A PROWLER IN THE NIGHT
An event for which the boys had long been waiting now came, after some
confusion, to pass. Several requests had been made for something to eat
but Ted turned a deaf ear to it until the camp had been put in shape.
The noon meal had been a sandwich affair and now the hungry stomachs
were demanding something solid. Ted gave orders for the meal.
He and Buck took care of the cooking for that one meal and they had
a big job on their hands. The two fires were used to cook beans and
soup and warm up coffee and before long the fragrant smell of the food
floated through the woods around them. Impatiently the boys awaited
their meal.
“Seems like I never was so hungry before!” sighed Drummer, gazing at
the big pot of cooking beans with wistful eyes.
“You drummed up a good appetite this afternoon, didn’t you?” someone
asked, and the stout boy nodded.
They used a flat stump to cut the bread on and for a general table,
finding that its location to the fires made it a handy natural object.
Buck organized a number of the boys to go and bring pails of water so
that they could be put on the fire as soon as the food was off, to heat
for dish water.
“Do we have to wash dishes here?” was an innocent inquiry.
“Well, I want mine washed,” grinned Buck. “If you want to eat from
yours without washing, why, go right ahead!”
“Who is going to wash them, Mr. Dalton?” a boy asked.
“We’ll have a volunteer gang tonight,” responded Buck, seeing to it
that each boy had a pail. “After that, we’ll have regular squads to do
the work. Go to it, boys.”
Ted had found that the supply truck was well filled and figuring even
recklessly he was of the opinion that they would not soon have to renew
their main supplies, though things such as butter and eggs and milk
would have to be taken care of from day to day. Much care and thought
had been taken by the leaders of the Boys’ Club in the selection of
the goods, and Ted was pleased.
At length the supper was cooked, the beans lifted from the fire and the
coffee pushed back to keep warm. “Come and get it!” called Buck, and
they obeyed loyally and enthusiastically. Forming in a line they pushed
their cups and plates toward Buck and Ted and for some minutes the two
leaders were busy dishing and pouring. Within the circle of the fires
the boys sat around, most of them silent as they applied themselves to
the subject at hand.
“Golly, nothing ever seemed so good at home!” declared Drummer,
munching contentedly.
“I don’t think so much of beans,” struck in Ralph Plum. “I wouldn’t eat
’em home!”
“You aren’t home,” was Drummer’s retort. “What do you eat them here
for?”
“There isn’t anything else, is there?” retorted Plum.
“I guess not,” replied Drummer. “Any time you don’t want your beans you
just let me know, Ralph.”
The little fellow, Tom Clayton, sat close beside Ted as they ate and
Ted smiled down into his serious face. “How are you enjoying it, Tom?”
“Great!” was the answer. “I’m glad I could come along, Mr. Thorn!”
“So am I,” agreed Ted. “We’ll have a lot of fun out of this camping
trip. You won’t get homesick, will you?”
“No, I guess not,” was the slow answer. “I’ve only been away from home
once before this, but I guess I won’t be homesick. Anyway, if I do, I
won’t let these fellows see it, because they’ll kid me about it!”
“That’s the spirit!” approved Buck.
After the meal was over came the task which was not welcomed any too
cheerfully. A multitude of greasy tin plates and cups lay piled up near
the creek and the pails of water were ready. Ted asked for volunteers,
and a few of the boys helped the two leaders do the washing and drying.
Most of the boys were content to lie around and chatter. When the
camp work was finished they all gathered around the fires while Ted
addressed them.
“Now, fellows,” he began, when he had claimed their attention. “Tonight
is rather an informal time and we’re just getting acquainted. Tomorrow
we’ll settle down to real business. Up to now I don’t even know the
names of all of you, but I’ll get on to them pretty quickly. In order
to get the best results out of our encampment we’ll have to have good
discipline and willing workers. For instance, we’ll have to have a
wood-gathering committee, a fire committee, a cooking committee, a
water committee, and a dishwashing committee. Some of these committees
won’t be as popular as others, I know, but we won’t be on the same
committees all of the time. Frequent changes will give us all a chance
to work at something different. Buck and I will take our share of the
work along with the rest of you.”
“That makes me think of something else. Some of you are calling me Mr.
Thorn and calling Buck, Mr. Dalton. That’s very nice, but we want to be
all fellows here together and so we are just plain Ted and Buck to you.
We’ll all work together and have a good time. Now about the tents: we
have four of them and that means that there will be five in a tent. We
have plenty of room, and Buck will sleep in one of the tents and I in
another. For the other two tents I’ll appoint a captain and he is to
be in complete charge of that tent. To him you will make any complaint
or suggestion and he can take it up with me. We’ll want to go to bed
early at night so that we’ll get plenty of good sleep. We’ll be up
early in the mornings.”
“Why didn’t we put the tents up in between the trees?” a boy asked.
“Because there will be such things while we are here as thunder
storms,” smiled Ted. “And if we do have them we want to be out in the
open and not under a tree which might be struck by lightning and fall
over!”
This was a thought which had not as yet struck any of them and for a
moment there was complete silence. They were all young boys and the
woods experience was new to them. Thunder storms had been witnessed by
most of them from a secure house or a comfortable bed and the thought
that they would now be almost exposed to the elements was somewhat
staggering. They looked around and up into the blackness of the
crouching mountains.
“Gee, it does get some dark up here, doesn’t it?” inquired one boy, in
an awe-struck voice.
The circle of light from the fires was not a large one and the
blackness around them seemed an immensity which held untold things
mysteriously unpleasant. Buck laughed to reassure them.
“Yes, they don’t have any street lights up here,” he said. “The animals
like dark nights!”
“Animals!” cried another boy. “Are there any animals up here? Do they
call the water Bear Creek on purpose!”
“I don’t know,” said Ted. “Some day we’ll look up the animals and see
if any of them live around here.”
The talk was resumed and under cover of it Buck and Ted conferred. “You
think I had better sleep in another tent than the one you are going to
have?” Buck asked.
“I think so,” nodded Ted. “You take the one on that end and I’ll take
the one at this end. We’ll put the smaller fellows in the two middle
tents and that will reassure them a little more.”
“Do you think they are going to be scared?”
“No, not when they get used to the camp, but you see they didn’t have
much in the way of daylight today while here and the night seems so
black. Probably a lot of them won’t sleep and it will seem an age
before the sun comes up tomorrow.” He glanced at his watch. “I guess we
had better turn in now.”
The word to this effect was passed around and the boys were not
reluctant to turn in. Ted told off Bob Gilmore as the captain of one
tent and Charlie Wells as leader of the other one.
“Each one of you will undress by the light of a single lantern which
will be hung from the pole of the tent,” he directed. “As soon as the
last man is in bed the captain of that tent will personally put out the
light. No loud talking after you are in your beds, in fact, none at all
would be better, because you’ll keep somebody else awake. Now go to it.”
The fires burned low and the four tents glowed with a subdued light
as the boys all prepared for bed. In the tent with Ted was little Tom
Clayton and three other fine young fellows and they were speedily in
their beds which they had built from boughs and packed leaves. Ted had
purposely placed the bed of the small boy beside his own. They were
all in under their blankets when he put out the light and crawled in
between his own.
The talking in the other tents died down as the lights were
extinguished. That some of the boys were restless was attested to by
the rustling turnings in their beds. One boy had gathered his boughs
with too much wood attached to the smaller branches and they made
him so uneasy and uncomfortable that he was compelled to throw most
of it out and sleep closer to the canvas covering that served as a
tent floor. Some deep breathing announced that a few boys had fallen
instantly asleep, tired out with the events of the day.
There was no talking on the part of the boys in Ted’s tent, inspired
probably by his presence and the little boy at least did not remain
awake long. Ted’s eyes began to close and the last sounds and
impressions were somewhat dim. The fire snapped once or twice, the
wind blew with a very faint rustle of leaves, and a katydid started
his endless fiddling, being joined by several others who tried to
out-fiddle him. Then Ted went to sleep.
He slept on for what seemed to be some hours and then a light struck
quickly and fleetingly across his eyes. The flap of the tent was
half open and he could look out, but there was no repetition of the
incident. He was puzzled and sat up.
“Was that from the fires?” he wondered, poking his head out of the tent
and glancing towards the two fireplaces.
It was not. Both fires had gone out and not a single spark glowed to
show even where they had been. But there was no question in his mind
as to whether there had been a light, for the thing had been very
definite. He stepped out of the tent, unmindful of the cool, damp earth
under his bare feet, and stood there in his pajamas, looking keenly
around.
A wandering beam of light came from around the last tent, the tent in
which Buck was sleeping, and Ted frowned. “Now, who the dickens can be
prowling around with a lantern?” he wondered, starting forward. “I’m
going to find out.”