad. I said, “Listen here, Will. If I hadn’t gone off like that and got in with those fellows, Dub and I wouldn’t have been here to-night, if it comes to that. And where would _you_ be now. I’d like to know?”

Dub said, trying to smooth things over, “That’s what Pee-wee would call a dandy argument.”

“Please don’t talk to me at all,” I said to Will. “As long as you’ll get chased home to-morrow morning what’s the use of scrapping? All you had to get was bird study and carpentry to be a Star Scout, and you know as well as I do that a Star Scout means a Star Patrol. You had to go and throw mud on the parade. Jiminies, nobody ever heard me shouting about the rules--I’ve broken some of them and I’ve bent a few others--but when you know blamed well that you can’t take a boat back at night without being nailed, _jimmy Christmas_, what’s the idea of doing that?”

Will said, “Oh I could have pulled it up in the bushes before I got to the float, couldn’t I?”

“Couldn’t you?” I shouted at him. “No you _couldn’t you_! Do you want to gather up some sticks or don’t you? It’s all the same to me.”

We all started picking up sticks for the fire and none of us spoke to each other--some merry party. Dub was kind of funny the way he went around picking up sticks not saying anything. I guess he was surprised because he never saw me like that before. Once, after we got the fire started, I saw how he winked and made a funny face at Will. A lot I cared, I was so good and mad. The more Dub saw how mad I was, the more he kept kidding me about it, winking at Will and acting--you know how. He said, “As long as you feel so much like roasting I wish we had some potatoes and we’d roast them.”

“Do you blame me?” I said. “You’re all alone up here, so you don’t have to be thinking about your patrol. But if you knew more about Temple Camp you’d know that a scout honor is a patrol honor. And a scout black eye is a patrol black eye--you ask any Scout up here.” Dub said, “As Pee-wee would say, it shows how much I don’t know. All I can say is that if Temple Camp wants to teach me anything it better be quick about it. It will have to do it by Saturday.”

“Temple Camp will take care of him first,” I said, looking at Will.

By that time the two of them were standing close to the fire, turning round and round so as to get dry. I kept putting sticks on it. I couldn’t help it, I had to smile at Dub, the funny way he kept turning around. He wouldn’t let on that he was trying to make me laugh. He said, “When I go home I can tell my mother I went around a lot up at Temple Camp.”

“Yes, and you didn’t have to go breaking the rules to do it,” I said.

“I didn’t see any good enough to break,” he said.

I said, “Well there’s one thing, I’m going to make a report to Slady[1] about what you did, about the rope and all, and I bet you won’t even have to take your life saving tests on the Eagle award--I bet the Gold Medal will cover that. You’ll have the hero medal and you’ll be an Eagle Scout both.”

“That shows Will Dawson did me a good turn,” Dub said. “I’d treat him to an ice cream soda if I was only going to stay up here, if I only had a dime.”

“Now you’re starting kidding about it,” I said.

Dub said, “All right, if you want me to be serious, listen here. You’re not going to tell Tom Slade anything--you’re going to keep your mouth shut. Nobody has to know anything about this. I did my part, now you have to do yours.”

“_And you not get the Gold Medal?_” I just shouted at him. “And how about--gee, don’t you want to go home an Eagle Scout?”

“I don’t want to go home at all,” he said.

I said, “If I was an Eagle Scout and had the Gold Medal, I wouldn’t mind going home, you can bet.”

He said, “Well, are we dry?”

Will said, “Wait till I get my shoes dried out a little.”

“Yes, and you row straight across,” I told him.

“Are you going to walk?” he asked me.

“Didn’t I start walking?” I said. “Dub and I are going to finish the way we began. Do you want to get the whole three of us in Dutch? You better put some more wood on if you want to dry your shoes.”

“I’ll get a chunk of wood,” Dub said. “You keep drying your shoes,” he said to Will.

“You don’t need a very big piece,” I called after him.

Dub went running up out of the hollow and away toward the shore. Will was holding his shoes close to the fire. I just sat there on a rock, waiting. Will didn’t say anything to me, and I didn’t say anything to him. I guess we waited about ten minutes. Then I called but I didn’t get any answer. I got up and walked up out of the hollow but I didn’t see Dub anywhere. So I went down to the shore. I could see the camp-fire burning away over at camp.

I kept calling Dub but he didn’t answer. It was so dark I took out my flash-light. Because as long as we had gone so far after wood, I thought maybe he remembered seeing a good piece near where I pulled the boat up. But I couldn’t even find the boat. All of a sudden I saw something white on a tree. It was a piece of paper. Then I knew that was just where the boat had been. The paper was held to the trunk by a long, thin switch from a tree that was tied around the trunk. I held my flash-light up to the paper and read it. After I read it I took it down and put it in my pocket, so you can tell that the way I write it out now is just the same as it was on that paper. This is what it said, because I’m copying it. It was all sprawly like.

Please you and Will Dawson hike around to camp and don’t be scrapping. When you get there you don’t need to say you saw me. Nobody knows who started out with you and what they don’t know won’t hurt them. Tell Will Dawson he better go ahead and get to be a Star Scout. I’d like to see Pee-wee at that corn-roast. Like you said he’ll eat two at once. It’s no matter if I get pinched for being out in the boat because I’m going home day after to-morrow anyway and I’ll only lose one day. You shout so much about badges and things, now see if you can be loyal to a Scout in your own patrol. Dub Smedley.

P.S. You keep still about me, do you hear.

That’s just what he wrote. After I read it I looked out on the lake but I couldn’t see anything and I couldn’t even hear a sound--not even the oar-locks clinking. I shouted, “_Dub._” But there wasn’t any answer. I didn’t shout again because I knew he must have heard me. I was afraid they might hear my voice, far away like, over at camp. So I just stood there on the shore trying to see out on the lake. I couldn’t even hear an oar dipping, I thought he must be pretty far out.

I guess he was sculling, because you can hear oar-locks even far off on the water. There was a little kind of a narrow bright path on the water, made by the camp-fire across the lake. Way over there it was wide, but past the middle of the lake, over toward the side where I was, it was just kind of like a bright line--all used up, sort of. I saw something black go across that and I called out again.

But there wasn’t any answer. It was good and dark around there.

----- [1] Slady. Nickname for Tom Slade, the young camp assistant and leader of camp activities.