FRIENDS
"Take your hand off your forehead," Tom said, trying gently to move it
against the victim's will; "so I can tell if it's bad. Don't be scared,
you're stunned that's all. It's cut, but it isn't bleeding much."
"I'm all right," Barnard said, trying to rise.
"Maybe you are," Tom said, "but safety first; lie still. Can you move
your arms? Does your back hurt?"
"I don't want any doctor," Barnard said.
"See if you can--no, lie still; see if you can wiggle your fingers. I
guess you're just cut, that's all. Here, let me put my handkerchief
around it. You got off lucky."
"You don't call _that_ lucky, do you?" Barnard asked. "My head aches
like blazes."
"Sure it does," said Tom, feeling his friend's pulse, "but you're all
right."
[Illustration: TOM HELPED BARNARD TO THEIR CABIN. Tom Slade at Black
Lake--Page 134]
"I got a good bang in the head," said Barnard; "I'll be all right," he
added, sitting up and gazing about him. "Case of look before you leap,
hey? Do you know what I did?"
"You stepped on the shadow instead of the log," Tom said. "I was going
to call to you, but I thought that as long as you're a scout you'd know
about that. It was on account of the fire--the way it was shining.
That's what they call a false ford----"
"Well, the next time I hope there'll be a Maxwell or a Packard there
instead," Barnard said in his funny way.
"A false ford is a shadow across a hollow place," Tom said. "You see
them mostly in the moonlight. Don't you remember how lots of fellows
were fooled like that, trying to cross trenches. The Germans could make
it look like a bridge where there wasn't any bridge--don't you
remember?"
"_Some_ engineers!" Barnard observed. "Ouch, but my head hurts! Going
down, hey? I don't like those shadow bridges; it's all a matter of
taste, I suppose. Oh boy, how my head aches!"
"If it was broken it wouldn't ache," said Tom consolingly, "or you
wouldn't know it if it did. Can you get up?"
"I can't go up as quick as I came down," Barnard said, sitting there and
holding his head in a way that made even sober Tom smile, "but I guess I
can manage it."
He arose and Tom helped him through the gully to where it petered out,
and so to their cabin. Barnard's ankle was strained somewhat, and he had
an ugly cut on his forehead, which Tom cleansed and bandaged, and it
being already late, the young man who had tried walking on a shadow
decided that he would turn in and try the remedy of sleep on his
throbbing head.
"Look here, Slady," he said, after he was settled for the night, "I've
got your number, you old grouch. I know what it means when you get an
idea in your old noddle, so please remember that I don't want any of
that bunch from down below up here, and I don't want any doctor. See?
You're not going to pull any of that stuff on me, are you? Just let me
get a night's sleep and I'll be all right. I'm not on exhibition. I
don't want anybody up here piking around just because I took a double
header into space. And I don't want any doctors from Leeds or Catskill
up here, either. Get me?"
"If you get to sleep all right and don't have any fever, you won't need
any doctor," Tom said; "and I won't go away till you're all right."
"You're as white as a snowstorm, Slady," his friend said. "I've had the
time of my life here with you alone. And I'm going to wind up with you
alone. No outsiders. Two's a company, three's a mob."
Something, he knew not what, impelled sober, impassive Tom to sit down
for a few moments on the edge of the bunk where his friend lay.
"Red Cross nurse and wounded doughboy, hey?" his friend observed in that
flippant manner which sometimes amused and sometimes annoyed Tom.
"I liked it, too, being here alone with you," Tom said, "even if it
hadn't been for you helping me a lot, I would have liked it. I like you
a whole lot. I knew I'd like you. I used to camp with Roy Blakeley up on
his lawn and it reminded me of that, being up here alone with you. After
I've gone, you'll mix up with the fellows down in the camp, but anyhow,
you'll remember how we were up here alone together, I bet. You bet I'll
remember that--I will."
Barnard reached out his hand from under the coverings and grasped Tom's
hand. "You're all there, Tommy," he said. "And you won't remember how I
got on your nerves, and how I tried walking on a shadow, and----"
Tom did not release his friend's hand, or perhaps it was Barnard who did
not release Tom's. At all events, they remained in that attitude, hands
clasped, for still a few moments more. "Only the _good_ things about me,
hey, Tommy boy?" his friend asked.
"I don't know any other kind of things," Tom said, "and if I heard any I
wouldn't believe them. I always said your scouts must think a lot of
you. I think you're different from other scoutmasters. You can _make_
people like you, that's sure."
"Sure, eh?"
"It's sure with _me_ anyway," Tom said.
"Resolution, determination, friendship--all _sure_ with _you_. Hey,
Tommy boy? Because you're built out of _rocks_. Bridges, they may be
nothing but shadows, hey? According to you, you can't depend on half of
them. I wonder if it's that way with friendships, huh?"
"It ain't with mine," Tom said simply.
And still Barnard clung to Tom's hand. "Maybe we'll test it some day,
Slady old boy."
"There's no use testing a thing that's sure," Tom said.
"Yes?"
And still Barnard did not release his hand.'
"It's funny you didn't know about false fords," Tom said.