CHAPTER XI

EATS

So that's how Warde Hollister got to be a Silver-plated Fox. Already he has four merit badges and he's crazy like the rest of us, only more so.

If he keeps on, maybe he'll be as crazy as I am because I wasn't so crazy when I started.

And that shows how you never can tell what you may run into on a bee-line hike. But when it comes to running into things just you wait till you get to the next chapter.

Now from Warde Hollister's house we went straight for the river. There aren't many houses down there and the land is low and we could see the tree all the time. We had to climb over a couple of fences and over the storage shed of the boat club, and we had to crawl under Benton's ice house that stands on piles.

Then we came to the river. There are willow trees down there and we sat under one of them to eat our lunch. We started a fire and I made some flapjacks. Warde Hollister said that was the first time he had ever eaten lunch out in the open like that and he said it was fine.

I said, "Have all you want, don't be bashful. They're nice and tender, they're intended for tenderfeet."

He said, "Is that what I am?"

"You're not anything yet," I told him; "you have to pa.s.s some tests; endurance tests and things like that. I'm going to introduce you to our scoutmaster and he'll take care of you."

"Eating flapjacks is an endurance test," Pee-wee said.

Westy said, "Sure, if you can eat these you can do anything."

"Are some of those things hard?" Warde asked me. "I mean those tests,"

he said.

"They're not so hard as these flapjacks," Hunt Manners told him.

"Oh, is that so?" I said. "I notice hard things don't trouble _you_ much."

He said, "The pleasure is mine; flop me another one, will you?"

"They call these things stove-lids up at Temple Camp," Will Dawson told Warde.

I said, "Yes, and you're a pretty good stove-lifter, all right."

"I bet you have a lot of fun, you fellows," Warde said, kind of laughing.

"Sure," I told him, "we have so much fun that even the weeping willows die crying from laughing so hard. If you had this patrol to look after your hair would soon turn white. My teeth are white already from worrying. We remind ourselves of balloons instead of foxes. We should worry. You're in for it now and you can't help yourself. The worst is yet to come. Don't you care, smile and look pleasant. You might have done worse, you might have got into the Raven Patrol."

"What's the matter with the Raven Patrol?" the kid shouted, trying to eat a flapjack and shout at the same time.

"One good thing about them," Westy said.

"What's that?" Hunt asked him.

"That's that they're not here," Westy said.

"The Raven Patrol will be--it'll be flourishing when the Silver Foxes are all busted up!" the kid shouted.

"Sure," I told him, "but not until then. Wait till you see that bunch,"

I said to Warde. "They're dead and they don't know it."

"They died laughing at P. Harris," Westy said.

"You think you're so smart, don't you?" the kid shouted. "One of our patrol is camp librarian at Temple Camp."

"They're all highbrows," Westy said. "They think Scott's Emulsion is by Sir Walter Scott. They're all busy studying monotony in that patrol."

"Do you mean to tell me that--that--that Ravens----" the kid began yelling.

"You see how ravens can go up in the air," I said to Warde. "Now you know why they're called the Raving Ravens. They're all right as long as you don't feed them meat. They think you can do good turns riding on a merry-go-round."

"What's the second-hand scout?" Warde wanted to know.

"Good night," I said, "don't make me laugh. You mean a second-_cla.s.s_ scout. Of course there are slightly used scouts, 1915 models, but you wouldn't call them exactly second-hand. First comes the tenderfoot, then the second-cla.s.s scout and then the first-cla.s.s scout--and above that are the Silver Foxes in a cla.s.s by themselves."

"That's because they can't get anybody to go in the cla.s.s with them,"

Pee-wee shouted.

Westy said, "Well, here we are talking about cla.s.ses in vacation time.

In a minute we'll be talking about arithmetic. Let's talk of something pleasant while we're eating."

I said, "Sure, let's talk of something pleasant. I didn't start talking about the Ravens. The question is how are we going to follow a bee-line across the river? I wish the equator went across the river and we could walk on that."

CHAPTER XII

BLACK OR WHITE

We knew it would be pretty easy going after we got across the river. But getting across the river, that was the question. We knew well enough that we couldn't swim straight across on account of the tide running out. It would have carried us downstream. The river isn't very wide there and it isn't much of a swim across, only if we tried it we'd land east of our course.

Westy said, "We're up against it now. What are we going to do?"

"If we wait till the tide is full," Hunt said, "we'll have to sit around here till about eleven o'clock to-night."

I said, "Do you suppose the rope would reach across?"

"Sure it would," Dorry answered, "only how are we going to get it across?"

"Throw it," Pee-wee said.

"And what will hold it there?" I asked him. "Besides, what good is the rope as long as we haven't got our bathing suits? You don't expect us to walk on the rope, do you?"

"Oh, here comes a boat!" Dorry shouted. "See it? It's just coming around the bend. There are two men in it."