Roy Blakeley's Adventures in Camp/Chapter XXXVI

by Percy Keese Fitzhugh

CHAPTER XXXVI

TELLS ABOUT WHAT BERT TOLD ME

He seemed different from the way he was before. He was all excited when he talked, and I could see he was just crazy about those new plans.

I said, "But tell us how you rescued Skinny."

"Don't bother your head about trifles," he said. "The passage came out in the old creek bed in the high land east of the flood; I'll tell you about it later. Listen, do you know what those fellows were doing? They may be rotten scouts, Blakeley, but they're A-1 sports. They're having a pennant made in Catskill. They're going to fly it over the tent. It says Camp McCord."

"I don't see how you did all this so soon," I told him; "I wish you'd tell me about the rescue."

"Row quicker," he said, "I've got to see my patrol and get some duds and beat it back by the road, They'll understand. It'll only be a few days."

"Bert," I said, "I'm going with you; Westy and I are—"

He said, "Now don't begin that. We've had one flood already; isn't that enough? Do you want everybody leaving camp? The trustees won't stand for that. I can speak to my scoutmaster, but you can't because yours is away. Now don't spoil everything, please. Come down and see us to-morrow, both of you, and we'll give you a couple of home-made doughnuts."

"Will the twins make them?"

"Never you mind. Come down to-morrow and give us the once over. Just follow the shore up from Pike's Landing; you'll see a khaki colored tent in among the trees. That's us. They're putting up the tent now."

"Have you got drainage?" Westy asked him, kind of funny.

"They're digging a regular Panama Canal around that tent," he said.

"Bert," I told him, "you know the rule—"

"Now don't begin about rules. Listen. Your scoutmaster is away. About every fellow in Temple Camp thinks Skinny is just a miserable little thief. He went over to see those fellows because—well, you know why. They took him in. And, by jinks, he's going to stay there and so am I—till this thing is fixed up."

I WENT INTO THAT PASSAGEWAY WITH THAT KID ON MY BACK.

Roy Blakely's Adventures in Camp. Page 213

"Blakeley and Westy," he said, and I could see he was pretty serious now; "I went into that passageway with that kid on my back. I was ready to crawl a mile and drag him along if I had to. As it turned out, the passage was about a couple of hundred feet long and came out in the old creek bed, like I said—up above the flood area. Blakeley, when I saw the light of day—or the light of night rather, because anything was lighter than that black hole—and when I laid that skinny little kid down—he doesn't weigh fifty pounds, Blakeley—I just said to myself, 'By the great Eternal, I'm going to stick to him like glue!' That's what I said. Even then I didn't know he had been over to plead with those fellows and ask them please not to believe he was a thief. When I heard that—"

"I know, Bert," I told him, "you're right."

"I'm not thinking about myself," he said; "my troop understands me; and they understand Skinny. He could bunk with us, or with you fel: lows. But this is better."

"I hope nobody'll raise a kick," Westy said.

Bert said, "A kick? We're the ones to raise a kick. Haven't I got anything to say about it? I couldn't bring the kid here—I'm not a horse. So I did the next best thing; I carried him down the old creek bed a ways, to where the water flowed into it. It was flowing easy then. I laced a couple of broken off branches together and made the craziest raft you ever saw. Then I laid the kid on it and held his head and poled with the other hand and that way we got down to the Hudson. I intended to get him to some house down there and then notify camp. He was a little better by then and a fellow stayed with him near the shore, while I rowed over to Catskill for some iodine and stuff. Would you believe it? I ran plunk into the Gold Dust Twins in the drug store; they were drinking sodas. They've got you beaten seven ways at that game, Well, I told them all about the flood and how I found Skinny and how their camp was carried away, and they didn't seem to take it hard at all, they just laughed and said it was part of the game.

"Oh, Blakeley," he said, "then was when the fun started—telegrams! One of them had to buy out a peanut stand for Skinny—and then for a tent. We rooted out that old sail maker from bed, and made him sell us a tent. They gave him an order for a flag—CAMP McCORD—mind you. Laugh! I just followed them around. They're two of the gamest sports you ever saw. We went back to the landing in a taxi with cans of food rolling all over the floor. 'Go faster,' one of them shouted to the taxi man, 'or I'll fire a can of pickled beets at your head.' We hired a motor-boat to take us over and then they retired from the game. Some whirligig, take it from me!

"But they wouldn't pick out the place for a camp," Bert said; "they made me do that. 'We don't want to be drowned out again,' they said. Honest, Westy, those two fellows are down there now, digging a drain ditch and carrying it way over to the Hudson. 'Safety First'—that's what they said, And Skinny's sitting there with a bandage around his head, eating peanuts."

As soon as Bert got out of the boat, he started right off up the hill for Tigers' Den, as they called it. We could see him stumbling up the path, limping to favor his leg.

"He’ll go back by the road, I suppose," I said.

Westy and I just sat in the boat watching until we couldn't see him any more. Then he said:

"Some scout, hey?"