The Banner Boy Scouts Part 21

Every fellow has his mind made up where he can cut wood easiest. I've made them bring in all loose stuff, you see, so that they start on an even thing. Here goes!"

Paul raised his hand, and exclaimed:

"Go!"

Immediately the dozen lads darted frantically off. Several came near having a collision right in the start, which would have been fatal to their chances for winning out; since the water in their kettles must have been spilled; and according to the rules of the contest they could not refill the same without journeying to the creek, which Paul had made sure was fully fifty yards distant.

It was a laughable, as well as interesting sight.

Having reached the various places mentally selected as the scene of their intended operations in fire building, the boys set down their kettles, and commenced to feverishly whack away at dead branches, or other wood.

In several instances two of them happened to pick out the same place, and naturally there was considerable rivalry between them, as well as an exchange of remarks intended to irritate and delay.

"Look at Wallace, will you!" observed Jack, presently; "nearly all the others have smoke going, but he's chipping away as steadily as you please. Why, he seems in no hurry at all. I guess he doesn't want to come in ahead!"

"Wait, my boy," laughed Paul. "You don't know that sly fox. He's up to all the dodges at fire making, and believes in a good start. Some of those smokes never will amount to much, for they just struggle along, and threaten to go out because it takes all the puffing the fellows can give to keep them alive. Now he's going to strike up. Only one match needed with Wallace, you see."

"And how his blaze jumps! You were right; he made sure he had enough fine kindling first, before starting in. Now he's adding larger stuff; and what's this he's doing with those stones?"

"What do you suppose?" said the scout leader, nodding his head approvingly. "Making a little fireplace where he can perch his kettle, and have the hottest part of his fire under it. Note also that the opening is in the direction of the breeze. That allows the flame to be fanned. Wallace will never have to blow out his cheeks and puff to keep his blaze going."

By this time some of the contestants were bobbing their heads to ascertain just how Wallace had done it; and made haste to follow suit.

All were willing to take pattern from a past master who knew the wrinkles of the game.

One upset his kettle, and despairing of having any show, withdrew from the race.

Eleven fires kept on burning, some of them under protest, apparently, for they did not give much promise of landing their unlucky builders as victors.

"How long is it?" asked Jack, presently, as certain signs caught his eye that told him the end was near.

"Just nine minutes; but--"

"Look at Wallace," cried Jack; "he's raising his hat. There goes an inspector to see. He nods his head. The water must be boiling; and who would have thought it? Hurrah for the Carberry Twin! Look at Ted and Ward! They act as if they thought there was some trickery, for they're running up to see. I guess they've tried this game, and come in under the wire in about fifteen minutes. h.e.l.lo! there's Bluff calling out. Good boy! He's going to run Wallace a race next time. But I'd like to see you make the test, Paul?"

CHAPTER XVII

CLEARING SKIES

Paul made no reply to this remark of his chum.

Having studied the charms of outdoor life always, he knew that he would be placing his friends under a heavy handicap if he ever attempted to compete with them in woodlore.

True, just as he said, Wallace was somewhat of an unknown quant.i.ty; for he, too, seemed to have a deep love for everything connected with life in the forest, and never tired of reading books that told of pioneers and their ways.

The scout leader immediately started some of the boys along another tack.

They were given a chance to find a lost trail, to detect all manner of signs such as would be apt to tell how long previously some one had pa.s.sed that way; and to discover where the tracks came out of the creek, upon the bed of which the unknown had walked quite some distance.

Of course, Paul had made the trail himself in the morning, running out here on his wheel so as to prepare the ground. And when they all failed to find out just how the party had left the creek, since the marked tracks did not seem to appear anywhere along the banks, he pointed to where the limb of a tree hung down over the water.

"That's the ticket!" cried Bobolink, excitedly. "See, fellows, how it's skinned where his shoes sc.r.a.ped along it."

"As sure as shooting he climbed up into that tree!" declared one, excitedly.

"Then scatter, and examine the ground around the trunk!" said Paul.

A minute or so later a happy whoop announced that one of the searchers had discovered the wished-for signs; and away the whole troop went on a trot, following the leader.

Meanwhile the photographers managed to get in some of their efforts, possibly unbeknown to the rest. Exposures where the subjects are unconscious of their posing always turn out best; since they avoid stiffness, such as ruins so many otherwise interesting pictures.

Here, with the woods for a background, Paul, acting by agreement as temporary scout master, drilled his followers in scout law, sign, salute, and the significance of the badges which they wore, all of them, of course, of the tenderfoot type, since few had as yet started to qualify for any higher plane.

Signal flags had been brought along; and a cla.s.s in semaph.o.r.e work proved that some of the members of the troop were making rapid progress along that line. They had mastered the Morse code, too; and had the occasion arisen might have sent messages over the wire, although probably none save Paul could have received the same, unless the words came painfully slow.

The afternoon pa.s.sed almost before they realized it; and more than a few declared that the sun must have dropped like a plummet, when they found twilight creeping upon the forest.

Both Ted and Ward had long since gone away, as though disgusted. They had tried to sneer at the work of Stanhope Troop No. 1; but every one knew this humor was a.s.sumed; and that secretly they were eating their very hearts out for envy.

No doubt there would be a hot time among their followers, when the leaders endeavored to drive them to beat the record Wallace Carberry had set in his fire starting, and water-boiling test.

"Suppose you come to supper with me, Paul," suggested Jack, when they were more than half way back to town, with the double column moving along like clockwork, every right leg thrust out in unison, as though forming a part of a well-regulated machine.

Paul looked quickly at him when Jack said this.

"Oh! I can see through a millstone, when it has a hole in it," he remarked.

"Which is one way of saying that you can guess I have a motive in asking you?" returned the other, smiling queerly; "well, I have, in fact, several. In the first place my mother told me to ask you. I rather think she wants to pump you about that affair last night. Father wouldn't tell her all she wished to know. Then again I'm still all broken up about those lost coins; and I thought perhaps you might have guessed the answer to the riddle."

"What's that? More of them gone, Jack?" asked Paul, lowering his voice, so that the two scouts at the tail end of the line might not hear.

"Don't know yet. Didn't have the nerve to go up into my den since this morning. To tell the truth that place has lost all charm for me. Whenever I find myself there I get to s.h.i.+vering, and looking around, just like I half expected to see a ghost step out, and pick up one of those miserable coins right before my very eyes--ugh! it's horrible to feel that way, and I used to be so fond of my den, too."

"Oh! I hope and expect you will be again, Jack, when we've settled this little thing. You say none of them were ever taken in the night?" said Paul, earnestly; while his knitted brows told how much he felt concerned over the mystery.

"Certainly not. Always in broad daylight. That's the queer part of it,"

returned the other, promptly.

"Sure, seeing that they always go in the daytime, and when you're away from home, too. Anybody else going to be there to-night?"

"To supper--oh! no. Karl went off after breakfast, to visit our uncle for a few days before school commences. I took him to the train myself, and then mustered up enough courage to climb up there, and once more count the coins," went on Jack.

"Six there then, eh?" asked Paul.

"Just as last night. And I purposely left the door unlocked."

"Both door and window open in the bargain?" asked the other; at which Jack looked puzzled.