Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this
file which includes the original illustrations.
See 42077-h.htm or 42077-h.zip:
(https://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/42077/pg42077-images.html)
or
(https://www.gutenberg.org/files/42077/42077-h.zip)
THE BOY SCOUTS AT THE PANAMA CANAL
by
LIEUT. HOWARD PAYSON
Author of
"The Boy Scouts of the Eagle Patrol,"
"The Boy Scouts on the Range,"
"The Boy Scouts and the Army Airship,"
"The Boy Scouts' Mountain Camp,"
"The Boy Scouts for Uncle Sam," etc.
A. L. BURT COMPANY
Publishers New York
Printed in U. S. A.
Copyright, 1913
by
Hurst & Company
Made in U. S. A.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. Boy Scouts to the Rescue 5
II. An Angry Farmer 16
III. On a Mission 27
IV. Some Up-to-date Advertising 35
V. A Big Surprise 43
VI. Baseball 53
VII. A Test for the Eagles 66
VIII. Skill vs. Muscle 85
IX. Fire! 91
X. A Scout Hero 100
XI. The Fire Test 113
XII. In Peril of His Life 122
XIII. The Enemy's Move 131
XIV. A Novel Proposal 148
XV. Off for the Isthmus 156
XVI. Something about the Canal 167
XVII. At Old Panama 181
XVIII. Between Earth and Sky 191
XIX. The Gatun Dam 200
XX. A Dynamite Volcano 209
XXI. "Run for Your Lives!" 217
XXII. The Boys Meet an Old Acquaintance 223
XXIII. Along the Chagres 232
XXIV. The Trackless Jungle 241
XXV. A Chapter of Accidents 257
XXVI. The Ruined City 270
XXVII. "Be Prepared" 284
The Boy Scouts at the
Panama Canal
CHAPTER I.
BOY SCOUTS TO THE RESCUE.
Farmer Hiram Applegate had just finished breakfast. For this reason,
perhaps, he felt exceptionally good-humored. Even the news he had read in
his morning paper (of the day before) to the effect that his pet
abomination and aversion, The Boy Scouts, had held a successful and
popular review in New York and received personal commendation from the
President failed to shake his equanimity.
Outside the farmhouse the spring sun shone bright and warm. The air was
crisp, and odorous with the scent of apple blossoms. Robins twittered
cheerily, hens clucked and now and then a blue bird flashed among the
orchard trees.
As Hiram stepped out on his "vendetta," as he called his verandah--or, to
use the old-fashioned word and the better one, "porch"--he was joined by
a rather heavy-set youth with small, shifty eyes and a sallow skin which
gave the impression of languishing for soap and water. A suit of loud
pattern, new yellow boots with "nobby" toes, and a gaudy necktie did not
add to young Jared Applegate's general appearance.
"Pop," he began, after a glance at the old man's crabbed and wrinkled
features, just then aglow with self-satisfaction, "Pop, how about that
money I spoke about?"
Old Applegate stared at his offspring from under his heavy, iron-gray
brows.
"A fine time to be askin' fer money!" he snorted indignantly, "you just
back frum Panamy--under a cloud, too, and yet you start a pesterin' me
fer money as ef it grew on trees."
"What d'ye want it fer, hey?" he went on after a pause. "More Bye Scut
nonsense?"
Jared shook his head as if denying some discreditable imputation.
"I've had nothing to do with the Boy Scouts since the day I was kicked
out of--that is, since I left the Black Wolf troop in New York."
"Dum glad of it, though you never tole me what you quit for," muttered
the old man.
"But to get back to that money," said Jared; "as I told you when I got
back from the Isthmus, I need it. Need it bad, too, or I wouldn't ask
you."
"Makes no diff'rence. What d'ye want it fer,--hey?" he repeated, coming
back to his original question.
Jared decided that there was nothing for it but to tell the truth.
"To go over what I told you the other night once more, I'm in debt. Debts
I ran up on the Isthmus," was the rejoinder. "A chap can't live down
there for nothing you know, and--"
"By heck! You got a dern good salary as Mr. Mainwaring's sec'ty, didn't
yer, an' a chance ter learn engin-e-ring thrun in. You git fired fer
misbehavin' yerself an' then yer come down on the old man fer money. I
ain't goin' ter stand it, I ain't, and that's flat!"
The old man knocked the ashes out of his half-smoked pipe with
unnecessary violence. Jared, eying him askance, saw that his father was
working himself up into what Jared termed "a tantrum." Taking another
tack, he resumed.
"Sho, pop! It ain't as if you weren't going to get it back. And there'll
be interest at six per cent., too."
This was touching old Applegate on a tender point. If rumor in and about
Hampton spoke correctly, the old man had made most of his large fortune,
not so much by farming, but by running, at ruinous rates, a sort of
private bank.
"Wa'al," he said, his hard, rugged old face softening the least bit, "uv
course you've tole me all that; but what you h'aint tole me is, how yer a
goin' ter git ther money back,--an' the interest."
He looked cunningly at his son as he spoke. Jared hesitated an instant
before he replied. Then he said boldly enough:--
"I can't tell you just what the business enterprise is that I expect to
go into shortly. I'm--I'm under a sort of promise not to, you see. But if
everything goes right, I'll be worth a good round sum before long."
"Promises ain't security," retorted the old man warily. "I--Gee
Whitakers! Thar's that spotted hawg out agin!"
Across the dusty road the animal in question was passing as the farmer's
eyes fell on it. In the center of the track it paused and began rooting
about, grunting contentedly at its liberty.
At the same moment a humming sound, almost like the drone of a big bumble
bee, came out of the distance. As he heard the peculiar drone, a quick
glance of recognition flashed across old Applegate's face.
"It's that pesky Mainwaring gal an' her 'lectric auto!" he exploded
vehemently. "That makes the third time in ther last two weeks that Jake's
bin out when she come along. Ther fust time she knocked him over, ther
second time she knocked him over, an' now--"
A smart-looking little electric runabout, driven by a pretty young girl
in motoring costume, whizzed round the corner. The ill-fated Jake looked
up from his rooting as the car came dashing on. Possibly the recollection
of those other two narrow escapes was upon him. At any rate, with a
scared grunt and an angry squeal, he whisked his stump of a curly tail in
the air and dashed for the picket fence in front of the Applegate place.
But either Jake was too slow, or the electric was too fast. Just as the
girl gave the steering wheel of the auto a quick twist to avoid the pig,
one of the forewheels struck the luckless Jake "astern," as sailors would
say.
With an agonized wail Jake sailed through the air a few feet and then,
alighting on his feet, galloped off unhurt but squealing as if he had
been mortally injured.
"Goodness," exclaimed the girl alarmedly, and then, "gracious!"
The quick twist of the wheel had caused the car to give a jump and a skid
and land in the ditch, where it came to a standstill. Farmer Applegate,
rage tinting his face the color of a boiled beet, came storming down the
path.
"This is the time I got yer, hey?" he shouted at the alarmed occupant of
the auto. "That makes three times you run over Jake. You got away them
other times, but I got yer nailed now. Kaint git yer car out uv ther
ditch, hey? Wa'al, it'll stay thar till yer pay up."
"I'm--I'm dreadfully sorry," stammered the girl, "really I had no
intention of hurting--er--Jake. In fact, he doesn't seem to be hurt at
all."
There appeared to be good reason for such a supposition. Jake, at the
moment, was engaged in combat over a pile of corn fodder with several of
his fellows.
"Humph! Prob'ly hurt internal," grunted the farmer. "Anyhow, it's time
you bubblists was taught a lesson."
"Oh, of course I'm willing to pay," cried the girl, and out came a dainty
hand-bag. "Er--how much will satisfy Jake's--I mean your--feelings?"
The old farmer was quick to catch the note of amusement in the girl's
voice.
"You won't mend matters by bein' sassy," he growled; "besides, your pop
fired my boy down on the Isthmus an' I ain't feelin' none too good toward
yer."
"I have nothing to do with my father's affairs," said the girl coldly,
noting out of the corner of her eye Jared's figure slinking around the
side of the porch; "how much do you want to help me get my car out of the
ditch, for that's really what it amounts to, you know?"
Ignoring the quiet sarcasm in her voice, old Applegate's face took on its
crafty expression.
"Wa'al, it's three times now you've run over Jake. Say five dollars each
time,--that ud be yer fine for overspeedin', anyhow,--that makes it
fifteen dollars."
"Fifteen dollars!" The girl's voice showed her amazement at such a
figure.
"It ort'er be twenty," snorted old Applegate; "thar's ther injury to
Jake's feelin's. You bang over him at sixty mile an hour an' scare him
out'n all his fat an' six months' growth. Fifteen dollars is cheap,
an'--you don't go till yer pay up, neither."
"Why, it's simply extortion. I'll pay no such sum. Send your bill to my
father. He'll settle it. And now help me out of this ditch, if you
please."
"Now, don't you git het up, miss. Thar's a speed law on Long Island, an'
by heck, you pay er I'll hev yer up afore the justice. Lucindy!" he
raised his voice in a call for his wife; Jared had vanished. A
slovenly-looking woman, wiping her hands on a gingham apron, appeared on
the porch.
"Lucindy, how many miles an hour? Jake's bin run over agin," he added
suggestively.
"Wa'al," said Lucindy judicially, "it looked like sixty; but I reckin
h'it warn't more'n twenty-five."
"Humph!" snorted Applegate triumphantly, "an' ther speed limit's
fifteen."
"Why, I wasn't going more than ten miles!" cried the girl, flushing with
indignation.
"Huh! Tell that to ther justice. I'll git my son to push yer machine
out'n ther ditch an' then I'll hop in aside yer an' we'll drive into
town."
"You'll do no such thing! Why, the idea! Take your hand off my car at
once, or--oh, dear! What shall I do?" she broke off despairingly.
"You'll drive me inter town or pay fifteen dollars, that's what you'll
do," declared Farmer Applegate stubbornly; "now then--hullo, what in ther
name uv early pertaties is this a-comin'?"
Around the same corner from which the auto had appeared with such
embarrassing results to its pretty young driver came three well-built
lads. One of them was rather fat and his round, good-natured face was
streaming with perspiration from the long "hike" on which they had been.
But his companions looked trained to the minute, brown-faced,
lithe-limbed, radiating health and strength from their khaki-clad forms.
All three wore the same kind of uniform, gaiters, knickerbockers, coats
of military cut and broad-brimmed campaign hats. In addition, each
carried a staff.
"Hullo, what's all this, Rob?" cried one of them as they came into full
view of the strange scene,--the ditched auto, the flushed, embarrassed
yet indignant girl, and the truculent farmer.
"Consarn it all, it's them pesky Boy Scouts from Hampton," exclaimed
Farmer Applegate disgustedly, as, in answer to the girl's appealing look,
the three youths stepped up, their hands lifted in the scout salute and
their hats raised.