THE LAST STUNT
“Well, Hervey,” said Mr. Wainwright, “being one of the _keepers_, as you
call us----”
“I’ve got nothing against _you_,” said Hervey.
“Thank you. Now, Hervey, we’ve been talking over your case for some time
and it was lately decided that since the end of the season was close at
hand there was no need of putting on you the stigma of dismissal. Tom
Slade was responsible for that decision; he seems to like you.”
“He knows I wouldn’t take a dare from anybody,” said Hervey; “I don’t
care what it is.”
“Hmph; well, he seems to like you. So you’re going home Saturday just
like all the other boys. You will have finished the season. No disgrace.
I don’t know whether you have any regrets or not. You have been a great
trial to the management. We who have the camp in charge feel that we
can’t again take the responsibility which your presence here entails. If
you were with a troop and scoutmaster perhaps it would be different;
perhaps you would have made a better showing under such influence. But
you are a born free lance, if you know what that is, and this camp is no
place for free lances, however picturesque they may be.”
“I have a lot of fun by myself,” said Hervey. “I stood on my hands on a
merry-go-round horse in a carnival in Crowndale. I bet you couldn’t do
that.”
Councilor Wainwright looked at him with an expression of humorous
despair. “No, I don’t suppose I could,” he said.
“Isn’t that a scout stunt?” Hervey demanded.
“Why no, it isn’t, Hervey. Not when you follow a traveling carnival all
the way to Crowndale and stay away for two days and identify yourself
with wandering acrobats and such. Of course, there’s no use talking
about those things now. But if you’re asking me, that isn’t a scout
stunt at all.”
“Gee williger!” Hervey ejaculated in comment on the unreasonableness of
all councilors and camp regulations.
“That’s just it, you don’t understand,” said Mr. Wainwright. “Scouting
doesn’t consist merely in doing things that are hard to do. If that were
so, I suppose every lawless gangster could call himself a scout.”
“I know a gangster that’s a pretty nice fellow,” said Hervey. “He did me
a good turn; that’s scouting, isn’t it?”
The camp councilor looked serious. “Well, you’d better keep away from
gangsters, my boy.”
“You say a good turn isn’t scouting?”
“We won’t talk about that now, because you and I don’t see things the
same way. The point is--and this is why I sent for you--you must never
again at any time return to Temple Camp. You are leaving as the season
closes and you are not openly disgraced. But you must tell your
father----”
“It’s my stepfather,” said Hervey.
Mr. Wainwright paused just a second. “Well, your stepfather then,” he
said. “You must tell him that your leaving camp this season has all the
effects of a dismissal. Councilor Borden wanted to write to your
father--your stepfather--and tell him just how it is. But for your sake
we have overruled him in that. You may tell your stepfather in your own
way----”
“Standing on my head, hey?” said Hervey.
“Standing on your head if you wish. The point is that you must tell him
that you are forbidden to return to Temple Camp. And of course, you will
have to tell him why. No application from you will be considered another
season. Now do you understand that, Hervey?”
It was characteristic of Hervey that he never talked seriously; he
seemed never impressed; it was impossible to _reach_ him. It was not
that he was deliberately flippant to his superiors. He was just utterly
carefree and heedless. He talked to the camp officials exactly the same
as he talked to other boys. And he did not talk overmuch to any one.
“Bet you can’t do this,” was a phrase identified with him. “Do you dare
me to jump off?” he would say if he happened to find himself one of a
group assembled on the balcony above the porch of the “eats” shack. He
could not just talk.
And now, in his disgrace (or what would have been disgrace to another
boy) he only said, “Sure, what you say goes.”
“You understand then, Hervey? And you’ll explain to your--stepfather?”
“Leave it to me,” said Hervey.
Well, they left it to him. And thereby hangs a tale. This breaking the
news was about the hardest job that Mr. Wainwright had ever done. If
Hervey, the stunt specialist, had only known what a stunt it was, and
how the other “keepers” had been disinclined to perform it, his
sympathy, even affection, might have gone out to Mr. Wainwright on
professional grounds. Even Tom Slade, afraid of nothing, found his
presence necessary across the lake while Hervey was being “let down.”
At all events if any sympathy was in order, it was for the young
councilor, not Hervey. The wandering minstrel ambled forth after the
encounter and, pausing before the large bulletin board, took occasion to
alter one of the announcements which invited all scouts to attend
camp-fire that evening and listen to a certain prominent scout official
“_who has seen many camps and brings with him several interesting books
which he will use in narrating how he caught weasels and collected
oriental bugs in the Mongolian jungle._”
When Hervey got through with this it read, “_Who has seen many vamps and
brings with him several interesting crooks which he will use in
narrating how he caught measels and collected oriental rugs in the
Mongolian bungle._” The misspelling of measles did not trouble him.
Having thus revised the announcement he went upon his way kicking his
trusty stick before him and trying to lift it with his foot so that he
could catch it in his hand.
He felt that the morning had not been spent in vain.