One thing, I wished Tom Slade was there, because he was the best tracker we ever had. He could track an airplane--that"s what the fellows used to say. But he was over in France and the only other fellow in our troop who is a crackerjack at tracking, is Westy Martin. I don"t say that just because he"s a Silver Fox, because I have to admit that Artie Van Arlen and Wig Weigand are heroes, and they"re not Silver Foxes. But, honest, Westy is a winner when it comes to tracking, and you"ve got to remember that, because now I"m going to tell you some other things about him and maybe you won"t know just what to think. But I"m going to tell you straight just what happened.
Well, I decided that I"d rather have another fellow with me, because that"s a good rule in tracking and anyway two fellows are better than one. And anyway, I knew he could hold a track longer than I could. He got the pathfinder"s badge for one of the best tracking stunts that was ever done up at Temple Camp and he"s done enough tracking stunts to win it two or three times over. He"s a fiend on tracking.
By now I knew that the fellows would all be coming down to the boat club landing to work on the houseboat, because we had it fixed that they would all be there by nine o"clock. I wasn"t going to flunk on that, you can bet, but I thought if I told them about the footprint they"d let Westy and me off for a little while, because if a scout is after a merit badge he can usually get leave all right. Anyway, that"s the way it is in our troop. And all the fellows knew I had the tracking bee, all right. Gee, I hate to tell you about this, but I have to. Now, the way you get from Marshtown landing up to the boat club landing is to follow the sh.o.r.e and its only about a quarter of a mile. After I"d hiked it a little way, I could hear the fellows talking and sawing and hammering, and I knew they were all busy working.
When I got there they were all over the houseboat like flies, painting and varnishing and fixing up the flagpole, and I could hear Pee-wee as usual, shouting away. Jiminy, but it sounded good.
Then I could hear somebody say, "Well, well better late than never," and I saw it was our scoutmaster, Mr. Ellsworth. He took a day off to help the fellows.
"I"m only six minutes late," I said; "Silver Foxes always show up."
"Well, let us hope so," Mr. Ellsworth said
And I kind of saw that something was wrong. "Westy isn"t here," somebody shouted.
"He"ll be here in a minute," I said; "get to work; you should worry about Westy."
But just the same I felt sort of uncomfortable because one thing Mr.
Ellsworth is a stickler about is us being on time. Whenever a scout comes late for campfire up at Temple Camp or at a troop meeting either, he always gets a look from T. E. At camp we have breakfast at 7:42 and lunch at 1:23 and supper at 7:13, just to teach the fellows to go by minutes.
Anyway, I started working with my patrol, who were painting the deck. I stuck right to it, but all the time I was wishing that Westy would show up. Every time I heard a sound I looked up. Because maybe you don"t know that a patrol leader is responsible for his patrol and if one of them falls down, it"s just the same as if he fell down. First the fellows kidded us about it, especially me, and spoke about the Tardy Foxes, and the Sleepy Foxes, but pretty soon Mr. Ellsworth came to me and said he guessed I"d better go into the club house and telephone to Westy and find out what was the matter.
"Find out if he"s awake yet," somebody said.
"Maybe we"d better send a taxi for him," another fellow shouted.
"You think you"re very funny, don"t you?" I said, "Maybe you raving Ravens won"t rave so much when you find out he"s sick in bed." So I went in and telephoned, and oh, jiminy, that was the first time in my life that I ever really wished a fellow was sick. But his mother told me he hadn"t been home since about half-past seven and that when he went out he had a catching-mitt and a baseball with him.
Jiminies, I don"t often get scared, but I could feel my heart up in my mouth, kind of, and I didn"t know what to tell the fellows and Mr.
Ellsworth. It was like a disgrace to my patrol and it disgraced me, too, you can bet. He would go off and play ball and let us fellows do all the work on the boat and then he"d go in it up to Temple Camp. Gee, that"s one thing a scout never is-mean. We had it all fixed up to work and then he flunked and let us do it all.
First I thought maybe I"d kind of not tell Mr. Ellsworth all about that phone call and say I couldn"t hear very plain, and all like that. But I saw if I did that, I"d be worse than Westy. It was bad enough having a slacker in my patrol without having a liar.
No, siree!
So I just went up to him and I said, "Mr. Ellsworth, he"s out playing ball somewheres and I guess he didn"t intend to come. I admit it disgraces my patrol and it disgraces the whole troop. I was going to ask you if you thought maybe I could go away for an hour or so to follow a track I found, but I won"t now; I"ll just stay here and work twice as hard so as to make up for him. And the other fellows in my patrol will too. Maybe that will make it seem not quite so bad."
CHAPTER XV
DURING NOON HOUR
One of the things that made me feel especially bad was that Wig Weigand and Artie Van Arlen were there working, even after being nearly killed the night before, and Artie was kind of lame, too, from straining his ankle when he fell. Gee, I had to hand it to those fellows. And even Pee-wee was working away with the rest of the Ravens and running to buy nails and everything.
Both of the other patrols were all there except Tom Slade in the Elks, but they kept his place open for memory, sort of.
After a little while Mr. Ellsworth strolled over to where I was working and said to me--gee, he was awful nice the way he said it--he said, "Roy, if you want to follow up that trail you may as well go ahead and come back after lunch. We"re going to hit the eats pretty soon now."
That"s the way he always says it, "hit the eats."
"I was expecting Westy to go with me," I told him.
"Well, no matter," he said; "Go alone and don"t worry any more about Westy. It wasn"t because Westy or any other single scout was needed here for we have plenty of scouts on the job, but it was just that he didn"t show up when we all planned to be here, that"s all. I don"t like to think of any; of my scouts falling down."
"It"s the same about my patrol," I said, "and I"m ashamed, that"s one sure thing."
He said I shouldn"t feel that way and that he guessed playing baseball was good exercise anyway. But he only said that so I wouldn"t feel bad.
Anyway as long as they were going to eat I thought I might as well go ahead and see if I could do that tracking if it didn"t take me too far.
On the way down to the other landing I thought what I"d say to Westy.
I knew he"d get a troop reprimand, but I decided he"d get a patrol reprimand too, you bet. And I was feeling pretty bad about it too, because none of the Silver Foxes ever got a troop reprimand. They got patrol reprimands but not troop reprimands. And Westy had gone and spoiled it all and, gee, that"s one word I don"t like--slacker.
When I got to the other landing I started following that trail. If you think Westy had anything to do with it, you"re mighty mistaken, because he didn"t. He always wore scout shoes, I knew that.
Well, believe me, that trail was a cinch and I could follow it as easy as a clothes line. It went right up through River Lane where there isn"t any pavement and every footprint was plain. I was afraid it would go through Daws Place, because that"s the easiest way to get to Main Street, and I"d lose it there on account of the pavement. But it didn"t, and, oh, boy, wasn"t I glad! Instead of going that way the tracks went right up across the ball field, just as plain as print. That"s another way to get to Main Street, and it brings you out at Harvey"s candy store, but don"t ever go there for ice cream cones, because you get bigger ones down at Jack"s.
Then I lost the trail on account of the pavements. Gee, that"s one thing I don"t like about pavements. So there"s where I did some deducing. Maybe you don"t know what bridging a trail-gap means. You have only yourselves to blame for not being scouts. Bridging a trail-gap means stopping to think when you lose a trail. You have to decide where it most likely starts again. That"s what grown-up scouts call mental tracking.
So I sat down on Ridgeway"s carriage step and thinked a couple of thinks. That"s right on Main Street, you know, and I had to decide if that person went up or down Main Street or across the street.
Right across the street is the big bank building. I"ve got forty-two dollars and eighteen cents interest in that bank. Mr. Temple is the head of it, and he"s awful rich--he owns railroads and things. He started Temple Camp. He calls me "Curly" because my hair curls. I should worry.
Right down alongside of the bank runs Barrel Alley. It reminds you of Fifth Avenue, it"s so different. That"s where Tom Slade was born, down there. Most every day somebody dies down there, but anyway there are paving--stones there now, that"s one good thing. Except for tracking. So you see how it was that person, who ever he was, could have gone up Main Street or down Main Street, or over the stone crossing into Barrel Alley.
I decided that he went across into Barrel Alley for several reasons. One was that he went across the ball field, and that meant that he"d have to get down and crawl under the fence, so I decided it was not a grown-up person, because most of them have stiff backs and they"d rather walk a mile than crawl under a fence. They"re all the time saying they"re not as young as they used to be. And if it was a boy he"d be most likely to go into Barrel Alley because, believe me, they have boys down there by the dozens, especially the kind that wear worn-out shoes that rich people give them. So that accounts for the good shoes all worn out. Smart boy, hey?
So you see that"s the way I bridged that trail, though I couldn"t be sure I was right, I have to admit that. Anyway I went across the street and I saw by the clock in the bank that it was half past twelve. I knew I couldn"t go much farther because I wanted to get back to the house-boat by one.
I started down Barrel Alley, watching the mud along the edge of the sidewalk, so I could tell if the fellow left the sidewalk to go into one of the houses. Barrel Alley is a blind alley-that means it has an end to it and you can"t go any further. It runs plunk into the end of Shad Row. Norris Row is the right name, but old man Norris is named Shadley Norris, so us fellows call it Shad Row. You can get through the end of Barrel Alley if you climb over old man Norris back fence, so it isn"t exactly a blind alley. It"s just a little near-sighted, kind of.
Anyway I started through it and I knew if my quarry (that means the fellow you"re tracking) went down there, he most likely went into one of the tenement houses and I"d see that footprint as soon as he turned off from the sidewalk.
Well, pretty soon I did see it right alongside the sidewalk just where he started to go into one of the houses. And oh, wasn"t I tickled! If it hadn"t been for Westy Martin and the way he"d acted I would have felt as grand as the Grand Central Station. But that was the thing I was thinking most about and when you"re thinking about something like that, you don"t have as much fun--I know I don"t anyway.
But as long as I was there, I might as well find out who it was I had tracked and solve the mystery about the Indian head. That"s the way Pee-wee would have said it, "Solve the mystery!" He gets that kind of talk out of books. The next-chapter is going to be a dandy and I promised to let him give it a name, so don"t blame me whatever it is.
So long.
CHAPTER XVI
n.o.bLE RAGS
"Good night!" I said to Pee-wee, "what kind of rags do you call those?"
"Didn"t you ever hear of n.o.ble rags?" he yelled; "that shows how much you know about story writing."
"Are they any relation to a dish rag?", I asked him.