is Sound Health Again, and Tom Rejoices
They got to Chicago the day before Christmas, and had time to go
shopping for presents. Tom sneaked off by himself, and returned with a
mysterious parcel, which Joe imagined was for him. Twenty-five hours
later, they were getting out of the train at Southmead, into the arms of
their parents and brothers and sisters, and amid the cheers of the
assembled scouts.
"Well, you are certainly a hard looking pair!" Mr. Rogers laughed. "And
hard feeling, too," he added, poking Joe's legs and arms. "What do you
weigh, Joe?"
"I weighed a hundred and fifty-nine in Chicago," Joe answered.
The next two days both boys spent telling everybody the tales of their
adventures, and Mr. Rogers took Joe up to Dr. Meyer again, who thumped
him and listened at him as before, weighed him and tested him, and then,
with a smile, declared he was as fit as a fiddle.
"And mind you live outdoors till you're twenty-one, and keep so!" he
added. "And then go on living outdoors if you can, till you're a hundred
and one. It's the only way to live, anyhow. I haven't been out for a
week, and I know!"
"Take that news home to your mother as a Christmas present, Joe," said
Mr. Rogers.
Then he turned to Tom. "And you, Tom, gave the present of health to Joe.
How do you like giving instead of receiving?"
"Giving? Giving nothing!" Tom exclaimed. "Don't you make any mistake. I
received more pleasure seeing old Joey get fat and strong than I'll ever
give anybody!"
"That's what I like to hear a scout say," Mr. Rogers smiled, putting an
arm over each boy's shoulder, and hanging his weight on them, to feel
how sturdy they were. Neither flinched an inch, but stood up like
hickory posts.
Joe's Christmas present from Tom--the mysterious bundle he bought in
Chicago--was a developing tank and all the chemicals. Joe also received
from Lucy Elkins, on Christmas day, a beautiful enlargement of a view of
Gunsight Lake and Mount Jackson, to hang in his room. For the next few
days he and Tom toiled over the tank, developing their endless rolls of
film, and then, when these were printed, they gave an exhibition at the
scout house.
But it was several days before they went into the woods.
"Gee, it's too much like a prairie 'round here," Tom said, casting a
contemplative glance at their eighteen-hundred-foot mountain.
Finally, however, just before school commenced, they put on snow-shoes,
and tramped over a mean little eight inches of snow to the top of their
highest hill, out on a ledge above the trees. Southmead lay below them,
with all its roofs and steeples gathered in the snowy fields like a herd
of cattle. The woods were still.
"It's not the Rockies," said Tom, "but it's pretty nice at that, and
we'll get out the old rope on this baby cliff in the spring."
"It's home," said Joe, "and I'm well again, and can go to school, and
help mother, and study for the forestry service with you, and--and--oh,
Spider, you're the best friend a fellow ever had!"
"No," Tom answered, "you've got the wrong dope. I've got the best friend
to be a friend to a fellow ever had. Anyhow, Joey, we've given old man
tuberculosis the knock out, and had a grand old time doing it. Let's see
if we can start a snowslide here."
But the snow stuck in a huckleberry bush six feet down.
"I guess it's old Caesar and geometry for us," Tom sighed, "till we beat
it for the Rockies for good and all."
"Geometry's not so exciting," Joe laughed, "but I suppose we've got to
have it."