One fact, and only one, did comfort them. Blythe wore no double-breasted vest; he wore no vest at all. But in the downward path of tramp life and poverty, the vest is very apt to disappear. Against this little gleam of forlorn hope was the fact that Blythe did wear a gray suit. And that suit was very old and shabby; as old as the notice with the picture, surely. For the rest, the printed description seemed all too accurate.

It was a preoccupied and downcast trio that made their way through the old reservation to the scene of their recent toil and pleasure. How familiar seemed the spot! How friendly, and abounding in pleasant memories of their odd camping adventure! Their companions were just getting through for the day. Doc Carson and Connie Bennett were shinnying down one of the corner uprights of a bare frame, several scouts were piling some odds and ends, and Blythe, anxious as usual to get the camp-fire started, was gathering chips and small bits of waste lumber for that purpose. He heard them coming and looked up smiling.

"We're going to have a big one to-night," he said.

"You said it," called Roy.

"A welcome home fire, hey?" said Blythe. Roy felt almost sick.

"You're just in time to cook supper," said Westy. "We were going to send a tracer after you. What news?"

"We'll tell you later," said Warde.

As he spoke, the "boss" walked toward Blythe's Bunk, as the scouts had named their little headquarters, and tumbled his gatherings near the fireplace. Warde tried to determine whether he did actually walk a little sideways. But he could not be sure. It is so easy to imagine these things, to see something when one is looking for it.

There were no secrets within the First Bridgeboro Troop and what the three scouts had seen was soon known to all the others. It completely overshadowed the finding of Miss Bates and the disappointment of Pee-wee at not ascertaining the name and address of the unknown soldier. They did not talk freely about these things, chiefly because of their appalling discovery, and partly also because there was a certain constraint around the camp-fire that night.

The talk and banter which before had been so free and merry could not be kept up; they could not do it, try as they would. The conversation was not spontaneous, and the few pitiful attempts at joking were forced.

Even Roy seemed to have lost his corklike buoyancy. And for Pee-wee, he could only sit gazing across the fire at Blythe with a kind of fearful fascination. Different, but equally intent, was the almost steady gaze of Warde Hollister. Roy noticed this; others noticed it.

Perhaps the only one who was quite at ease was the "boss" himself. "I'll tell you what Doctor Cawson did to-day," he said.

Edwin (Doc) Carson was in the Raven Patrol and was called Doc because he was the troop's official first aid scout. He was the son of a physician, which fact had doubtless helped to raise him to proficiency in that splendid part of scouting. It was one of Blythe's most noticeable characteristics that he got the names of the scouts confused in his mind. Almost the only name which he consistently p.r.o.nounced correctly was Will Dawson. And he p.r.o.nounced Carson the same as he p.r.o.nounced Dawson.

Whether he really thought that Doc was a young physician it would be hard to say. His simple admiration of the scouts amounted to a kind of reverence, and he gave them credit for professional excellence in the case of all their honors. To him their merit badges meant that they were aviators, astronomers, chemists, and what not. And he always spoke of Doc Carson as "doctor."

"What?" asked Roy, half-heartedly.

"I found a robin under the flooring of the last shack," said Blythe in his usual simple way. "His wing was dragging open. I closed it up and carried him in my hand like you said about carrying a bird. I held him till the doctor came, and he said the wing wasn't broken, only strained.

He stood him on a branch and in a little while he flew away."

"Why didn't you kill him and be done with it?" Warde asked.

Blythe just laughed. "I guess you don't mean that," he said.

"Righto," said Hunt Ward of the Elks.

Followed then an interval of silence, broken only by the mounting blaze.

Everyone seemed to experience a little relaxation of the constraint. For a minute it seemed as if the spirits of the company rose. It was just for a moment.

Warde's gaze was fixed directly on Blythe, who seemed calm, content, and happy to be among them. He at least showed no constraint.

"I dare say that robin will be in Canada by morning," Warde said. "They go as far north as Montreal before they turn south. Hey, Roy?"

"Some of them do," Roy said.

"There's a place I'd like to go to--Montreal," said Warde. "Ever been there Blythey?"

"Montreal?" said Blythe. "Not as I know of."

"Toronto?"

Blythe shook his head. "Toronto's up near there, isn't it?" he asked.

Warde seemed on the point of asking more but apparently decided not to.

"Who's going to tell a yarn?" he asked. "This is a kind of slow bunch to-night. How about you, Roy?"

CHAPTER XX

THE VOICE

The camp-fire had died, the last embers had been trodden out, the scouts had turned in for the night. A half dozen or so fresh air enthusiasts lay upon their couches of balsam under a big elm, through the high branches of which the stars looked down upon the weary toilers, dead to the world. For a precious interval at least they would feel no disappointment. It was well that they were tired that night.

They had not decided what they should do, but they knew they could not conceal a criminal and take money from him and count him their companion. They must do a detestable thing; they must go home and tell.

They did not relish doing this, they _could_ not relish it. They were not of the cla.s.s of detectives. They were capable of feeling contemptible....

There, close to where they slept, were the results of their faithful labor. And there, too, were the dead embers of their cheerful fire around which they and their strange, likable companion, had gathered night after night. One shack had completely disappeared, another stood there in the darkness like a skeleton to mock them, the third was to have been tackled in dead earnest in the morning. Then would come the dividing of the money--oh, the whole thing would seem like a dream when they awakened.

Only Warde and Roy were abroad on that still night. They sat upon the sill of a shack rather more pretentious than the barnlike buildings all about, for it had been officers' quarters. There were even the rotten remnants of curtains in the windows, necessary no doubt to help defeat the Germans. The neighborhood was very quiet and very dark, save for the sounds caused by the breeze in those old wrecks of buildings. Every rusty hinge and loose board and creaky joint seemed to contribute to this dismal music. One might easily have imagined those dark, spectral structures to be tenanted by the ghosts of dead soldiers.

"Why didn't you mention Quebec?" Roy asked. "Why didn't you ask him if he had been there? That was the place named in the notice."

"That isn't what I was thinking about," Warde said. "I was reading in the old scout handbook[2] how you can tell where people come from by their talk. If a person belongs in Canada he'll say Monreal instead of Montreal. He'll say Tranto instead of Toronto."

"Yes?" urged Roy, hopefully.

"That's all," Warde said. "He doesn't talk as if he came from up that way. But the notice didn't say he belonged there, it only said he was wanted there. The way he spoke about the robin was what got me. I can't make him out at all."

"I guess the picture's the princ.i.p.al thing," Roy said despairingly.

"The princ.i.p.al thing is to wait a day or so," said Warde; "and see what we can find out. It looks bad, that's sure. It's his picture as far as I can see. I don't see how we're going to take his measurement; we don't want to make him suspicious."

"It's funny how he never speaks about his past," said Roy.

"Anybody can see there's something funny about him," Warde said. "What he said about the robin makes me think that if he committed a murder he was probably crazy when he did it. Maybe he doesn't even remember that he did it."

"You can't say he's crazy," Roy protested.

"I know I like him," Warde said; "I just can't help it. I like him now.

Maybe he isn't smart, but he's always thinking about us. He's for the scouts good and strong. Maybe it's because he's so simple and easy--maybe that's what makes me like him so much...."

For a few moments neither spoke. It seemed as if both were preoccupied by pleasant memories of their friend. Weak, uncertain, queer he may have been, and a failure into the bargain. Shabby and all that. But his smile haunted them now; he had been their comrade, their friend, their champion.

"Something always gets in the way when you try to swing a _big_ good turn," Roy mused.