The initiation of Billy took place at the old shack on Duck Island a
few days later; and the first formal meeting of the Four Square Club
was held immediately after.
Tom called the meeting to order as usual, and they all four sat down on
the floor in the customary way; only this time they were careful to sit
in the four corners of an imaginary square instead of in a triangle.
In the middle of the square thus formed Tom had laid a small iron hoop
which he had found in the cellar, and explained that it was intended as
a memorial of the manhole in Captain Craven’s turret, like the circle
in the center of the square in the Club emblem, and it was voted to
use the hoop as a symbol at every formal meeting.
Then the Charter of the Club was read by Dick, and, after that, there
was a pause which Tom was the first to break:
“Say, fellows, do you remember what it was the old Admiral said to
George Gray about Captain Craven after he had told him the story?”
“I remember,” answered Chippie, “it was something about how the Captain
had been doing the same thing every day, all his life, and so he was
all prepared to do it then.”
“How’s that?” asked Bill.
“Why, you know, he had to take an oath--the same as we do--and he had
been working hard to do his duty and keep his oath in all his work, no
matter what it was,” said Tom.
“And so,” Dick went on, “when it suddenly was his duty to get drowned
to save the other fellow--why, he just kept right on, doing his duty,
and got drowned!”
“Oh, I see,” said Bill, with a little shiver. “Was he friendly with the
water?”
“He was friendly enough not to run away from it, anyway!” answered
Chippie.
“I say we put that all down in the Charter,” exclaimed Dick.
“Dick!” said Billy earnestly, “I wish we could talk to your Dad
about that, and see what he’d say. You know you said I might see him
sometime!”
“That’s a grand idea,” chimed in Chippie. “We’ll ask him to come down
to the next meeting! What do you think, Dick?”
“Well, he could come down any time after working hours,” said Dick
reflectively. “But I tell you what I’d better do. I think I’d better
tell him all about the baseball game and what _I_ did first.”
“Yes, _sir_!” replied Bill earnestly, “and tell him about my funk and
all. The more he knows about us the better. What do you say, Tom?”
“I say the same thing,” said Tom.
“What I like about this Club is, that we’re all working together for
something that’s worth while, and that something is all in the Charter.
But--Gee!--the more I think of it, the bigger it seems to me; and an
older fellow, like Dick’s Dad, ought to be able to help us a lot.”
Then the meeting adjourned; and that evening at home, Dick had a
heart-to-heart talk with his father and told him everything of
importance that had happened during the cruise.
Mr. Gray’s face clouded over when Dick made his confession about his
foul play at second base, but it soon began to brighten as Dick spoke
of the torment which began working inside of him afterwards from time
to time, and finally the revolt of his spirit against any further
deception when he was about to receive the commendation for having
saved the little girl’s cat.
“You gained a victory over yourself, then, Dick, and I thank God! There
has always been a mean streak in you which showed itself in what we
used to call your ‘dark moods.’ You conquered that mean streak then,
and you will be able to conquer it again. Have you had any of the dark
moods since?”
“Yes, father, but they have been lighter, and I have been able to drive
them away without much trouble.”
“Good,” replied his father, “you could not have told me anything that
would have given me more real satisfaction. God bless you, and help you
to keep on the same track.”
Mr. Gray listened attentively and with great interest, also, to the
story of Billy Brown’s struggle with fears, and every now and then
asked a brief question to make sure that he had understood all that had
occurred, and all that had been going on in the boys’ minds. He had
never heard the story of Captain Craven before, and was delighted with
it, as an example of the spirit of loyalty to duty and heroic courtesy.
Finally, when Dick explained the reason why the boys wanted him to
come to their next meeting:
“Sure!” he exclaimed warmly, “I wouldn’t miss it, Dick! I’ll explain it
to your mother, too, and she wouldn’t have me miss it, either! It means
a lot to me to see you and these other lads catching on--while you are
still boys--to ideas which it has taken me a lifetime to reach, through
all kinds of experience, and some of it pretty tough, too. You tell the
other boys that I’ll be there, and that their motto means just as much
to me as it does to them.”
* * * * *
At the time of the meeting the following Sunday, Dick had brought
over a chair for Mr. Gray to sit in while the four boys took their
accustomed places, and he assured them that he would be quite ready to
adopt their charter as a rule of life. Then, lowering his voice, and at
the same time talking more earnestly, he said:
“Dick has told me, boys, of some of your difficulties and victories
during this cruise, and your desire to carry on the same warfare
against evil, now that you have come ashore again. I believe that there
is more of the man in every one of you than there was when you first
started on this cruise.”
“Would you like us to read the Charter, sir, before we begin?” asked
Tom. “Because it’s about that especially that we want you to tell
us. Say, Bill, you ask him what you want to know. But we’ll hear the
Charter first.”
So Dick read the Charter through and ended with the words: “and so
Captain Craven gave up his life to do his duty as a good scout, and
to keep his oath and law; and so, to remind them of his brave and
courteous act, the officers of the navy have the custom of saying:
‘After you, Pilot’, when one of them steps back to make way for
another; and also, because we want to be reminded of his brave and
courteous act and faithfulness to his oath and law, we--the members of
the Four Square Club of Duck Island--have written out this story to
read once in a while, and have taken ‘After you, Pilot’, as our motto.”
After a little pause, Mr. Gray said: “What was it, Bill, that you
wanted especially to know?”
Bill felt a little shy, but he was already beginning to control his
feelings more, and so pushed through the shyness and began to talk.
“At the last meeting, sir, Dick was saying that there ought to be
something else in the Charter about how it was that Captain Craven was
strong enough to do the way he did. And the old Admiral, when he first
told the story to George Gray, he said that it was because Captain
Craven was in the habit of doing his duty every day of his life--no
matter what it was. What do you think of that, sir?”
“I think that’s right,” replied Mr. Gray, “and it would be a good
thing to put it in the Charter, because it shows that each one of us
can be preparing every day to do whatever may be required of us in an
emergency.”
“‘Be Prepared’ is the Boy Scout motto, sir,” said Chippie.
“I know it is,” continued Mr. Gray, “and ‘Be Prepared’ is the motto to
act upon every day of our lives, if we want to be strong enough to say:
‘After you, Pilot’, when we get our chance.”
“I see that, sir,” answered Bill, “but if you want to have grit in the
water, you have to be friendly with it; and what I wanted to know was,
whether Captain Craven was friendly with the water, and if that was the
reason he did not mind drowning?”
Mr. Gray thought for quite a while before answering this question; and,
while they were waiting in silence for his answer, the boys listened to
the lapping of the little waves on the beach near by.
“Of course you know, Bill, no one can say for certain just what passed
through that man’s mind; but I, for my part, would say that he had done
lots of things in his life that were harder to do than just dying, and
that there was no reason for his not feeling friendly with the water. I
think he did.”
“It makes me shiver,” said Bill, “to think of getting drowned, in spite
of the fact that I am able and willing to swim in deep water any time;
it’s being friendly with the water that’s helped me to get my balance,
but--Captain Craven--_he knew_ he was going to drown, so what was the
use of his keeping his balance?”
“I guess, Bill, that Captain Craven loved the water because he had
conquered all fear of it years ago, if he ever had any, and some of
the happiest times of his life had been spent in doing his duty at
sea. But I’m thinking that he had another habit that prepared him for
this emergency. If he hadn’t been drowned at that time he would have
reported to Admiral Farragut, his superior officer, every detail of
the explosion; and now,--when there was no possibility of reporting to
the Admiral,--he may have thought to himself, ‘this drowning will be
over in a few minutes, and then I’ll report to the Great Captain, whose
child I am and whose will is my duty, wherever I see it.’”
“Won’t you come to another of our meetings some time, sir?” asked Tom
after a pause.
“That I will,” answered Dick’s father, “and I tell you what it is,
boys; I won’t forget this meeting in a hurry, either!”
As they got up and left the shack, the sun was just setting.
“It’s time for ‘colors’,” said Tom, “will you give the command, sir?”
and all stood at attention while Dick slowly lowered the flag.
* * * * *
Transcriber’s note:
Illustrations have been moved to paragraph breaks near where they are
mentioned.
Punctuation has been made consistent.
Variations in spelling and hyphenation were retained as they appear in
the original publication, except that obvious typographical errors have
been corrected.
p. 108: Missing words were assumed to be as follows:
the (force the inner)
latch (a latch from)
into (out into the)
at (station at the)