STILL BUMPING BUMPUS.
Various were the expressions of disgust when the scouts heard this piece
of intelligence from the guide.
“Well, what d’ye think of that now, for a piece of nerve?” exclaimed
Step Hen.
“Seems just like this here Ricky, whose first name must be Gin, I
reckon, thinks he owns pretty much all Alligator Swamp, because he’s
held out here so long, and nobody ever bothered him before!” Bumpus
lamented.
“But what’s the use talking that way, fellows?” said Giraffe, almost
fiercely; “none of us expect to clear out just because Mr. Ricky says
we’ve got to go. If he expects that he’s given us the worst scare of our
lives, he’s got another think acoming to him, that’s all.”
“Giraffe, you never spoke truer words than that,” cried Davy Jones,
suddenly firing up, and showing unexpected zeal in the matter; he had a
way of stretching his eyes when under any sort of excitement, and in
this way made the other boys laugh at his looks; but just then, somehow,
no one even smiled, for they were too much taken up with the seriousness
of the conditions confronting them.
“Well, it strikes me about the same way,” spoke up Bob White, with his
customary Southern eagerness, “the Silver Fox Patrol has gone through
with too many adventures in its time to get scared off, just because one
old moonshiner chances to feel ugly that we’ve had to come into this
swamp.”
“He’d better take care,” warned Smithy, who seemed fully as much worked
up as any of the rest of them; “or we might make up our minds to kill
two birds with one stone.”
“That’s what!” echoed Bumpus, aggressively; “while we’re alooking up
this here Felix, why, if we’re forced to show our hand without a glove,
p’raps we’ll take a notion to pull old Ricky in, and hand him over to
the revenue officers. Maybe there might be some sort of reward out for
him; and we’ve made our expenses before now in helping the hands of
justice. Remember what we did up in Maine, boys?”
“Yes, and please move our boat a little to the right, will you, Allan,
because somehow I think the air comes a mite finer from that quarter,”
and Giraffe as he said this almost glared at Bumpus; who returned his
look with one of pretended indifference, as he fondly stroked his dingy
old khaki jacket that was so discolored from long and hard use that one
could hardly tell what the original color may have been.
“Well, I hope now we ain’t going back, anyhow?” the fat scout remarked,
calmly.
All eyes were turned upon the scout-master, as though the decision must
rest entirely with him; but then they knew Thad well enough to feel sure
he never backed down in anything he attempted until the very last word
had been said.
And then again they must have found more or less consolation in the fact
that it was his particular business that had brought them all the way
into Dixieland; the possibility of finding his long lost little sister
would spur Thad on to reaching his goal, if there were a dozen Ricky
moonshiners in the way.
Just as they hoped and expected, he lost no time in settling the matter,
at least as far as he was concerned.
“We’re here to find that man with the little girl, boys, and we’re bound
to do it, by hook or by crook,” he said, quietly, but in that firm tone
they knew so well. “If this man who makes the moonshine stuff chooses to
get in our way and show himself disagreeable, why, we may have to turn
aside for a little while, and teach him that it isn’t always safe to
interfere with other people’s business, even if they do happen to be Boy
Scouts. And I’m sure our guide here, Tom Smith, will stand by us through
it all, won’t you, Tom?”
Now, the swamp hunter was having his eyes opened right along to the
possibilities of boys under the new way of making them think for
themselves, and the more he saw of Thad and his seven chums, the higher
his admiration arose. So when the young scout-master thus appealed to
him, he was quick to assure them of his constancy.
“I’ve lived around hyah fo’ a good many yeahs, an’ minded my own bizness
right along so ’at Ricky an’ me we-all never hed any fallin’ out; but I
sez right now, thet if he thinks he kin chase you boys outen Alligator
Swamp, jest ’cause yuh happens tuh be wearin’ them uniforms as makes him
’spicious like, he’s beatin’ up the wrong tree, thet’s all. I’ll stick
tuh yuh through thick an’ thin; and Ricky, he bettah go slow, thet’s
all.”
“Of course,” put in Thad, hastily, as with a movement of the hand he
checked the cheer that arose to the lips of several of the more
enthusiastic scouts; “we’d rather not have the least trouble with the
man, because, you understand, we never even knew of his being here until
we started in to try and find the others; but if he’s as obstinate as a
mule——”
“Or Bumpus here,” interjected Davy, as quick as a flash.
“Why,” Thad went on to say, “we’ll have to pay attention to him first of
all, because it’s unpleasant to think that at any minute you’re apt to
be shot at from ambush, by some one who is hidden behind a tree.”
“I never did sot any store by this hyah bushwhackin’ bizness,” declared
their guide, frowning. “And Ricky, he’s bound tuh git hisself intuh a
heap o’ trouble if so be he tries thet same on, many more times.”
“I was thinking,” resumed Thad, “that perhaps, now, there might be some
way for you to get in touch with Ricky, or leave a communication for him
somewhere. In that way you could tell him who we were, and that we
haven’t any notion of doing him any harm. In fact, so far as we’re
concerned, it doesn’t matter if he keeps on with his little still in the
swamp till doomsday, does it, boys?”
“No, if only he keeps his hands off, and don’t bother the Silver Fox
Patrol in the line of their duty,” asserted Giraffe. “Some other people,
just about like this same old Ricky, learned that it was as safe to
monkey with a buzz-saw as to fool with scouts when they’re bent on
minding their own affairs. I could mention more’n a few who got their
fingers pinched, and pinched bad too.”
“Well, don’t bother going into details now, Giraffe,” remarked Allan;
“all that will keep for some time when we’re sitting around the fire,
and you happen to feel like telling our guide a few things about what
we’ve done in the past. Just now we’ve got to settle on our plans for
work. How about what Thad asked you, Tom Smith; can you manage to get
word to this Ricky, do you think?”
The swamp hunter had been thinking while the boys exchanged these few
remarks; and now he nodded his head in the affirmative.
“I kinder reckons as how I mout do thet same, son,” he went on to say,
as though his mind were made up. “In the fust place, I knows jest whar
Ricky he holds out, an’ hes his ole still; an’ I wants tuh say thet I
don’t reckon tuh find them parties yuh be alookin’ fo’ in thet ere
quarter. So, yuh see, we’s soon gwine tuh head in a diff’rent way, so
Ricky, if so be he’s a watchin’ on us frum the bushes’ll make out thet
we don’t mean tuh disturb him yet awhile.”
“Still, he might think we were only going around to come up on him from
another quarter?” ventured Allan.
“Yes,” added the scout-master, “and if you can let him know what I said
about our being only Boy Scouts; and that we’ve hired you, not to find
him, but another party altogether, it might be best.”
“They’s a chanct tuh do thet same,” returned Tom Smith; “an’ this is
theh way o’ hit. Yuh see, Ricky he don’t never show hisself outen the
swamp, leastways not in daytime, ’cause he reckons as how thar be a
marshal behind every tree, jest awaitin’ tuh nab him fo’ moonshinin’.
But he sells his mountain dew, as they calls it up in Georgia an’
Tennessee tuh sum o’ theh natives, an’ when they wants a supply they
leaves word at his post office like.”
“Oh! I see, Ricky isn’t only trying to beat the United States Government
out of its revenue on the stuff he distills, but he’s set up a rival
establishment for sending letters through the mails without paying a
cent of postage?” and Giraffe chuckled at his own wit, which Bumpus
thought very bad taste; but then Bumpus was provoked at the lanky scout
just then, and could not see anything good in whatever Giraffe said or
did.
“And can you get a note into that private post office without too much
trouble?” Thad asked, quite interested, and ready to carry out the
little scheme with all the speed possible.
“Why,” resumed the swamp hunter, “hit happens thisaway, yuh see; we’s
bound tuh pass right neah thet holler tree, whar Ricky allers looks fo’
letters; an’ if so be yuh guv me a note tuh stick in the hole, chances
are he’d see me do hit, an’ be ahookin’ theh same out arter I quits.”
“Then Ricky can read?” queried Allan, as though surprised.
“Him?” ejaculated Tom Smith, as though surprised at the question; “sure
he kin, an’ write too. Why, I ’members him atellin’ as how he went tuh
school an’ got book larnin’ a whole winter, long time ago.”
“What d’ye think of that?” ejaculated Step Hen. “Suppose, now, Ricky had
had half the chances of us fellows, wouldn’t he set the world on fire,
though? Only went to school one winter when he was a boy, and learned to
read and write at that. I’m ashamed to say it, but there are some chaps
I know that have been agoing to school all their lives, and don’t know
much more’n how to read and write.”
“Speak for yourself, Step Hen,” said Bumpus, who seemed unusually touchy
these days, and resented the significant way in which the other looked
in his direction.
“I’ll write a few lines then,” said Thad, “and make it as plain as I can
that we don’t mean Ricky any harm, and would rather than not he helped
us find that strange man with the little girl; for I suppose he must
have noticed him around in the swamp, and has wondered what they were
doing here.”
“Oh! as fo’ thet,” chuckled the guide, “nobody ever questions what a
feller is after when he hides in ole Alligator Swamp; ’case, yuh see,
it’s allers been a safe retreat fo’ every escaped convict, and sech
others as want tuh keep outen sight. I hev heard as how in theh ole days
o’ slavery many a black took tuh this place arter runnin’ away from the
sugar plantations; and they used tuh hunt ’em with bloodhounds. Fack is,
right in these hyah days I’ve heard the bayin’ o’ hounds more’n a few
times; and I done larn on’y yesterday as how the sheriff, he went an’
fotched a brace o’ dorgs down from another parish, tuh use the same
hyah’bouts.”
Thad was already busily engaged, having secured a page from a pocket
notebook, and with the stub of a pencil he was writing a few lines as
plainly as he could accomplish it.
Giraffe and Davy were whispering together as their boats happened to
drift close together, and from the fact that they allowed their eyes to
turn toward Bumpus from time to time, it seemed probable that some new
scheme was being hatched looking to the further annoyance of the fat
scout.
Bumpus saw what was going on, and moved uneasily, as though he suspected
that some species of bomb were being prepared to explode under him; but
he did not say anything, however much he may have thought.
Thad had just folded the note, and handed the same to Tom Smith, so that
he could place it in the tree post office as they came to it; when
Giraffe caught the attention of the scout-master.
“Me’n Davy here been conferring on a certain matter, you see, Thad,” he
went on to say, apparently half in earnest, yet with his eyes twinkling
as though a wicked sense of humor bubbled up within; “an’ while we hope
you won’t think we’re atrying to start a mutiny of any sort, we would
like to get your opinion to a certain scheme to keep peace in the
family, and let the rest of us get our share of good sweet air.”
“Well, hurry up and state your case, Giraffe,” remarked Thad, who
possibly could more than half guess what was coming; “because we’ve lost
time enough already, and should be on the move.”
“Why, it’s just this way,” continued Giraffe, after exchanging winks
with Davy, as though looking for encouragement there; “we’ve tried our
level best to coax a certain member of this expedition to be faithful to
his vows, and stow away the greasy old fishy suit he keeps on awearing;
and he’s just that like a mule he won’t do the first thing to
accommodate us. Now, we all feel that we’ve got rights, and Davy here
thought up a plan whereby Bumpus can keep on wearing his cast-offs if he
wants to, and have all the fun to himself.”
“Oh! is that so?” sneered the object of all this tender solicitude; “how
kind of Davy, and you too, Giraffe. Maybe, now, you’ll go right along,
and explain how this same miracle’s agoing to be fixed? This suit is an
old friend of mine, and I just love it. Course, if Thad lets you, and
the whole bunch pile on, I can’t hold out against seven; but that ain’t
the way to treat a fellow scout. Go right along and explain what Davy’s
plan is.”
“Why, here’s the scheme, and I must say it’s a grand good one,” Giraffe
continued, bracing up to make the explanation. “Since Bumpus must save
his good suit, let him, if only he don’t bother the rest of us so
furiously. Now, there’s the boat of our guide; let him change places
with Tom Smith, and follow away behind the balance of the expedition. We
could wave him back whenever we thought he was getting too close, you
know. And I want to say the plan has my unqualified endorsement, and
does our chum Davy great credit. Now, what’s the verdict. Thad? Does
Bumpus either have to agree to throw away that old suit of his; or get
in the guide’s canoe, and go away back and sit down? We’re content to
abide by your decision in the matter; and here’s hoping you fix it to
suit the majority!”