THE RETURN OF THE EIGHTH SCOUT.
"HE'S gone!" exclaimed Bumpus; and it would have been hard to tell
whether relief or regret lay back of his words; for some of the boys,
forgetting the peril that might hang over the head of Bob White, did the
moonshiner know of his presence, and his mission to the Blue Ridge, only
considered the entertainment afforded by having Old Phin at their fire.
"And I guess the old feller's got enough information in his head to last
him a long spell," remarked Giraffe.
"Say, p'raps he's seriously considerin' starting a troop of Boy Scouts
here in the Blue Ridge country," suggested Step Hen, who sometimes did
have brilliant ideas flash through his brain.
There was considerable of a laugh at this proposition, which struck the
boys as about as absurd as anything they had heard for a long time.
"Wonder how our real scoutmaster, Dr. Philander Hobbs'd like to take the
job?" chuckled Davy Jones. "He thought he had trouble enough on his
hands when he ran up against a few hard cases, like Giraffe and Step Hen
here; but they'd be just pie alongside the strappin' mountain kids we've
seen."
"Well," remarked Thad, "you never can tell what might happen. Even those
boys have got something in them that can be brought out, if only one
knows how to go about it. Don't you forget, fellows, that some of the
greatest men this country has ever known, were born among the mountains.
And right now there may be a future president of the United States
within ten miles of where we sit."
"Hear! hear!" cried Step Hen, pretending to clap his hands in applause.
"Huh! nearer than that, mebbe," declared Bumpus, mysteriously swelling
out his chest and looking every inch the hero; "how would the name of
Cornelius Jasper Hawtree sound to you? We've never had a President
Hawtree; but that ain't no reason we never will, is it? Tell me that."
"Give it up," sang out Davy Jones.
"Anyhow, it'd sound more distinguished than plain Jones," retorted
Bumpus.
"My name isn't Plain Jones, it's David Alexander Constantine Josephus,
and a few more that, to tell the honest truth; I've forgot," the other
went on.
Thad and Allan drew apart from all this mimic warfare, in which the
fun-loving scouts liked to indulge from time to time.
"Then you did talk with Bob?" asked the former, with some show of
eagerness in his voice.
"Yes," replied Allan, "it was great fun too. Waited a little while
before I could get the first answer to all my waving; but in the end I
saw a flash, like a match had been struck, and then we got in touch."
"What did Bob have to tell?" asked the patrol leader.
"He met his little cousin, all right, just as they had arranged," Allan
went on to say. "And she must have told him something that has made our
chum wild with delight, for he says the trip paid him twenty times over.
Just what it was he didn't try to tell me, saying it would have to keep
till he got to camp."
"Well, we can give a pretty good guess what it must be," Thad observed.
"You mean that Bertha has looked, and made a discovery among the papers
in her guardian's safe; is that it, Thad?"
"Just about; but we'll have to quit guessing, and just wait till he
comes in," said the scoutmaster, who knew just how to take a grip upon
himself, and appear patient, where some of the other boys would have
fretted, and worried greatly.
"He oughtn't to be more'n an hour, at the most," suggested Allan.
"Not unless something happens to him, which we hope it won't," replied
Thad.
"You don't think now, do you," demanded the other, "that Old Phin might
take a notion to waylay him, just to have a look at the eighth scout?"
"I've thought of that, but made up my mind that so far the moonshiner
can have no suspicion who Bob is. And that being the case, Allan, you
can see he wouldn't be apt to bother himself to lie in wait for him. I
hope not, anyhow. It'd sure upset some of the plans we're trying so hard
to fix. And it might spell trouble with a big T for Bob."
"He's a good fellow, all right," remarked Allan, not in the least
jealous because his particular chum seemed drawn more than ever toward
the Southern boy.
"That's right," answered Thad, quickly; "and we've just got to stand
back of him, no matter what happens. I guess that if some of the boys'
parents had had even half a suspicion that we'd run up against such a
combination as this, they wouldn't have given their consent so easily to
our coming!"
"I suppose that would have been the case with Bumpus and several
others," the Maine boy went on; "but I've seen so much of this sort of
thing up in the pine wood that it isn't new to me. Not that it doesn't
give me a thrill, all right, whenever I think of what we're doing here,
and how we had that man sitting at our fire, the worst moonshiner of the
whole Blue Ridge, I guess. And Thad, you did give him a treat, the way
you talked. I could see that he took considerable stock in all you said.
And you opened his eyes some, believe me, with all the wonderful things
you reeled off."
"Wonderful to him, Allan, but the plain every day truth to the rest of
us. But I've always heard that there is a spark of good even in the
worst man living; and perhaps his weakness for boys may be the soft spot
in Old Phin Dady, the moonshiner's heart."
They presently went back to the others, and joined in the general
conversation, which, quite naturally enough, was pretty much confined to
the visit of the mountaineer, what he had spoken about, his suspicions,
and above all the strange interest he had taken in Thad's account of
the Boy Scout movement.
"Hello! there!" said a voice; and they saw Bob White stalk into camp.
One look at the face of the Southern boy told Thad that he had indeed
made a profitable trip, for he saw a smile there, such as had seldom
marked it in the past.
They quickly made room for him by the fire; while several of the boys
scouted around, to make sure that no spies lurked in the undergrowth,
listening to all that was said.
The fire crackled merrily, and looked very cheerful, as the ring of
faces turned inquiringly toward Bob White. He knew they were anxious to
hear what he had accomplished; and, as there were no longer any secrets
to be kept from the balance of the patrol, all having been taken into
his confidence, the Southern boy hesitated no longer.
"I found no trouble getting across the valley," he began; "though once I
had to lie low, when two men passed by. From what I heard them say, I
knew they were some of the moonshiners, and that they had been ordered
to take up positions somewhere, and stand guard. They seemed to be all
at sea about the nature of the danger, and yet when Old Phin gave the
alarm, they knew what they had to do."
"We ought to tell you in the start, Bob," said Thad, "that we had Phin
Dady sitting right where you are now; and that he stayed more than a
full hour in camp."
"Yes," broke in Bumpus, "and filling up on the stuff Thad gave him, all
about the heaps of things Boy Scouts are supposed to do. He liked it,
too, sure as you live, Old Phin did; and we reckon he's got a sneakin'
notion of startin' a troop right here, some fine day."
Bob White appeared to be astonished, and demanded to hear the whole
story before he went on with his own experiences. This was presently
told, and the one who had been absent at the time looked thoughtful when
he heard the conclusion.
"It may work for good, who knows?" he remarked, as though speaking to
himself. "He's a strange man, is Old Phin; a hard case in most ways; but
p'raps now he has got a soft spot in his flinty old heart for boys. He's
a daughter of his own but no sons. And that kind of men generally take
to boys best."
"If they do, it's because they don't know what boys are like," suggested
Bumpus.
"Now go on and tell us what you did," observed Thad. "Was your cousin at
the place you told her about?"
"Yes, it was a little arbor in the garden that I knew well," remarked
Bob, tenderly. "She was right glad to see me again, suh; and while she
wouldn't tell me all I wanted to know, I'm mighty sure Reuben Sparks is
cruel to her. She has been anything but happy; and always dreamin' of
the time when I'd come back to see her, and take her to my mother."
"Did she do what you asked her?" asked Thad, seeing that Bob was apt to
lose the thread of his narrative in letting his thoughts stray back to
his meeting with little Bertha, whom he loved like a sister.
"She did, suh, took a chance to peep through some of the papers in the
safe of Mistah Sparks; and believe me, she gave me a shock when she said
there was one hidden in a little compartment, that seemed to have been
signed by her own father. I asked her some more questions, and I'm
almost sure that it's a will which Reuben Sparks kept hidden away, but
which something or other has prevented him from destroying these four
years and more, since my uncle died."
"If you only could get that in your hands, and it turned out to be all
you think, seems to me you might do about what you wanted with old
Reuben," Thad remarked.
"Given another day, and good luck, suh, and I surely expect to have the
same in my possession. Then I can shape my plans; but one thing sure, my
cousin will go back to Cranford with me!" and Bob smote the palm of his
left hand with his doubled right fist, to emphasize his remark.
No one seemed a particle sleepy. Indeed, they had never been more wide
awake in their lives. Even Davy Jones, filled with the spirit of
mischief that seemed to take possession of him every once in so often,
climbed the tree under which they had built their camp-fire, and swung
himself from limb to limb; now with his hands but just as frequently by
his toes; as though he wanted to prove the truth of what that learned
professor by the name of Darwin always declared, that we were descended
from a race of monkeys.
The rest were lying around in the most comfortable attitudes they could
find.
"Oh! say, come down out of that, Davy; you make me tired with your
everlasting pranks. Take a drop, won't you, please?" called out Bumpus.
Hardly had he spoken than there was a whoop, and Davy landed squarely in
the middle of the now smouldering fire, sending the brands to the right
and to the left in a hurricane of sparks.
The seven scouts threw themselves backward to avoid contact with the
scattered red embers, while Davy scrambled out of his fiery bed with
furious alacrity.