MARSHAL WALTER MAKES A CAPTURE AT LAST
As the significance of Tony Cooper’s words slowly dawned on the
resentful Boy Scouts a silence fell on the Wolf Patrol. The members
realized that a boyish escapade had turned into a criminal offense. And
the thing that set the scouts thinking was the knowledge that they had
often approached that line themselves. The thought of being called as
witnesses to send another boy to the penitentiary sent a chill to the
heart of every Elm Streeter.
“I don’t know as I could be absolutely sure about who was in the
wagon――” began Connie.
“But you know Carrots was one of ’em,” remarked Art dolefully.
“Yes,” argued Abercrombie, “but he wasn’t arrested for breakin’ into
the camp. None of us saw him take the horse an’ wagon.”
“But Connie said he did,” exclaimed Colly Craighead regretfully.
“I kind o’ think I did,” said Connie. “But it was awful dark an’ I
wasn’t very clost.”
“I reckon it won’t be up to us,” added Art. “Tony said they found the
horse an’ wagon at Hank’s home. What can they say to that? It looks bad
for some one, I tell you.”
When the boys reached Connie’s home they found Mr. Trevor and Mr.
Conyers on the porch. Ranks were broken and all hastened forward to
learn exact details. When Connie had repeated his account of the
midnight raid and what he had seen, he was far from being positive
about the identity of the boys. Mr. Addington had at once put the case
in the hands of Marshal Walter and he, after a canvass of several
families and the finding of the stolen vehicle and horse, had made the
six arrests.
“They’re now where they have belonged for several years,” Mr.
Conyers declared, “safe under lock and key. Monday morning they’ll
have a hearing before the mayor and he’ll hold them under bonds for
examination by the grand jury when it meets in the fall. Then they’ll
all be sent back to jail to be tried by the courts for horse stealing.
It looks to me as if they’d get a few years in the penitentiary or
reform school at least.”
“And will they be in jail till the trial comes off?” asked Connie
anxiously.
“Unless they give bonds,” answered his father. “And those’ll likely be
so high that no one will give them.”
“How’ll they know, for sure, that the boys done it?” went on the
agitated Connie.
“Aren’t you boys witnesses?” laughed Mr. Conyers.
“I might ’a’ been mistaken,” faltered Connie.
“Hardly,” replied Mr. Conyers. “I think the mayor’ll believe you.”
When the boys finally dispersed to their homes Mr. Trevor remained in
talk with Mr. Conyers for nearly half an hour. When Art reached home
he was so happy to hear that the sick boy had been making steady gains
that he almost forgot the tragical ending of their two days of camping.
On Sunday morning word was passed that Bonner was to sit up for a few
minutes. About nine o’clock Art was permitted to visit the invalid.
From his nurse Bonner had learned all about the boys, both as young
aviators and as Boy Scouts; each boy’s name, age and character; the
trouble at the old sycamore, the episode of the “treasure keg” and the
clash at the camp on Bluff Creek. When Art appeared, it was as if two
life-long chums had come together.
The two boys naturally fell into talk of that closest to the heart of
each――the wrecked aeroplane. With tears, Bonner told what it meant to
him. With the wrecked aeroplane on his hands he saw no way to meet his
payments for it.
“Don’t tell anybody,” whispered Art, “but I don’t think it’s ruined.
I’ve been to see it! I don’t think the engine is hurt.”
“But I haven’t a cent,” answered Bonner in a weak voice. “And there’s
all these doctor’s bills and the nurse――”
“But you’re goin’ to be our chauffeur and live with us,” protested Art.
“Father said so. You can save all your wages. An’ we’ll all help!”
The young aviator, very white in the face, turned his head to the wall.
“Now that’s all right, Bill,” went on Art, choking a little himself.
“Father wants you――we ain’t got no chauffeur an’ we need one. You’re
goin’ to stay long as you like. The folks say you ain’t got no folks
where you lived. So what’s the difference? This is a bully town even
if it ain’t no city. You’ll be well an’ out in a few days, an’ then
you’re a-goin’ right to work for us an’ I reckon that’ll mean forty or
fifty dollars a month an’ board an’ keep. An’ when you ain’t busy with
the automobile we’ll all turn in and help fix your aeroplane. An’ while
that’s goin’ on,” concluded Art with a new and happy idea, “you’ll join
the Wolf Patrol an’ be a Boy Scout with all of us. What’s the matter
with that, Bill?”
At last the sick boy turned and asked the nurse if he might try to sit
up for a few minutes.
“Yes,” she answered, “but Arthur will have to go now.”
“I wanted to see all the boys,” exclaimed Bonner weakly.
“Not to-day,” insisted the nurse. “You’ve talked long enough.”
“Is he goin’ to sit up a little while?” broke in Art as he saw the look
of disappointment on the patient’s face. When the nurse nodded, he
added, “Then you let him sit over there by the window. An’ wait till I
call you, won’t you?”
A half hour later ten of the Boy Scouts were gathered at the Trevor
home in full uniform. Ordering them to fall into line, Leader Connie
marched the squad to the guest-room side of the house. At the words,
“Column front――squad halt!” a chair was wheeled to the open window, and
for the first time Willie Bonner saw the boys who were soon to become
his chums. And the scouts in turn had their first good look at the boy
whose skill and daring was to mean so much to them. There were only
embarrassed smiles and nods on the part of each, a formal salute from
the scouts and a weak “Thank you, boys,” from the invalid, and the
nurse wheeled his chair away.
A little later the entire company of scouts sought out Mr. Trevor on
his front porch. Connie was spokesman.
“Mr. Trevor,” began the young leader, “I’ve been talkin’ to father, and
he told me we’d have to see you. We want to ask something.”
“Go ahead,” answered Mr. Trevor.
“We don’t like to see them kids locked up in the calaboose, an’ we hope
they won’t have to go to jail!” began Connie.
“Haven’t they violated the law?” asked Mr. Trevor.
“Mebbe they have,” replied Connie. “But so did we the day we went over
there lookin’ for a fight. An’ I reckon that when Sammy Addington hit
Nick Apthorp with a rock he could ’a’ been arrested for assault an’
battery. An’ we was all violatin’ the peace. They was goin’ to lock us
up, too, only you got us off.”
“An’ we want you to get ’em off,” broke in Art. “Bygones is bygones!”
Mr. Trevor’s previous smile disappeared as he looked carefully at each
boy. “But,” he answered at last, “you know why I did that. You bought
yourselves out of trouble by reforming, as it were. But these boys may
not be penitent. It may save them from something worse.”
“But mebbe they’re scared, too, now, like we was,” suggested Ware.
“Mr. Trevor!” exclaimed Connie with sudden animation, “do you know
what! Hank Milleson and Nick Apthorp are stuck on Boy Scoutin’ worse
than we are, only they pertend they ain’t. They both got books about
it. I’ll bet they’d turn Boy Scouts quick as a wink if you could get
’em out of this scrape.”
Neither Connie nor his chums knew the sudden joy that filled Mr.
Trevor’s breast at this little speech. Whatever his own Boy Scouts had
felt or done since he organized them, this was proof to the interested
man that his work had already borne fruit.
“What if they did?” he continued, scrutinizing each lad before him.
“They’d be your rivals more than ever. These boys are older, bigger and
more experienced in all things. If they went into this thing sincerely
you boys might be put in the shade.”
“That’s all right,” exclaimed Connie. “We’d stand for that if they did
it fair and square.”
“Do it, father,” pleaded Art. “You do what you can! I wish they’d
organize. It’s no fun with just one patrol.”
“They got a name already,” chimed Sammy Addington.
“What’s that?” asked Mr. Trevor.
“The ‘Coyotes,’” answered Sammy. “But I bet you a wolf is as good as a
coyote any day.”
“Remember,” continued Mr. Trevor soberly, “you can get your revenge
now. You could punish those boys for their mock parade and their beer
keg trick and for stealing your flag.”
“That’s all right,” exclaimed Art. “I guess they’ve been punished
enough. I’d rather fight ’em if they’re Boy Scouts an’ stickin’ to the
rules, than see ’em locked up in jail. Besides, you got _us_ off. An’
it ain’t fair if you don’t do what you can for them.”
“Do you all feel that way, boys?” asked Mr. Trevor finally. There was
a murmur indicating unanimous approval. “Then,” he added, “I’ll see
what I can do. If you boys don’t prosecute perhaps the matter will be
dropped.”
Late that afternoon, unknown to the boys, Mr. Trevor rode to the home
of Mr. Conyers, and the two men visited the mayor of Scottsville. In
truth, the Goosetowners had long been a thorn in the mayor’s official
side. But when Mr. Trevor had explained his mission there was no
trouble in arranging a program of action. The three men drove to the
mayor’s office, Marshal Walter was summoned, and Hank Milleson, Nick
Apthorp and their four fellow prisoners were escorted into the presence
of the three leading citizens.
As if about to pass sentence upon the six shivering prisoners for
some capital crime, the town official reviewed their offense. He
added a homily on the results of truancy and idleness, predicted the
penitentiary if the prisoners persisted in their present manner of life
and then turned the sniffling boys over to Mr. Trevor.
The latter was far milder in his speech but equally emphatic. When he
reached the point where, to the complete surprise of the boys, he told
them there yet remained one chance of escape, he paused. Nick Apthorp,
who was easily the least affected of the gang, spoke up:
“What you’re a-sayin’, Mr. Trevor, is mostly all right but it ain’t
quite a square deal for Hank――”
“That’ll be about all that guff,” broke in Hank. “Don’t get soft, Nick.”
“I’ll get soft enough to tell the gentlemen here that we’re tough
enough――all of us――but we’d been tougher if it hadn’t been fur
Milleson. Your boys all put Hank down fur leadin’ us into trouble. But
it ain’t so. If they’d listened to him when he met ’em on the railroad
bridge they wouldn’t been no fight. When we paraded in front o’ the
boys he didn’t want to do it but we egged him on an’ then we all had to
promise we wouldn’t start nothin’. An’ down there on Round Rock River
where we set the dead pup in the beer keg, that was all my doin’s.
Hank didn’t even go with us but argued it was a joke that turned his
stummick. We did take the horse an’ wagon but I reckon they wasn’t one
of us who done it cause we were a-goin’ to keep ’em.”
“I was there all right,” broke in Hank. “I was in the game.”
“An’ at that,” went on Nick, “he kicked again’ goin’. But, Mr. Trevor,
when it comes down to arrestin’ them as really is responsible, they
ain’t no cause to lock Hank up. He wasn’t responsible fur what he done.”
“Why not?” asked the mayor.
“’Cause he was drunk,” confessed Nick with unflinching lips. “You
give Hank half a chanct an’ he’d be worth all the rest o’ us rolled
together.”
“Mr. Mayor,” exclaimed Hank at once, his face flushed. “I did have too
much beer but I knowed what I was a-doin’. I could have stopped the
whole thing but I didn’t. Don’t you mind this hot air. I’m the oldest
in the gang; I helped drive the horse away; I’m most to blame.”
“Well,” commented Mr. Trevor after a pause, “you see what you’re up
against. What’ll you do to get out of this trouble?”
“Anything I can do,” answered Hank. “An’ I reckon the others’ll do the
same.”
“Are you ready to be respectable?”
“You mean quit loafin’ an’ go to work?”
“Yes――both.”
“I can’t get no job. None of us can. The factories don’t want us.”
“Will you go to work if I see that you get work?”
“Yes, sir,” exclaimed Hank, “an’ I’ll cut out the pool rooms an’ beer
saloons, too.”
“All of you?” asked Mr. Trevor sweeping a glance over the other five.
“It’s your only chance,” explained the mayor sternly.
“Yes, sir,” came from five hopeful but yet alarmed boys.
“So far, so good,” went on Mr. Trevor. “Your trouble isn’t wholly
because you haven’t been working or in school. It’s because you haven’t
had better ways of amusing yourselves when you’re not busy. I’ll see
that everybody here has a chance to begin work. I’m also going to see
that you are given a chance at decent, helpful play. Hank,” he said,
turning to the Goosetown gang leader, “what do you think of the Boy
Scout idea?”
“Seems all right fur them as kin afford it.”
“Will you also promise to organize your friends into a Boy Scout
patrol?”
“Me? Us?” exploded Hank.
“It isn’t altogether a matter of choice,” went on Mr. Trevor. “I’ve
found the principles of the Boy Scouts have already helped our sons.
The Wolf Patrol in a body has asked us to intercede for you boys. We
have done so and you won’t be prosecuted, on this second condition: you
must organize and keep up honestly a patrol of your own.”
“We ain’t got no money to buy all them clothes an’ hats,” exclaimed
Nick Apthorp. “Besides, Art and Alex Conyers’ll guy us.”
“Perhaps,” commented Mr. Trevor. “I believe you did that to them.”
“If you boys mean business,” broke in Mr. Conyers for the first time,
“and try to make something out of yourselves, I’ll see that you get
uniforms. I’m tired of your deviltry.”
The rough nature of the boys did not permit a gracious response but
when the three men left the young offenders the answer of every boy was
shining in his eyes.