MORE HANDLING
And so Peter Piper, of Piper's Crossroads, proved too much for
Scoutmaster Ned. He kept his secret. But he had a very narrow escape
from being a hero.
Scoutmaster Ned had his way, too. "So you think you'd like to have a
pike at that camp, eh?" he said.
Scoutmaster Ned's theory about camping was to keep open house. If he
lacked discipline (which it is to be feared he did) he made up in pep,
and the surprises that he was forever springing on the camp were a
perpetual joy. I suspect that he was not well versed in his
scoutmasters' handbook. He was a sort of human north wind. He adopted
the pose of being driven to distraction by "those kids" and he denounced
them roundly and said there were too many of them and that he was going
to pick out one and drown the rest. Then he would show up with a new
one. He was a sort of free-lance scoutmaster and I wonder how he ever
drifted into the movement. Probably he didn't drift in, but blew in.
Scoutmaster Safety First (Bill) was his balance-wheel.
"Where is she? I'll talk to her," he said to Peter.
So he talked with Mrs. Piper while Peter stood by. He sat down in the
kitchen and drank a glass of milk and ate a piece of pie and told her
that it was the first real piece of pie he had ever eaten in his life.
Would he have another? Well, he'd say he would! Mrs. Piper thought he
was about the finest "young gent" she had ever seen.
He told her all about his adventures of the night as if she were a pal
and when she said she had slept through all the rumpus outside, he said,
"Well, you've got West Ketchem, where I come from, beaten twenty ways.
Could I have just one little sliver--no, not as much as that--well, all
right. That town, why you couldn't wake it up, Mrs. Piper, not with an
earthquake. It would just fall down through the crack in the earth and
go right on sleeping--no I couldn't eat another speck. We must be off."
"We?"
"Oh yes, Pete's going with me. He's going to make us a little visit for
a week or two. We have lessons and everything, study nature, and all
that, and all he wants to eat. I'll bring him back, he wants to see the
real scouts in captivity. No accounting for tastes, hey, Mrs. Piper?
You'd better bring along a coat, Pete; but don't change your clothes,
you're not going to church; come just as you are, so I'll be able to
tell you from the rest in case I should decide to kill them all. That
lets you out, see? Come ahead before your mother changes her mind."
Poor Mrs. Piper had not yet made up her mind, so she could not very well
change it. Scoutmaster Ned had made up her mind for her.
"I'll have to get Sally Flint ter come over and visit with me," said
Mrs. Piper doubtfully.
"Just the one," said Scoutmaster Ned. "She'll keep you company and
you'll have a little peace with this youngster gone. Mrs. Piper, if I
had my way I'd chloroform every boy in creation. I wonder you look so
young with a wild Indian like that around."
"Oh, I ain't lookin' so young," she smiled, greatly pleased.
Before she realized it she was shaking hands with Scoutmaster Ned while
her other arm was around Peter. "I'm going to come here and stay a
month," the young man said. "I'm going to churn butter and eat pie--if I
can escape from that outfit. Well good-bye, we're off. I hope the old
bus runs."
"It looks reel smart with all the blue paint," said Mrs. Piper.
"Handsome is as handsome does," said Scoutmaster Ned. "Climb in, Pete,
what are you scared of? It won't eat you. Anybody'd think you were
stalking--stepping so carefully. Know what stalking is? They'll show
you."
Mrs. Piper stood holding her gingham apron to her eyes as they rode off.
It was of exactly the same pattern as Peter's shirt. He looked funny
sitting rather fearfully on the front seat. She had never dreamed of
seeing him enthroned amid such sumptuousness. Perhaps some day he would
go away and come back _rich_--a hero. Her Peter. And this stranger
liked him. She was weeping because she had never heard her boy called
Pete since his father died. She liked to hear him called Pete, it was so
friendly, and recalled the past so vividly....
As if Scoutmaster Ned would have called him anything else than Pete!