The head vanished, but something slid across his neck and he felt a tug at his straggling hair. The impulse was irresistible to try and grab the arm which held him up, and he started to squirm around.
“Cut that out!” ordered the voice sharply. “If you don’t, I’ll let go.”
There was grit in Garrity’s make-up, and fortunately he was not quite too far gone to reason. He had little faith in the boy’s ability to save him, but at least his face was partly out of the water and he could breathe. His teeth dug into his under lip until it bled. Cold fear was tugging at his heart, but he made the effort, and let his muscles lax.
For a space nothing happened save that he did not sink under the water again. Then all at once he saw the bank closer than it had been before. It was lower, too, and shelving. A wild hope sprang up, followed swiftly by wilder panic. For though they still moved, it was more slowly, and gasping sounds of distress came from his rescuer.
Strainingly Red’s eyes watched the bank. Would they ever gain it? It was scarcely two feet above his head and little more than that away. Suddenly he felt a little push. An instant later his clawing fingers caught at a thrusting root, his feet struck bottom, and with a strangled sob he half pulled himself, half crawled onto a slippery shelf of rock.
For a moment or two he lay motionless, drawing in the air in great gulps. He felt chilled to the bone and every muscle ached, but nothing really mattered now. Finally he struggled up and turned his head. A white-faced, panting boy in dripping khaki lay beside him, a strange expression in his great gray eyes. Garrity’s own grew wider, his jaw dropped. Somehow he felt choked and speechless.
“You!” he gasped at length in a strangled voice. “You!”
Bill McBride merely nodded. He was too busy getting his breath to speak. At length he sat up and presently got on his feet.
“Come on,” he said curtly.
Garrity followed him without question. His mind was a turmoil of dazed thoughts. In silence they climbed the bank and pushed through the undergrowth. Presently they reached a little clearing amongst the pines. A scout axe, a hat and an open haversack lay there, and close to them a neat pile of twigs and small sticks.
McBride knelt down and with fingers that shook a little drew a box of matches from the haversack. With one of these he lit the pile of sticks and when the fire was well going, he stood up.
“Take off your clothes and dry ’em out,” he told Garrity briefly.
As one in a dream, Red obeyed. When he had wrung out his soaking garments, he followed the scout’s example and made a little frame of sticks to hang them on before the fire. And all the time he was doing this he watched his companion with furtive, curious glances. He did not seem at all like the boy he had knocked about on the street that day. There was an air of quiet competence about his every movement which roused in Red’s heart an odd, unexpected admiration. Though he would never have admitted it, he knew he couldn’t have made that fire so quickly and so skillfully. Even his frame of sticks was crude and wobbly compared with McBride’s. And as for the horrible experience in the water—
“Well?” said Micky suddenly, straightening his slim, white body. “Are you through?”
Garrity nodded and thrust one upright stick more firmly into the pine needles. It was cool here in the shade and he shivered slightly.
“All right,” said McBride. “Come out here in the open, then. I’m going to give you a lesson.”
Garrity’s jaw gaped. “A—what?” he repeated. “Whatcher mean?”
“We’re going to fight. Is that plain?”
Red’s wide eyes mirrored his amazement.
“Aw, say!” he mumbled. “I ain’t going to fight—you!”
“Aren’t you, though?” McBride’s lips tightened. “You weren’t so particular a few weeks ago. You didn’t mind hitting me foul and then knocking me around before I could get up. You big stiff!” His tone brought the blood tingling into Garrity’s freckled face. “I don’t believe you ever fought fair in all your life. Do you want me to slap your face again?”
He took a quick step forward, his eyes blazing. Garrity, dazed, yet furiously angry, flung up one hand—and the fight was on.
As usual, Red lunged forward to get into a clinch. To his amazement he got an upper cut which drove him backward half a dozen feet where he scraped painfully against a pine trunk. Wild with pain and rage, he plunged at his opponent again, to find that this was an altogether different McBride from the one he thought he knew.
Quick on his feet, cool, competent, the scout seemed to slide out of the bear-like embrace with ease, landing a smart blow on Red’s chest as he did so. With a savage growl Garrity pulled up and whirled around. This time he would surely get him. He came forward more cautiously, muscular arms outspread. The next thing he knew he struck the ground with a jarring force which was only partly tempered by the thick bed of pine needles. Dazed a little, but undeterred, he scrambled up and leaped forward again.
But somehow Red’s moment never came. Ducking, dodging, feinting, countering, the smaller fellow simply played with his clumsy opponent. Not for a moment did he let him rest. Now and then he got in a smashing blow with all the force of his weight and muscle behind it, which brought a gasp from Garrity’s wide lips. Constantly he lured the other on to frantic rushes which took the fellow’s strength and got his wind, while McBride, with the skill he had gained in these past weeks of work, expended not even an unnecessary ounce of effort.
At last there came the moment Micky had hoped for. Sweat streaming down his face and chest, breath coming in loud gasps, Garrity staggered back from where he had been flung amongst some bushes. As he came slowly, he swayed a little, and McBride, watching his face narrowly, stiffened. A little feinting, and then a blow on the jaw with all his strength back of it, would settle things—would pay for that humiliating experience the thought of which had rankled in his memory all these weeks.
He took a quick step forward and then he paused. Something in that strained, white, dogged face before him brought to the scout a sudden strange sense of repugnance in his task. The fellow was game, all right. He would not turn tail as long as he could keep his feet and senses. But that dazed look of bewildered pain in his eyes told its own story of a suffering which was more than physical. Micky was conscious of a sudden sense of shame at the purpose in his mind; his arms fell abruptly to his sides.
“Had enough?” he asked gruffly.
There was a pause. Garrity’s head drooped wearily. “Y—yes,” he mumbled.
In silence they went back to the fire and began to put on their dried clothing. Not a word was spoken until they were nearly dressed. Then it was Garrity who broke the silence.
“I—I didn’t say nothing—about your—pulling me out,” he muttered, eyes fixed on a refractory shoelace.
“You needn’t,” returned McBride briefly, reaching for the haversack which held the grub he had brought on this solitary hike. “Any scout would have done the same.”
Red’s glance shifted from the fire to the empty rack of sticks and then back to McBride’s mussed and wrinkled shirt and breeches. A poignant memory of those horrible moments in the river made him shiver. He picked up a narrow strip of bark and began to twist it about his fingers.
“I—I want to tell you—I’m sorry for—for what I’ve said about the—scouts,” he said presently in a low, embarrassed voice. His head was lowered and his face flushed. “I—I didn’t understand, I guess. They’re not—like what I thought they was—”
“I don’t suppose you did,” cut in Micky suddenly. “Why should you?” He had accomplished what he had set out to do, and with the responsibility of it gone, he was more like his old easy going, friendly self than he had been for weeks. And as he looked at Garrity’s downcast, embarrassed face he realized all at once that the fellow wasn’t wholly bad. In fact at the moment he found something almost appealing about him. “Nobody ever does really understand scouts unless they travel around with them or see a troop working,” he went on impulsively. “You’d better come down some Friday night and look us over.”
Garrity’s head went up and he stared.
“You—you don’t mean that?”
McBride smiled.
“Why not? Your old friend Conners is in the troop now. He’s going to join the boxing class next week. Why don’t you come down and see how he makes out?”
Red’s eyes drooped again. He felt a curious warmth stealing over him.
“Mebbe—I might,” he mumbled.
It was the end of a glorious fall day early in November. Autumn had held back this year and the hills around Wharton were flaming with masses of red and yellow, which stood out against the darker pine and hemlock in raw splashes of gorgeous color. The air was balmy, yet with a touch of crispness which made tramping exhilarating, and also roused pleasant thoughts of cracking fires and the snug warmth of indoor cheer which make the most delightful possible endings for such a tramp.
Eight scouts from the Wharton troop were off for an overnight hike. There had been few enough of these this Fall, owing to the work on the Liberty Loan, campaigns for War Saving Stamps and the like. But now there was a momentary breathing spell and Cavanaugh, McBride and six others from the troop had been prompt to take advantage of it. Amongst the others were Chick Conners and—Red Garrity! The latter had been a member of the troop for just one week but already he was clothed in a complete scout uniform which made a different fellow of him. It was plain that he tried to appear unconscious of his attire, but at times he seemed unable to resist a swift downward glance of admiring approval at the smooth folds of spotless khaki.
Full of high spirits, they tramped along the steep, crooked wood road, laughing, joking, playing tricks on each other, and apparently quite oblivious of the weight of haversack and blanket roll with which each one was burdened. But as they drew near their journey’s end, they sobered down a trifle and began to discuss the cabin with interest and curiosity.
“Of course it isn’t haunted—really,” said Fernald Barber at length, in a pause which followed some especially lurid story.
He had meant the remark to be a positive statement, but somehow a touch of questioning crept into his voice. He was an imaginative boy, and the story had impressed him strongly. Moreover, dusk was approaching, and the trees cast long shadows across the trail.
“Of course not, you nut,” laughed Cavanaugh, glancing back. “There’s no such things as haunts, is there, Micky?”
McBride shrugged his shoulders. “I guess not, Cavvy,” he grinned. “I never saw one, anyway.”
“Nor anybody else,” affirmed the patrol leader positively. “Just because old Morford lived alone in the cabin for so long, and was found dead back in the woods, a lot of loafers down town have made up a lovely yarn about his ghost coming back and hanging around the place. It’s all the worst kind of rot.”
“I wonder why it ain’t ever been lived in since?” remarked Chick Conners curiously. “It’s been empty a couple of years, you said.”
“Sure, but who’d want it? It’s miles away from everything, and unless you found another old hermit like Morford, who spent most of his time rambling around the hills, I don’t know who’d have any use for it. Dad stopped there a couple of times while he was out hunting, and I was there once myself last fall.”
“Did you stay over night?” asked Barber.
“No, but I’d just as soon have. There’s not a thing the matter of it except a little damp. The roof’s tight and there’s some wooden bunks, and a dandy stone fireplace. I don’t know what happened to the furniture. I guess it was the homemade kind and was broken up for firewood. With some tables and chairs and cooking utensils and things, it would make a dandy place for the troop to come on overnight hikes. I only wish I’d thought of it before.”
“Well, we’ll have to make the most of it now,” said McBride. “Let’s speed up, Cavvy. It’ll be dark pretty quick, and we’ve got to rustle around for wood.”
“Plenty of time,” returned Cavanaugh. “We’ll be there in five minutes.”
Nevertheless he quickened his pace and for a while conversation ceased as the others followed him closely up the narrow, winding trail. One or two, like Barber, may have been slightly affected by the weird tales they had heard of the shack and its former eccentric owner, but the majority were simply curious for a glimpse of the place and eager to reach their destination and settle down restfully after their long tramp.
The trail, which was scarcely more than a track, followed the rocky edge of a deep ravine. There was a glint of water down below, but in those depths already shadows were creeping up, filling the hollows, smoothing over the rough slopes, obliterating one by one each separate detail of tree and rock and brawling stream. On the other side the slope swept steeply upward, covered with close-set ranks of pines, whose long branches spread out over the trail itself.
Presently the road curved sharply to the right around a mass of fern-covered rock, twisted erratically for a space amongst the trunks of tall, straight pines, turned again, and ended abruptly on an open shoulder of the mountain.
“There she is,” announced Cavvy.
Before them, at the top of a gentle slope a long, low, structure of logs nestled against a background of trees. Close to one side towered a giant pine, its feathery branches overhanging the sloping roof of slabs. The closed door was almost hidden in the shadow of a wide, projecting roof, and to Furn Barber the whole place fairly breathed desertion and loneliness. But he would have perished rather than reveal that feeling to the others, and he was one of the first to dash up the slope and cluster around the door.
This was merely on the latch, and in a moment they had swarmed inside and were staring about in eager curiosity. Opposite them yawned a great stone fireplace, cavernous and empty. On the left was a shuttered window and on the other side stood a double tier of wooden bunks. There were some rough shelves at one side of the chimney, and a couple of empty boxes on the floor, but that was all.
For a moment no one spoke. The silence, the bare emptiness, the shadows in the corners, undoubtedly gave the place a gloomy look, and there was a damp chill over it all which was not exactly pleasant. McBride was the first to speak.
“Why, it’s a dandy place, Cavvy,” he said cheerily. Micky was one who always made the best of everything, and there were moreover, possibilities about the cabin which he sensed before the others. “All we need is a fire and some lights to make it as homelike as can be.”
His words broke the spell. Candles were quickly produced and lighted, and then the whole crowd hustled out for wood. There was plenty about in the shape of dead limbs and fallen trees, and each scout worked with a will cutting it up and dragging it in. In an hour a roaring fire blazed on the hearth and there was a pile outside the cabin door which would easily carry them through the night.
The transformation was surprising. The firelight flickered cheerily on the log walls, driving out the shadows and brightening every corner. Blankets spread out in the bunks, and a litter of cooking utensils around the hearth, took off much of the bare appearance. And when cooking operations began the place resounded with the clatter of dishes, with jokes, laughter and noisy but good natured disputes, until it would have taken a powerful imagination indeed to detect anything “spooky” about it.
Nevertheless, Furn Barber’s mind was not entirely at ease. To be sure, he thoroughly enjoyed cooking and eating supper, and the fun which went on then and afterwards. But when bedtime came and the bustle of turning in was over, his thoughts returned to the weird tales he had heard of old Morford’s “ghost” and lingered there with growing apprehension.
He occupied one of the bunks with McBride, and long after everyone else had gone to sleep, he lay watching the flames leaping in the fireplace, and their reflection glowing and dancing on the walls and roof. Every now and again, as the fire died a little, his glance swept shadowy corners nervously and he shivered at some particularly creepy detail of the stories he had been told about the place.
But even his wrought up imagination could find nothing very fearful in this peaceful picture, and at length he dozed off.
He woke with a start to find the room in darkness. The fire had died down to a dull red glow which illuminated only a foot or two of the stone hearth. Everything else was swathed in shadows—everything, that is, save—
Barber gasped suddenly and sat up tingling, his gaze fixed fearfully on the farther wall of the cabin. For a long moment he stared, wide-eyed, horrified, at the motionless, shapeless figure which stood out, vaguely white against the glass of the window. Then suddenly it moved with a slow, creepy motion along the wall, and with a gurgle of fright, Furn clutched his bedfellow.
“Micky!” he gasped thickly. “Micky—wake up!”
McBride rolled over. “Huh?” he grunted sleepily. “W’as matter?”
“The ghost!” shrilled Barber. “Morford’s ghost!”
The words penetrated to more ears than one. Startled into complete wakefulness, McBride bounced over and leaned out of the bunk. At the same instant Red Garrity sat up abruptly from a heap of blankets on the floor, and Cavanaugh poked his head over the edge of the upper bunk.
“What’s the matter?” they both cried at once.
“The ghost!” wailed Barber. “There beside the window. I can see it—”
He broke off with a shrill squeal of fright as Cavvy’s flashlight, sweeping suddenly across the room, brought into clear relief an unmistakably human form, lank and white-clad, looming up beside the rough shelves that hung between the fireplace and the window.
Furn’s cry choked, died away, changing to a surprised gasp which, in its turn was drowned in the shout of laughter that came from the others. For what the clear white light revealed was nothing more spectral than the lank figure of Ted Hinckley clad in voluminous white pajamas—he had been the only one to so thoroughly prepare for bed—and placidly munching the remains of a cold baked potato.
For a long moment he stood motionless, paying not the slightest attention to the noise, and continuing to eat the cold potato as if it had been the most delicate of viands. Then, as the remaining scouts woke and added their clamorous questioning to the din, an odd change came over him. He started slightly and the potato slipped unheeded from his fingers. His eyes, already open, widened, and into them came a dazed, bewildered stare which merged presently into a broad, sheepish grin.
“Sleep-walking again, Ted?” inquired Cavvy, when he could get his breath.
“Doggone it!” mumbled Hinckley. “What the deuce was I doing, anyhow?”
“Eating a cold potato,” chuckled Cavanaugh, “and scaring Furn most to death. He took you for Morford’s ghost. Some ghost, eh, fellows?”
“Oh, you Furny!” laughed McBride.
He clutched the blushing Barber in the ribs and created a diversion for which Furn was only too thankful. Hinckley, chilled in his scant attire, piled wood on the fire and hastily sought his blankets, but it was a good while before the chuckles died away and silence fell upon the cabin, this time to last until morning.
There was more joking then, and a good deal of fun was poked at both Barber and Hinckley. But the necessity of making an early start for town cut this rather short, much to the former’s relief.
“I reckon no respectable ghost would stand half a chance with this bunch,” laughed McBride as they started off. He glanced back at the cabin which looked cheery enough now in the full glare of the morning sun. “It’s a swell place, fellows, and I don’t see why we shouldn’t make it a regular troop headquarters. If we could scrape up enough money to buy some furniture and fix it up a bit, there wouldn’t be a scout cabin anywhere that could beat it.”
“Not a half bad idea,” agreed Cavanaugh. “I don’t see why we shouldn’t do it, either. We’ll have to take it up with the chief on Friday and see what he says.”
It was not difficult to arouse Mr. Wendell’s interest in the project. Always a firm believer in over night hikes and camping trips as the best possible means of carrying out the scouting program, he realized at once the value of such a place as this which could be made use of at all seasons of the year.
With some of the discoverers and a number of other scouts whose interest had been stirred up by the tales of that first party, he made a trip up the mountain. The cabin was viewed from every standpoint and it was unanimously decided that there were far too many attractive possibilities in the building to allow it to stand there deserted and unused. Not long afterward Mr. Wendell and two of the troop committee visited the owner of the land—old Morford, the builder, had been merely a squatter—and by dint of persuasive argument obtained permission to use the cabin as a scout headquarters.
It was too far from town to be turned into a regular meeting place, but the troop decided to furnish it and use it as an objective for hikes and brief winter camping trips. It was Cavanaugh who conceived the brilliant idea of using it also as a place of entertainment for some of the many soldiers from the big new Government training camp located in the neighborhood, who constantly thronged the town.
The presence of that camp and the frequent sight of the soldiers thrilled the scouts as nothing else could have done. It did not take them long to know many men by sight and a few of them intimately. The crowd first in training happened to include a number of Western boys who had no friends in this part of the country and were too far from home to go back on furlough. The scouts got into the habit, therefore, of bringing some of these home with them for stays of varying length, and several of the young men who had been scouts themselves not so very long ago, revived their interest in the movement, frequently attending the troop meetings and even helping the busy scoutmaster in looking after the boys.
From these the scouts kept secret the existence of the cabin. They wanted to furnish and equip it thoroughly, and then have a grand surprise party and house warming for the soldiers. But unfortunately all this took a good deal of time. They might easily have filled it with odds and ends of discarded furniture from their own homes, but the majority voted against this. The cabin had become the pride of their hearts, and they wanted, as they expressed it, to do the thing right. And so, for many weeks they worked like beavers at every possible chore and occupation which would bring in money for the fund, until at length the latter reached a very decent total.
Bill McBride was treasurer and there were few waking hours that he did not think with pride and pleasure of the growing size of that canvas bag which held their hard earned dimes and nickels. It was in his mind one morning late in November as he caught up sweater and books and dashed out of the front door.
The air was chill, and overhead the clouds were dark and lowering with a hint of snow in them. But Micky was not considering the weather as he sped along, nor was he even thinking of the Thanksgiving holiday which loomed so pleasantly near.
“We’ve got over sixty dollars,” he said to himself as he hastened up the street, “and I don’t see why we shouldn’t begin pretty soon. If we don’t, Jack Farren and Harley and all the rest of that corking bunch will be ordered across and never see the cabin at all. You can get a lot of stuff for sixty dollars.”
“Aye—Micky!” shrilled a voice from up a side street. “Wait up.”
McBride glanced that way impatiently. Harry Ritter, stout, round-faced and indolent, was approaching at his usual lazy stroll.
“Can’t, Rit, I’m late,” he called without pausing.
Whereupon, with a grunt, Ritter speeded up and caught McBride about the middle of the next block. “I don’t see what’s your rush,” he complained, puffing a little. “It isn’t half-past eight yet.”
“I know it, but I’ve got to fix Mrs. Wright’s furnace and carry out some ashes before school.”
Ritter sniffed. “You still doing that?” he inquired disparagingly. “Youarean easy mark. I’ll bet you don’t get a cent for it.”
“Of course I don’t, you mercenary young pup,” retorted Micky. “I’m not doing it for money. When Jim was drafted, I said I’d look after her chores ’till he came back. You’re a hot scout, you are!”
“Shucks! WhenIwork, I want something out of it, especially with the troop needing money like we do.”
Micky chuckled. “Whenyou work!” he repeated with emphasis. “That’s a good one. Just let me know when you’re going to start, and I’ll come around and look on. It would be a real treat to see you exerting yourself for once.”
“You go to grass! I’ll bet I’ve turned in as much money to the fund as anybody.”
“Maybe so, but you didn’t earn it. You just grafted it off papa.”
Ritter flushed floridly. “Huh!” he grunted. “You think so, do you? That runt, Midge Willett’s been stuffing you full of lies. Just wait till I give him a piece of my mind—”
“Don’t do it,” laughed Micky. “You haven’t any to spare.”
He skipped up a side street, leaving the stout youth snorting incoherently on the corner. A few houses beyond he turned in at the gate of a small, white-painted cottage, hastened along a gravelled path at the side, and dived into the open cellar door.
When he had shaken down the small furnace, swept up the floor and carted the ashes around to the rear he knocked at the back door and stepped in, closing it behind him.
It was an immaculate kitchen, fairly shining in its scrubbed, polished state of cleanliness. Everything was so spotless, in fact, that the vigorous movements of the broom, wielded by the small, spare woman in a limp calico dress seemed rather unnecessary.
“Good morning, Mrs. Wright,” said Micky, pulling off his cap. “I’ve fixed the furnace and carried out the ashes. I’ll split your kindling this afternoon after school. Is there anything I can do for you downtown?”
She glanced momentarily at him over one shoulder. The vigorous movement of the broom never ceased. “No, thank you, William,” she said briefly.
Still Micky hesitated. He had noticed her reddened eyelids and a curious, unwonted droop to the usually erect shoulders. “I—I thought perhaps you might want something special from the store,” he persisted awkwardly. “To-morrow’s Thanksgiving, and—”
She faced him suddenly, her thin, rheumatic fingers clenched about the broom handle. “Thanksgiving!” she repeated harshly. “What’s that to me? What have I got to be thankful for?” Her lips quivered for an instant and then straightened. “Jim’s going over—going to France. And—and they won’t let him come home to say good-by!”
Micky drew a quick breath; for a moment the tragedy in her eyes turned him speechless. It hurt him, too, that look, and brought into his mind for a vivid second the eyes of a mother fox he had once seen, backed into a rocky corner, her frightened, shivering cubs behind her.
“Oh!” he exclaimed sympathetically, an instant later. “They won’t give him leave? But—but couldn’t, you—go to see him?”
“I could, but I’ve got no money,” flamed the woman—“and he leaves on Saturday.”
Abruptly she turned her back and resumed that fierce, monotonous sweeping of the spotless floor. Micky stared for a moment at the narrow, drooping shoulders, the plain white collar, the soft, pretty, grayish hair, and of a sudden something rose in his throat and choked him. With eyelids stinging, he reached blindly for the knob, opened the door and stepped outside. Drawing it softly shut, he blinked rapidly several times before he stepped off the stone and moved slowly down the gravelled path.
“It’s tough!” he muttered gruffly—“beastly tough!”
A picture of Jim Wright flashed into his mind—laughing, fearless, blue-eyed Jim, whose devotion to his mother had been the only thing that made him await the machinery of the draft. He might have pleaded dependency, but he did not—could not, he told Micky, who was an ardent admirer of the older fellow.
“She’ll have every cent of my pay, Micky, old scout,” he explained just before leaving. “And with you to help her over the hard spots, I guess she’ll make out all right. I just can’t stick around home when men are needed over there.”
So he had gone into training—ordered, perversely, to a distant camp instead of one so near at hand. And Micky had kept his promise to help in the spirit as well as letter. Jim had been back just once in all those months; a soldier’s pay doesn’t stretch for frequent railroad journeys. And now he is going over. It might be years before his mother saw him again; it might be—never.
“If only he was at Camp Wheeling,” growled the boy, speeding mechanically toward school. “It seems too stupid to send him all that ways. Why, the round trip costs nearly fifty dollars.” A remembrance of that look in the woman’s eyes came back to him and he ground his teeth. “Gee!” he burst out. “If I only had the money—if I could only get some!”
But in a smallish town like Wharton, with everyone feeling the effect of the war in increased prices and voluntary self denial, fifty dollars seemed a really enormous sum to raise at short notice. It was not until Micky was running up the school steps that there came to him in a sudden, blinding flash the realization that this amount and more already reposed in the scout treasury.
He stopped abruptly in the hall. But that was their fund! That was what they lay up, and to the spending of which they had looked forward with such enthusiasm. For a moment the thought of its being suddenly swept away, of having to start all over again in that slow, painful piling up of dimes and nickels, seemed an intolerable, an impossible thing. But it was only for a moment. After all, what were chairs and tables, dishes, pots and pans, against the hunger of a mother’s love or the bitterness of parting?
The boy’s face cleared and his lips straightened. It was the only way. And as he dashed through the coatroom, deftly flinging cap and sweater on a hook as he passed, and slid into his seat just in time for roll-call, his mind was busy working out details. The thing must be put through swiftly or it would be too late. Mrs. Wright really ought to leave on the four o’clock train that afternoon to reach Jim in time for dinner the following day. In the meantime the whole troop had to be won over to the scheme, and as Micky considered the situation it seemed to him as if Fate had conspired to make it especially difficult.
Mr. Wendell was out of town for a few days. Cartwright, the assistant scoutmaster, worked in a neighboring city and would not be home until after six. And finally Cavanaugh, whom he felt sure would have backed him to the limit, had gone off that very morning to spend Thanksgiving with a relative in the country.
“It’s up to me,” thought the boy dubiously. “I’ve got to handle the whole thing. I wonder if I can put it over.”
He glanced speculatively around the school room. Champ Ferris would be easy. He was assistant patrol leader of the Eagles and usually followed in Micky’s lead. Tallerico could also probably be won over; so could Furn Barber. But there was Clay Marshall and one or two others who had made the fund almost their religion. There was also Harry Ritter! And finally one never knew how the smaller kids would take a thing like this.
But McBride had a stubborn streak in him which made difficulties things to be surmounted instead of stumbling blocks. It is to be feared that lessons were much neglected that morning, but before the noon recess he had passed around word to everyone that there would be a special meeting of the troop in one of the empty class rooms at twelve sharp. In the absence of the other officials, McBride would have to conduct the meeting besides acting as principal speaker.
“What the deuce is up, Micky?” Two or three spoke at once, as they crowded around the teacher’s low platform. “Has Mr. Wendell got back already?”
“Not that I know of. This has nothing to do with him. It’s about something I found out this morning.” McBride hesitated an instant, his back against the desk, his eyes shifting swiftly from one face to another. “Jim Wright’s sailing for France on Saturday,” he explained briefly, “and they won’t give him home leave before he goes.”
There was a momentary pause. “They don’t, generally,” commented Ted Hinckley. “It’s hard luck though. Still, he’s mighty keen to go.”
One or two murmured perfunctory agreement, but most of the boys were silent, looking with puzzled expectancy at McBride. Champ Ferris’ question seemed to voice the feeling of the majority.
“But what can we do, Micky?” he asked at length, in his slow, drawling manner. “What’s up to us—to give him a farewell present, or something?”
Micky stared; then laughed oddly.
“Yes, you might call it that,” he agreed. “You’d call it a farewell present, I suppose, though it isn’t the sort any of you have in mind. Listen!” He bent forward abruptly, his face suddenly serious. “Jim can’t come home, but his mother could go to him. She wants to; she’s dying to. But she hasn’t any money. You know how poor they are. Jim’s pay is about all she has to get along on. And so it seemed to me—Jim’s an old scout and used to be in the troop—it’s up to us to send her there.”
He stopped and there came another pause. Several of the boys looked blank.
“But it costs an awful lot to go to Camp Merrill,” said Clay Marshall doubtfully.
“It does; the fare there and back is nearly fifty dollars. And we’ve no time to pass the hat even if there was a chance of getting that amount. She’s got to leave at four this afternoon to reach Jim on Thanksgiving. But if you fellows are willing, we won’t have to do that. We’ve got more than enough—in the treasury.”
It took a moment for the idea to seep in. Then a sudden murmur of protest came from the group.
“Oh, I say, Micky!” objected Marshall. “Why, that’s ourfund!”
“I know it is.” The boy leaned back against the worn edge of the desk, eyes sparkling, bright color heightened. “But what was the fund for? Chairs, tables—junk! What do such things matter when maybe it’s the last time she’ll ever see Jim again? Fellows, if you’d seen her face when she told me this morning, I wouldn’t have to say a single word.” He blinked an instant and then glared at them defiantly. “You’d be falling over yourselves to do what’s really the only decent thing—what any scout would know was just—his duty.”
His eager, compelling gaze flashed from one doubtful, dubious face to another. Suddenly Ted Hinckley stepped over and thumped him on the back.
“I’m with you, old scout,” he said briefly. “Let’s send her to Jim and make a good job of it.”
“Same here,” echoed Furn Barber.
“I guess we can live a little longer without the stuff we wanted,” drawled Champ Ferris.
“A while!” protested Harry Ritter, frowning. “But look at the time it’s taken us to earn that money. Why, it’s months, almost. And it’ll go in a minute and we’ll have to start all over from the beginning. Suppose she didn’t see him again. Lots of other—”
“Suppose it wasyourmother, andyouwere going to France and couldn’t come home, like Jim!” flamed Micky, his hands clenching. “Wouldyouget any comfort knowing there were other men in the same fix?” He paused. His face relaxed in a whimsical, appealing smile. “I can’t say any more, fellows,” he went on quietly. “I’m no talker anyway. It’s up to you. If you’d rather keep the money to furnish the cabin, all right. But if you’d rather—”
“Sure we would, Micky!” interrupted Midge Willett shrilly. Midge had the reputation of being rather tough, but he was undeniably a leader with the younger crowd. “We ain’t made out of no stone. Jim’s one dandy fellow, and I move we let the old furniture go and send his mother to him for a Thanksgiving present. How about it?”
The shrill chorus of approval which burst forth left no doubt as to the feelings of the majority. Even Clay Marshall joined in, and though Ritter said nothing, he made no protest.
“That’s great!” exclaimed McBride delightedly. “I knew you fellows would do it. Now it’s up to us to get a hustle on. Chase home for the money and buy the ticket and berth and take ’em up to Mrs. Wright. If we turned over the coin she might balk. I’ll be late, I s’pose, this afternoon, but I should worry!” He pushed briskly through the group, but at the door, moved by a sudden impulse, he turned. “Come ahead, Rit,” he urged abruptly. “I’ll want somebody to hold the change.”
Ritter flushed, hesitated, and then, almost reluctantly, came forward. Together they left the school and sped toward the McBride house. There the canvas bag containing their hard earned “fund,” mainly in dimes, nickels and quarters, was secured and they headed for the station.
The ticket agent was some time counting up the coins and making jocular comments on their probable use of the strip of paper he handed them in exchange. It must be confessed that even Micky felt a momentary qualm at the limpness of the bag that was returned to them, but he suppressed it swiftly. Ritter gave an involuntary sigh, but made no remark until they had turned into the Wright yard.
“I’ll just wait here till you’re through,” he said briefly.
“You will not!” rejoined McBride, catching him firmly by an arm. “What do you think I brought you for? You come along with me.”
Mrs. Wright sat in a rocker staring listlessly out of the window. Her hands lay limply in her lap, and something in the hopeless resignation of her pose was even more eloquent than her feverish activity of the morning. She glanced up as the two boys entered, and Micky was smitten with sudden embarrassment.
“We—we—that is, the troop wanted to give Jim a—a little send-off, Mrs. Wright,” he stammered. “We didn’t know what he wanted, so we thought— Here!” He thrust the bits of cardboard into her hands hastily. “We thought his mother would be the best present we could send. You’ll have to take the four o’clock train this afternoon,” he added more briskly.
For a moment the woman sat motionless, staring at the printed strip in her limp fingers. Then a word leaped into her consciousness out of the blur of printing—a word which, since early morning, had burned in her brain a symbol of hopeless despair. It was merely the name of a distant railroad station, but as she realized its meaning the frozen look melted from her lined face.
“William!” she gasped. “You don’t mean—” She stumbled to her feet and one thin arm reached out and caught his shoulder with surprising force. “I—I’ll see Jim after all?”
“Of course,” said Micky gruffly. “That’s what the fellows want. You get ready and we’ll come up after school to carry your bag. Remember, it’s the four o’clock train.”