I guess Westy was kind of flabbergasted, so I spoke up and said, "We've got a right inside of our own car. We've got a right to cook in there if we want to. What harm does that do? Haven't we got a right to try to reduce the cost of living? If you want to start this car going, go ahead and do it, but I tell you beforehand that the brakes don't work. And you can keep off of our car, too."

The man said I was an impudent little some-thing-or-other, and he was just starting to pick up the bag of flour when, good night, all of a sudden a little man stepped out from the crowd. All I noticed about him was that he had a cigar in his mouth and his hat was kind of on the side. But, oh, boy, I heard his voice good and plain.

He said, "Look here, _you_. What's all this trouble about? You mustn't think you can browbeat these boys, because you _can't_. See? I'm telling you the law and you can take it or leave it just as you like. If you've got any kick, go to the railroad. If you're not satisfied to wait until this car goes away, start it going. You stand between those two tracks or on the platform of that car, and you're on the property of the United States Railroad Administration. I'm a lawyer and I'm telling you that.

It's you that happens to be here, not these boys. Here's a crowd of people being fleeced--eating sandwiches that aren't fit to throw to a dog and drinking red lemonade that would die of shock if it saw a lemon.

Twenty cents for a cup of coffee that they ought to pay me a dollar for drinking! Now you boys just climb aboard and let's see what you can do.

You've got the American people in back of you. I've heard about you scouts; now let's see what you can do. Get aboard and get busy. You're here, because you're here----"

"That's just what we said," Pee-wee shouted.

"All right," the man said; "climb up and I'll take care of the legal end of it. I'm for the Boy Scouts to the last ditch. I once tried a case just like this. Let 'em talk to the car. Climb up and see what you can.

I don't believe you know how to boil water!"

He just sat down on the lowest step of the platform and stuck his hat on the side of his head awfully funny, and lighted his cigar. Everybody began laughing. The people were all on our side, that's one sure thing, anyway.

CHAPTER x.x.xVII

TENDERFLOPS AND OTHER FLOPS

"He's right," Pee-wee whispered to me; "that's a good argument. Because if a thing is somewhere where it shouldn't be, if it isn't there on purpose, why then if somebody gets into it that doesn't belong on that place, but belongs in it, he's trespa.s.sing just as much, because anyway, if he took it away it wouldn't be there. See?"

"Absolutely, positively," I told him. "It's as clear as mud."

"Reduce it to a common denominator," Westy said. That fellow is always thinking about school.

"We should bother our heads," I said. "Here we are; even the Supreme Court couldn't deny that."

"They don't have to deny it, we admit it," Connie said.

"We'll stand on our rights!" Pee-wee shouted. "We'll stand on our he----"

[Ill.u.s.tration: PEE-WEE WAS SHOUTING ON THE ROOF OF THE CAR--"THEY'RE ALL RED HOT!"

_Roy Blakeley's Camp on Wheels._ _Page 207_]

"Sure, we'll stand on our heads," Wig said. "Anything to please you."

"Our hereditary rights!" the kid yelled.

"All right, get up and stand on the top of the car," I told him, "and shout. We'll do the rest."

We made a paper hat for the kid and tied a towel around his waist for an ap.r.o.n, because we wanted him to look like a chef. I gave him a saucepan from Westy's kit and told him to wave it around while he was talking, because I thought, kind of, it might make the people hungry.

Pretty soon we could hear him marching back and forth on the roof of the car, and shouting at the top of his lungs. Even before I got the stove hot there was a big crowd standing all around outside, laughing.

He kept shouting, "_Here they are! They're all smoking hot! The celebrated Boy Scout tenderflops! Flopped by the only original Boy Scout flopper! They're one cent each! Eat one and you'll never eat another--I mean you'll never eat anything else! O-o-o-o-oh! They're all red hot!

The kind we eat around the camp-fire! Only one cent! None genuine unless stamped BE PREPARED! The famous scout tenderflops! They melt in your mouth! They MELT in your MOUTH!_"

"Good night!" I said to the fellows; "listen to him."

By that time I was frying them six at a clip, while Connie and Wig and Westy were pa.s.sing them around on pieces of board and scooping in the money. All of a sudden I heard Pee-wee's voice; it seemed to be in the stove. I opened the lid and heard him calling down the stovepipe, "Send me some up here so I can be eating them; it'll make the people hungry."

"That's a good idea," Wig said; "let's all be eating them, and let's look kind of happy every time we take a bite. It pays to advertise."

We pa.s.sed a saucepan full of them up to Pee-wee and charged them up to advertising. Westy said, "That's what you call overhead expense."

Believe me, that kid was some overhead expense, all right.

"You have to demonstrate," he shouted down.

"You're a pretty good demonstrator," a man called up to him.

I was laughing so hard I could hardly fry the cakes fast enough. There was a big crowd outside, just scrambling for them, and we had Westy's aluminum coffee-pot about half full of pennies. Up on the car, Pee-wee was strutting up and down, waving the saucepan with one arm and holding a cake in his other hand and shouting, "_O--oh, to taste one! Just to TASTE one! Watch me eat one! Mm-mmm! They're one cent each! None genuine unless stamped BE PREPARED!_ Send up some more, you fellows!"

After a little while we stopped to rest, and we asked Mr. Pedro to come in and have lunch with us. In the afternoon we went around the grounds and had some rides on the merry-go-round and tried our luck throwing baseb.a.l.l.s at a negro man. I won a j.a.panese doll. We found out that the price of sandwiches had gone down to ten cents. Waffles were selling two for a cent and going begging--that's what a man told us. He said crullers were off the market. The coffee-man wanted to buy tenderflops wholesale from us, but we wouldn't sell him any. Believe me, we had all the visitors at that place eating out of our hands--that's no joke either; it's true.

About four o'clock I mixed up all the stuff we had left. Already we had eight dollars and we had only spent about four. So we had over four dollars' profit. It would have been bigger, except for the overhead expense. It costs a lot to advertise.

On toward evening the crowd was even bigger. That was because everybody was telling everybody else to see the Boy Scouts selling stamped cakes from their private car. We were a what-do-you-call-it--an inst.i.tution.

All of a sudden came the grand climax. I was just laying the last tenderflops on the boards and trying to sc.r.a.pe enough stuff out of the pan to make just two or three more, when I saw a wagon stop right alongside the car. Oh, please excuse me a minute while I laugh!

Now we had seen that wagon most all afternoon, because a man was using it to cart sawdust from the ice-house and sprinkle it on the race-track.

I suppose he did that on account of the races which were going to be at five o'clock.

Anyway, he got down from his wagon and came over to the platform and said, "Let's try a couple of them floperetts I'm hearin' so much about."

I said, "Is this your last load?"

He said yes, it was, and that after he got it sprinkled on the track, he was coming back for more floperetts--that was what he called them.

That man ate a whole board full and I called up to Pee-wee, "There isn't any more batter, so we're on the home stretch. Shout good and loud and tell them it's their last chance."

Just at that very minute I heard a locomotive whistle.

"Good night," I said; "I bet it's twenty-three for us."

"What's the difference?" Westy said; "there's no more batter, anyway, and I'm tired out."

"We have a coffee-pot full of money," I told him.

After I had fried the last tenderflop, I went outside to take a good rest. It was hot working over that stove. Up on the car, Pee-wee was stamping back and forth, waving the pan and screaming for all he was worth.

"Look!" I said to the fellows; "just take one look at him. Get your kodak, Westy."